I often get asked about which guitar pickups are best to reproduce Brian's tone. There are a few options, so here goes...
The original! These are the pickups which Brian has on the Red Special and he bought them in London in the 1960's. These can be found on the used market, but they tend to fetch rather high prices and because of their age, they could be in poor condition. There were originally five different versions of the Tri-Sonic pickup, so be careful before purchasing!
Burns London have recently re-introduced the Tri-Sonic pickup, a reproduction of the original and these are available new. The pickups are made in Korea and there are some differences between the original 60's pickups and the re-issue, such as the impedence - the modern version has a slightly higher impedence, but these are still a very accurate reproduction.
A lower impedence version, known as the Tri-Sonic V is also available. These pickups have less windings than the standard Tri-Sonics and therefore give a brighter sound, which is closer to the sound of the original Tri-Sonic pickups Brian has on the Red Special.
The DiMarzio Brian May signature pickups were used on the 1984 Guild BHM-1 guitars. These pickups look rather different to the Burns units, featuring black plastic covers with Brian's initals, BHM, in gold script. Tonally they are not bad, perhaps a little more modern sounding than the Tri-Sonics. They are still available new and any decent guitar dealer will be able to order a set.
The Seymour Duncan pickups were used on the 1993 Guild Brian May guitars. These pickups are visually and tonally a reasonably close approximation of the original Burns Tri-Sonics. One important difference compared to the originals is that the Duncan units have a higher impedence, which can lead to a loss of higher frequencies. They were never sold as separate units, but if you talk very nicely to the custom shop people at SD they can make you up a set to the same spec. As with all custom shop jobs, don't expect them to be cheap!
As used on Greg Fryer's copies of Brian's Red Special. Kent Armstrong makes the new reissue Tri-Sonics for Burns, so these pickups sound pretty close to the real thing. Kent sells the pickups himself and these can often be found cheaper than the Burns units, despite the fact that they are essentially the same. Both the standard model and the low impedence Tri-Sonic V model are available.
Greg Fryer has also been selling these pickups, modified to the same specification as he used on his super-accurate copies of Brian's Red Special. Greg's modifications include changes to the windings, magnets and casing, which he believes gives the most accurate reproduction of Brian's original.
Adeson have recently come on to the market with an accurate reproduction of the original Burns Tri-Sonic pickups. Adeson use traditional hand-made manufacture for their pickups and initial reports from users are that the tone is excellent. They are also very good value compared to the official Burns pickups.
A major difference between the Red Special and most other guitars is that Brian has his pickups wired in series rather than the usual parallel wiring. This was a deliberate choice because this wiring system, combined with phase change switches, allows a much wider range of tones to be produced. If you own a guitar with 3 single coil pickups wired in parallel (such as a Fender Stratocaster), changing the wiring to series will dramatically alter the tone. Click here for a diagram showing the wiring configuration for the Red Special and click here for our guide to getting the best tones from the Brian May pickup switching configuration.
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