The White Strat

[Paul Childs]

Didn't Hank have a lot of Burns prototypes made for him before he was satisfied with the ones they used?
Could be he used some of them in the studio while still using the white Strats live?

[JimN]

Didn't Hank have a lot of Burns prototypes made for him before he was satisfied with the ones they used?
Could be he used some of them in the studio while still using the white Strats live?

That is more or less what he is said to have done.

There is scant evidence of his having used Burns guitars (the Double Six prototype excepted) live on stage, so testing and trialling must have been mainly done either in rehearsals or in the recording studio, or both.

[neil2726]

wasnt Atlantis two seperate takes joined together - both the Burns and Strat may have been used!

[AlanMcKillop]

As Jim says, Hank has already said quite a lot on the subject, not 40 or 50 years later, but at the time in 1964, He wrote a column in BEAT and introduced his new Burns guitar. He stated that the guitar had been in the making for almost two years with many prototypes for both him and Bruce to test until they got it 'right'. I believe the all white Fender strats (with white scratchplates first) were introduced with the Burns in mind, a gradual progression to the Burns Marvin as we now know it. There are plenty pictures available of the white strats with both scratchplates, so there is a timeline available if you want to piece them altogether. Both Hank and Bruce have confirmed that the testing of new gear took place in the studio, so it's perfectly reasonable to conclude that some music recorded mid to late 1963 was indeed on a Burns Marvin, but it's up to the listener to decide which tunes.

[Paul Childs]

wasnt Atlantis two seperate takes joined together - both the Burns and Strat may have been used!

Have always noticed seeing Hank live, he switches the Strat from bridge to neck pickup several times throughout Atlantis.

[jgoatcher]

From what I know I do think they were actual strats. But if you remember they started out as all white with white scratch plates and then in late 63 they appeared with brown tortoiseshell plates, which I think could have been an attempt to 'ween' the public off the strats and onto the new Burns which looked very similar. Does anyone know what pickups the white one used, did they differ from those in the 1961 red rosewood strats ?
Interestingly, I have several strats with different pickups - all sound good, and a Burns Legend bought in 2001. Though this Burns was supposed to be the closest replica to the original Marvin, and it is a great guitar, I have always been slightly disappointed that I could never really replicate the sound of those Burns tracks from 1964/5, ( someone else also thought his Burns sounded very like a strat ). From the many useful and informative comments on the amps and recording process I am also now convincedthat the different sound of the Burns ( and just pre Burns) era was largely due to influences outside the guitar. I think this change was also something to do with the move at the time away from heavy echoes of the early 60's to the uneffected sounds of the Beat boom starting of course with the Beatles. I remember at the time thinking the Shads had betrayed their roots, but hey ho, they were just following fashion.
Many thanks to everyone who has contributed to bettering my understanding of this topic.

John G

[jgoatcher]

From what I know I do think they were actual strats. But if you remember they started out as all white with white scratch plates and then in late 63 they appeared with brown tortoiseshell plates, which I think could have been an attempt to 'ween' the public off the strats and onto the new Burns which looked very similar. Does anyone know what pickups the white one used, did they differ from those in the 1961 red rosewood strats ?
Interestingly, I have several strats with different pickups - all sound good, and a Burns Legend bought in 2001. Though this Burns was supposed to be the closest replica to the original Marvin, and it is a great guitar, I have always been slightly disappointed that I could never really replicate the sound of those Burns tracks from 1964/5, ( someone else also thought his Burns sounded very like a strat ). From the many useful and informative comments on the amps and recording process I am also now convincedthat the different sound of the Burns ( and just pre Burns) era was largely due to influences outside the guitar. I think this change was also something to do with the move at the time away from heavy echoes of the early 60's to the uneffected sounds of the Beat boom starting of course with the Beatles. I remember at the time thinking the Shads had betrayed their roots, but hey ho, they were just following fashion.
Many thanks to everyone who has contributed to bettering my understanding of this topic.

John G

[alanbakewell]

It's actually not that difficult to get a Strat to sound "Burnsish".

Thanks to Ecca for access to this oldie.

https://app.box.com/s/06igbb21rpq753kitqkh

[Stratpicker]

Great video! And "that Burns sound" is from a very genuine CS Strat costing all of £3.57.
(They made it the wrong way round - thats why it was cheap)
Love the SFs at the end - oh so familiar.
cheers
ian

[ecca]

What's an SF ?