First 12-string bass? A bit of British bass history...

[Cosmo Valdemar]

Not Hamer - apparently Burns!

 

Well, not a 12-string in the modern sense, but still.

 

A random pic of The Hollies popped up on Facebook the other day, and I was surprised to see Eric Haydock playing what looked like a Burns Double Six instead of his usual Fender VI.

 

On closer inspection, those strings do look a bit thick... so I did a bit of digging and yes, Burns made a 12-string bass in the 60s. It was even on their now-archived website so potentially was still available as a custom order in recent years - the Double Six Apache model.

 

It seems that all the featured players of the Apache Double Six played it as a standard 12-string guitar, however the glamour shots on the Burns site are all clearly strung as a bass: 

 

 

And, it seems it was used for recording as well!

 

 

Jump to 1:10 for a slightly hesitant bass solo. Begins well but then he seems to regret starting it at all.

 

 

[crazycloud]

A 6x2 string arrangement. Sweet.

[BigRedX]

That vibrato mechanism is a bit optimistic.

 

I have a Burns Barracuda 6-string bass and with decent (95 E or heavier) Bass VI strings the vibrato mechanism is inoperable.

[Alanko]

I'm sure that sounded amazing through the Watkins Dominators and other miserably small amps of the era!

 

A design introduced too early?

[Cosmo Valdemar]

On 19/05/2025 at 13:51, Alanko said:

A design introduced too early?

Indeed - if anything it seems to have been swept under the carpet of history. It doesn't appear to have been hyped or marketed at the time either, so it's not even much of a noble failure. It just doesn't seem to have been given much of a chance.

[BigRedX]

According to the Burns Website the scale length is 25.5" which IME is a bit short for a decent bass tone.

 

Also the Burns neck for their standard Bass VIs is a bit on the narrow side (although not as bad as Fender/Squier) and you would definitely want it wider for the additional octave strings. Confusingly the website says it's 55m in the description which would probably be about right, but only 49mm in the specifications. Plus a 55mm wide nut would result in a near parallel string path unless the pickups and bridge had been modified for increased string spacing all the way. It's alll very confusing. The Barracuda Bass VI had standard guitar width pickups and bridge which wasn't great.

 

I'd certainly be interested in one of these with a 30" scale length and a suitably wide neck, and overall string spacing.

[Grahambythesea]

That bass with the ridiculously narrow strap he has must have taken its toll on his shoulder.

[BigRedX]

These just appeared on one of the Burns Guitars Facebook pages along with the following explanation:

 

Octave down 12 string which Hank saw when visiting the Burns factory. He took it with him and still has it. I believe it was converted to standard 12 string tuning. So this would have been Hanks first Burns.

 

 

 

 

[Woodinblack]

So the string layout on the top photo is what you would expect, but then in the 2nd and 3rd, the top sets of strings are reversed (the 4th one you can't really see).

[BigRedX]

If you look at the second photo you can see that the octave strings are above for E, A and D and below for G, B and E.

 

Interesting idea. Something I might look at if I ever manage to find one of these.

[tauzero]

3 hours ago, BigRedX said:

If you look at the second photo you can see that the octave strings are above for E, A and D and below for G, B and E.

 

Interesting idea. Something I might look at if I ever manage to find one of these.

 

A Double Six was just sold at the Gardiner Holgate auction. £550 plus 25% or so fees.

 

https://auctions.gardinerhoulgate.co.uk/catalogue/lot/af9fe3e054d9552ea0fd7eb82ba5736b/63b778f7668dabe928d3800924a99077/the-guitar-sale-five-day-auction-including-the-gord-lot-187/

 

 

Fixed bridge though.