A Brief History of DIMARZIO

For many guitar players, the name ‘DiMarzio’ conjures up instant images of fun, expression and colour. Fluorescent humbuckers, guitar straps with elaborate decorations, and associations with some of the most incredible talent the guitar has ever known, DiMarzio is a brand name that carries weight.

But what lies behind that celebrated name? And why does the name Larry DiMarzio feature as the photographer of so many cool rockstar images? Is one related to the other?

Now, the time has come to find out...

Staten Island Origin

World’s First Replacement Pickup

The story of DiMarzio is most definitely a New York tale. Staten Island, in fact, and it was in 1972 that Larry DiMarzio finally got fed up with the stock pickups in his guitar. Back then, there was no such thing as a replacement pickup. If you were unhappy with the sound of your guitar, your only choice was to move it on and buy yourself a whole new guitar!

Looking for a hotter sound, Larry began experimenting at home and ended up with what eventually became the world’s first replacement pickup: the DiMarzio DP100 Super Distortion.

This was an instant success. The Super Distortion was (and is) a hot, overwound humbucker that added a significant level of power and output to any guitar it was fitted into. Made available as a black or cream open coil unit, the Super Distortion really got going when KISS guitarist Ace Frehley began using them in his Les Pauls. As a fellow New Yorker, Frehley was the first name to champion this local brand. Frehely’s influence was massive in the early 70s, particularly in America, and the visibility of the DP-100 on Ace’s guitars was possibly the best publicity a brand could get.

A new concept in guitar tone

The birth of customisation

In fact, the debut of the DiMarzio Super Distortion arguably played a role in how hard rock and metal sounded. In the 70s, you needed to have a large amp running at maximum volume in order to get the levels of overdrive that allowed sustain and harmonic distortion to happen. Fuzz pedals offered a different type of sound, and BOSS or MXR pedals were not quite in existence, so something like a DiMarzio Super Distortion actually allowed guitarists to heat up their sound from the source, as it were. That level of output - and we’re talking about 13.68 Kohm of resistance here, which is almost double that of a PAF humbucker - was enough to overload an amplifier’s input stage and get it singing with far less volume required.

This was obviously appealing to rock fans, and indeed anybody with the notion of customising their own guitars to be more in line with what they wanted, rather than just how they came as stock.

After the success of the Super Distortion, DiMarzio continued to release new pickups, new solutions for guitarists who wanted fresh sonic options, and to generally innovate. Other companies took their lead and began producing aftermarket pickups, but DiMarzio had already become the established name on the scene. They kept their high reputation by constantly inventing new ideas, and here are a select few that have changed the pickup game as we know it:

Airbucker: developed for Dream Theater’s John Petrucci, this technology allowed the pickup to retain a high output without undue magnetic ‘pull’ on the strings from the pickup magnet.

DualSound: this was the original term for the Super Distortion, and was based on the pickup having three conductor cables, allowing for custom wiring options. This quickly became the 4 conductor cable style we know today,

Cliplok Straps: DiMarzio’s famous Cliplok straps feature a quick release clasp at either end of the strap, with separate strap ends screwed tightly into the instrument. It’s an iconic look these days!

Virtual Vintage: vintage-correct sounds with none of the attendant hum. This is achieved partly by using a ‘stacked coil’ (another single coil sits below the one you see) and partly by meticulous winding and EQing of each pickup, and constant comparison to vintage units.

Collaborative pickups: DiMarzio were the first major pickup manufacturer to collaborate with a major guitar company on new pickups. I’m talking about Ibanez of course, who created joint ‘DiMarzio/IBZ’ pickups for several lines of Prestige guitars. This is a step beyond a company having their pickups chosen (which of course is what initially happened here), and into the realm of custom voicing. It’s still unusual these days, but nobody did that before DiMarzio.

Top Guitar talent who stay for the duration

Possibly the greatest artist roster in the industry

One major success that Larry and his team had with the guitar world at large was the very notion of signature pickups. Whilst DiMarzio were not, the first company to issue a signature pickup - Seymour Duncan got there with George Lynch first, I believe -  they were one of the main brands to make the most of the relationship and publicity brought by top players.

And what players!

Steve Morse was the first artist on DiMarzio’s books, with his DP200 bridge pickup. The 80s were hardly lacking gunslingers out to maximise their potential, so it wasn’t long before DiMarzio worked with Steve Lukather, Joe Satriani, Steve Vai, Paul Gilbert and more. Although it never came to the market, DiMarzio worked extensively with Eddie Van Halen too. They pretty much owned the 80s in terms of signature pickups!

This trend continued into the 90s and beyond with Yngwie Malmsteen, Andy Timmons, John Petrucci and many other incredible players. The great thing is, the majority of these artists have stuck with the brand, which is somewhat singular in this market. Artists who’ve endorsed almost every other major pickup brand have chopped and changed (say from EMG to Fishman or whatever), but the DiMarzio artists have almost all stayed put. AND, all of these pickups are still in production, more or less. It’s impressive, and says more about the company and their products than a sheet of specs, if you ask me.

Here is an entirely subjective and partial list of some of DiMarzio’s most notable pickups, in order to illustrate the amount of variety the brand covers with their creations…

DiMarzio DP100 Super Distortion: the original replacement pickup, still in production, still an amazing choice.

DiMarzio Chopper DP184: the perfect upgrade for a Strat’s bridge pickup, for those who want to rock.

DiMarzio X2N: outrageously high output, one of DiMarzio’s most extreme designs.

DiMarzio DP156 Humbucker From Hell: the opposite to your expectation, this is almost like a Strat sound from a humbucker. Gorgeously glassy when coil tapped, too.

DiMarzio DP155 Tone Zone: one of those all-time great rock pickups, with loads of mids to cut through a mix.

DiMarzio DP159 Evolution: bridge pickup for Steve Vai, hot but still controllable, with very useful coil-tapped tones to boot.

DiMarzio DP151 PAF Pro: Satriani’s first signature pickup, and a fantastic choice to add heat and harmonics to a vintage tone.

DiMarzio DP228 Crunch Lab: one of John Petrucci’s many signature pickups, this one innovates with both polepieces and a blade in place for an extremely wide EQ response.

They’ve never branched out into making effects pedals. They’ve never jumped on the active bandwagon and offered up something that has a CPU or runs on batteries. They’ve never stopped creating new pickups. Sure, they make parts like switches, and they’ve developed an iconic strap, but it’s really all about pickups for DiMarzio. Passive, expressive pickups.

In a world that has more competition than ever before, pros and hobbyists alike continue to turn to DiMarzio again and again, because their pickups are handmade in New York, because they sound better than other pickups, and because they can have them look how they want them to look as well as sound how they want them to sound.

And yeah, Larry DiMarzio is indeed the same guy who photographs rockstars. He’s even got a photography book out there, should your coffee table require some brightening up! More significantly, he’s still busy doing what he has spent his life doing: talking to musicians, finding out what they need, and working to bring those desires to life. Long may it continue.

(Pic by Larry DiMarzio)

Click to View our DiMarzio Pickups and Accessories