Pickup lines
The founder of Burns London, Barry Gibson, explains why this classic British pickup design popularised by Brian May could be your kind of magic
“There’s magic that happens with a good valve amp, and that’s what we’ve tried to capture” Barry Gibson, Burns London
During the 60s, Burns guitars were played by the likes of Elvis Presley and Hank Marvin, but it was to be a young Brian May who’d later popularise the Burns Tri‑Sonic pickup with his now‑ iconic Red Special custom‑built guitar.
Having ceased production for a number of years, the brand was resurrected by vintage Burns enthusiast Barry Gibson in 1992 with the formation of Burns London. Along with a range of authentic Burns guitars, Burns London also offers modern versions of the Tri‑Sonic based on original early 60s pickups, for those considering an alternative to the often unpredictable (and expensive!) vintage pickup market.
“There were various types of Tri‑Sonic pickups made in the 60s,” says Barry. “The early ones had hollow [Alnico pot magnet] polepieces and some had solid magnetic polepieces. They then experimented with various types of bar magnet, and after a while they discovered ceramic bar magnets worked really well – that’s the [Tri‑Sonic] version Brian May used. The winds tended to vary and, as a rule of thumb, the earlier ones are around eight to 12kohms, but as time went on they were wound less hot at around six to eight kohms [DCR].
“I don’t think there are many pickups that were made in the same way back then,” Barry continues. “Rather than winding the coil directly around the magnet, the coil was wound separately, screened and then laid around the magnet. Maybe that method was for ease of construction at the time, but by chance or by design, I think it added to the pickup’s character. In the early 60s, Burns were trying to develop their own way of doing things and they discovered some great stuff – including these pickups!
“We currently do two models of Tri‑Sonic pickups: the Mini Tri‑Sonic and the Vintage Tri‑Sonic, the standard 60s‑sized one. People come to us for the real thing and we’ve put in a lot of time and effort to get it right. I’ve got several vintage Burns guitars with different versions of the Tri‑Sonic in them and they all sound awesome. We have lots of vintage Burns guitars and we painstakingly took the pickups apart and got our experts to analyse them to find out exactly why they sound like they do. It’s far more scientific than people think.
“Tri‑Sonics have a distinctive sound because of their construction: the [steel] pickup chassis, the [chromed] brass cover, the wire and the magnet all work together to produce something very unique. They certainly look different on an oscilloscope. It’s not a humbucker and it’s not a regular single coil. It is a single‑coil pickup, but because it has a wide [magnetic field] it sounds somewhere in between. They have a full, sweet sound and they overdrive really well. I think that’s why a lot of people like them – the overdriven sound is very creamy and controllable. There’s some magic that happens with a good valve amp; that’s what we’ve tried to capture with the reissues.
“We’ve addressed the issue of the larger Tri‑Sonics not fitting into a guitar with standard‑sized single‑coil pickup cavities by introducing a smaller version called the Mini Tri‑Sonic. It’s the same construction and they have the same unique sound. After experimenting for a few years with different wire, we hit on the right coil and people love them. It really gets that character of sound but with no surgery. You just need to swap the pickups over. Some people like to swap all three pickups; others just match the bridge pickup. For a lot of players, some single‑coil bridge pickups can be quite thin‑ sounding, but the Mini Tri‑Sonics can really make the guitar sound fatter.
“I think a lot of people became aware of Tri‑Sonics through Brian May, especially since the movie Bohemian Rhapsody came out. Maybe he’s stuck with them ever since he built [the Red Special] because he thinks they’ve got the right sound for him. He gets a unique sound – a combination of various things but it starts with the pickups.” www.burnsguitars.com