It's a typical Seymour Duncan
MJ at Seymour Duncan was great, not only did she do the modification for me, she noticed that the pickup I sent them had a cracked bobbin and she rewound it it for me free of charge.
This was a Custom Custom I had installed in my GMW Superstrat. I sent the pickup to Duncan's custom shop for an Alnico 8 magnet swap, the Custom Custom has an Alnico 2 magnet. I read a lot about this pickup on the Duncan forum, it is a very popular pickup modification among the members there, and was intriqued by it... In 2 previous reviews, for both the standard Custom Custom and the Alternative 8, I noted that both were my favorite Seymour Duncan's, so when I saw that people were creating some sort of in between model, I jumped at the chance to try it.
Compared to the stock Custom Custom, there is much more bottom end with the A8 magnet, which was the reason I replaced the Custom Custom with an Alternative 8 to begin with, with some punched up low mids, the bass growls with that chunka chunka palm muting, much more so than the stock Custom Custom. The highs aren't as warm as stock, maybe due to the pickup being angled with the treble side closest to the bridge, I'm gonna try reversing the angle or making it even across the strings. Harmonically, the Custom 8 maintains the harmonics of the stock Custom Custom. While output doesn't change with a magnet swap, the Custom 8 definitely louder.
Compared to the Alternative 8, the Custom 8 definitely warmer, more on the vintage side of the tracks, maintaining a beefed up PAF quality, as opposed to outright modern sound of the Alternative 8.
To be honest, I like both the Alternative 8 and Custom Custom better, on their own, but this a really good sounding go between, I prefer it over the JB, which may be the closest production pickup Duncan makes that is between these, it cuts through better than a Custom Custom, and is louder, but the bottom is a little looser and more of a hot rodded PAF tone.
I have it paired with a Jazz in the neck, and the pair work really well together.