Burnys, Grecos, & other Japanese guitars

[pigmaker]

I'm pretty new to these Japanese copies.

They look awesome. Want want want.

This is where I get hung up. These are often referred to as "lawsuit Gibsons" or whatever. Meaning Gibson sued to get them to stop making them. (Right?)

Yet they are still making new ones? Huh?

You can go on ebay or reverb and there are a slew of new Burnys, Grecos etc

Anyway, here below is what I have gleamed on Burnys from their wiki page. Until I figure out what's going on with the new Burnys, this is why I am focusing on trying to bag a Burny from the 80's. I'm willing to wait.

Fernandes currently has guitars made in Japan, Korea and China. Fernandes does not have its own guitar manufacturing factories, and relies on OEM guitar manufacturers to make its guitars.

Fernandes has used many different factories to manufacture Burny guitars, including Terada in the mid to late 1970s (FLG models), Tōkai in the late 1970s (FLG models), Terada in the early 1980s (FLG models), Kasuga and Matsumoku from the early 1980s up until Matsumoko's demise in 1986 (RLG models), Dyna Gakki from 1986 to the early 1990s (RLG models), FujiGen from the early to mid 1990s (RLG models and the early 1990s LG75GR "Guns N' Roses" model),[1] and currently Tokai. FujiGen were not making many set neck guitars in the late 1980s and early 1990s. Atlansia have supplied body and neck parts for Fernandes.[2] Matsumoku, Santai[3] and Dyna Gakki have also contributed to Fernandes training programs. Fernandes/Burny Japanese Acoustics up till 1982 were made by Hayashi Gakki and from 1982 by Headway.[4] Chinese Burnys are currently made by Yako (Taiwan).

[jirodreamsofdank]

The lawsuit thing is 99.9% bullshit. Gibson sent one company (Ibanez, I think) a letter about using the open-book headstock and shipping to the US, Ibanez stopped. No one was ever actually sued and apparently for the Japanese domestic market Gibson and Fender don't have a case to force them to stop using the headstock.

Between urban legends and people trying to pump up ad copy we get everything from Japan in the '70s being called a "lawsuit" guitar.

Prices used to be a lot better, they're not nearly as much of a bargain as they were 5 or 10 years ago. Newer ones are a better deal, IMO - I have a Tokai Les Paul that's from 2008 or 2009, 99% of the appointments of a higher end Gibson (neck tenon, hide glue, nitro finish, etc.), I got it for $600 last year.

[pigmaker]

Word. Yeah I was pretty surprised to see some Burnys with asking prices at $1200 and whatnot

[repoman]

I think Lawsuit is just used as a convenient blanket label for faithful Japanese reproductions of US guitars, rather than an actual historical comment.

Japanese guitars in general were kind of crummy until the late 70s, the ones that have cult status are years around '79-89-ish

There are so many models and lines that you have to do a lot of research into the specific model you are eyeing, Japanese guitars in this sought after period had lower quality models and higher quality models just like any thing else, a lot of sellers will try to pass off lower end as higher end because of the mystique. In the case of Burny it's extra weird in that the MIJ Burny's did not come with serial numbers, whilst the 80s Chinese made Burny's had serial numbers.

Most of the Japanese guitars sold from Japan on places like Ebay are resellers, who don't actually own the guitar, but they know in Japan where the guitar is for sale (or auction, Japanese people use Yahoo Auctions Japan, not Ebay), usually there will be multiple sellers of the same guitar, so you can get the price down a lot by shopping around or playing the resellers off one another. Ishibashi and Rakuten would be legit sellers though.

As far as prices...theres so much to determine...the high end Tokais (IE LS80) were built exceptionally well, finished in nitro, etc so the high prices for the top shelf ones have never really been a bargain and those guitars always commanded high prices just a little south of a real Les Paul. FYI Most Tokais are made in China today and a lot of sellers on Ebay will try to obsfucate this with terms like "shipping from Japan!" or "from Japan" to imply it's actually a MIJ.


Asking prices on places like Reverb don't indicate what they sell for, I just bought a Burny Firebird that was listed for $1250 but wound up paying $700 for it.

[pigmaker]

There are so many models and lines that you have to do a lot of research into the specific model you are eyeing, Japanese guitars in this sought after period had lower quality models and higher quality models just like any thing else, a lot of sellers will try to pass off lower end as higher end because of the mystique. In the case of Burny it's extra weird in that the MIJ Burny's did not come with serial numbers, whilst the 80s Chinese made Burny's had serial numbers.

So far what I have been able to gleam is that the higher quality Burny's have fret nubs, and the model #'s represent the original sale price of the guitar (in Yen)
So (example, no idea if the numbers make sense) FY-200 was 200,000 yen, FY-50 was 50,000 yen

Personally I only like playing 24.75" scale guitars with thin necks and that eliminates a whole bunch of the Burny's, Grecos that I see online

[JTurbide]

As said above, the late 70's - early 80's seems to be the more sought after but my early 70's Greco EB-420 that I had for a very short period of time was pretty good.
You can find them all day on reverb and ebay. Try to find them in your country tho, I paid a ton of customs/dutys when I bought that Greco from Japan.
Altought it might be different where you live (I'm in Canada)

[frigid midget]

Yeah, the "lawsuit" reference gets trown around whenever some guitar happens to look just like the one it's base one

In short: back when there were still quite a few cheap and good condition Greco/Tokai/Burny/etc guitars around, it wasn't yet common knowledge that they were a MUCH better bang for the buck than the '80s "real" versions...

These days though, thanks to the internet and the fact that the somewhat affordable Gibson option, let alone the nw MIJ Tokai option, don't always suck...

[Zounds Perspex]

If you don't mind more recent Japanese copies, the Edwards copies of Gibson guits are pretty darn good.

I picked up a used Edwards '56 style goldtop LP that had nice wiring put in and an aftermarket P-90 in the bridge - sounds and plays very nice - for $500. Looks good, too!

[pigmaker]

If you don't mind more recent Japanese copies, the Edwards copies of Gibson guits are pretty darn good.

I picked up a used Edwards '56 style goldtop LP that had nice wiring put in and an aftermarket P-90 in the bridge - sounds and plays very nice - for $500. Looks good, too!

thanks bud, will def check those out

[omarwhite]

Passed on a Bradley Strat and a Memphis Jazz Bass this weekend and still kicking myself...

[dubkitty]

i have two modern (i.e. 2000s) Tokais, a sunburst Les Paul Standard and a singlecut TV Yellow Les Paul Special. both are great, but the Special is one of my favorites that i own. with the newer ones you need to watch out, cos the lower-priced ones are Indonesian and kind of junky. if you're paying over ~$700 you're probably onto a good one.

[Faldoe]

A good source of information would be to look around the MyLesPaul forums in the "Other Single Cuts" sub forum which is all about other LPs and mostly MIJ.

I've had a few - and I'm actually toying with selling my 95 Orville John Sykes LPC with ebony board if you're interested.

Though now I'm realizing you might be MIJ in general and not just LPs specifically.

I'm not sure about how, say, Tokai Fender copies compare to their Gibson copies.

But there is: Orville, Orville by Gibson, Greco, Tokai, Aria, Burny, Navigator.

[dubkitty]

i don't know anything of Tokai Fenders other than word-of-mouth, but Neil Halstead of Slowdive has been swapping between his Epiphone Casino and a Greco Strat which sounded great when i saw them last year.

[jirodreamsofdank]

I had a '79 or '80 Greco Strat that was incredibly nice for the $400 I paid, but it convinced me that I'm not really into Strats.

[coldbrightsunlight]

I've got a Greco acoustic I picked up fairly cheap and it's a pretty nice guitar. No idea of the actual age but it's clearly not from this century at least