In one embodiment, a magnetic head includes a lower shield layer positioned at a media-facing surface of the magnetic head, at least two magnetoresistive (MR) elements positioned above the lower shield layer, each MR element extending in an element height direction away from the media-facing surface of the magnetic head, back wiring layers positioned above at least one lower layer of each of the MR elements at a position away from the media-facing surface of the magnetic head in the element height direction, wherein the back wiring layers are configured to electrically communicate with the MR elements and configured to separately extract signals from each MR element during a read operation, and an upper shield layer positioned above the MR elements that is configured to electrically communicate with the MR elements.