A couple of years ago for my 40th birthday, my wife and my friends offered my a signed BMG Red Special !
I was as happy as a kid and still I am : it is my idol's guitar !
After some years of playing on it, I wondered if a pickup replacement would improve it. A few month ago, I had the opportunity to rehearse with a Queen tribute local band for a try. They had another Red Special mounted with genuine Burns Tri-sonic pickups and the difference was HUGE !
So I decided to buy a set of Burns Tri-Sonic... but the Brian May version !
These are the genuine Burns Tri-Sonic, but with the little modifications that Brian May did himself on his pickups : they are wax-potted (Brian filled his with Araldite) to prevent microphony, the middle pickup has its polarity inverted. I mounted these beautiful pickups on my BMG RS.
These are the genuine Burns Tri-Sonic, but with the little modifications that Brian May did himself on his pickups : they are wax-potted (Brian filled his with Araldite) to prevent microphony, the middle pickup has its polarity inverted. I mounted these beautiful pickups on my BMG RS.
It was also the opportunity to set the guitar : lower string action, finer pickup height setting. Result : it sounds waaayyyy better than before.
The Burns Tri-sonic BM signature are creamier, hotter, less harsh than the stock BMG pickups. The neck pickup is just a marvel, more bell-ish or flute-esque, very beautiful. There goes the Killer Queen solo !The phase inversion somehow seems to work better and I can't explain it. More presence and more output than the stock BMG pickups. Is it because of the polarity inversion of the middle pickup ?
The RS becomes also more silent and more good feedback sensitive : she wants to sing !
Important note : The BMG website gives some hints about the typical pickups height. To me, it's a good start but definitively not a state-of-the-art setting. To my ears, this settings is too dull. My pickups needed one more millimeter (may be less) to sound good.