Gibson Review: Les Paul Special

History:

Purchase: Purchased new for $599 in a local shop in the Bay Area.

What I Like About This Gibson Les Paul Special: First off, it is important to note that this guitar is played through a Fender Twin amplifier (super-clean tube amp), so my impression of the tone of the guitar is filtered by that. I really like this guitar. I chose it because it offers excellent tone and playability for the price range. It has a good solid feel, the wood is beatiful in the clear finishes and says in tune quite well. This guitar has really good tone versatility between the three P/U configurations (neck/bridge/mix) and independent tone and volume control. All swtiching is quiet and the tone is clean, even at low volume settings. this guitar would be a good mainstay for intemediate guitars, early gigging or as a bckup guitar for more advanced players.

What I Do NOT Like About The Gibson Les Paul Special: If you set the knobs correctly, you can get good lead tones and reasonable rhyhm tones, but it is difficult to set it up such that it is easy to switch between rhythm and lead and maintain balance. This may just be an artifact of not figuring out the best combo of guitar-amp knob settings though. It is a fairly heavy guitar and the shape makes it a bit difficult to play sitting down.

Gibson Les Paul Special Quality Rating: Well constructed and earns the Gibson name for a reason. Integrated neck helps with the tone and sustain.

Review Summary: If you are looking in this price range, this guitar is hard to beat. It offers good pickups and playability. Because the guitar is simply built, your money goes into good tone and worksmanship rather than showy stuff.

Rating of this Gibson product: 4

This Gibson Les Paul Special Electric Guitars Review Submitted By: Glen

Review Date: 2002-12-31