I bought this set just out of curiosity and I was pretty surprised with it: the ceramic pickup sounds slightly different than the EMG81, I would say more open but with the same kind of typical EMG focus on the mids; the neck pickup sounds very brilliant though, a great twist on the EMG 60 in my opinion. If you want to change your typical 85/51 and you already own a 57/66 set, this one might surprise you.