I own two Gibson guitars, a Flying V and a 335. In the course of my life I’ve had a chance to play almost every brand out there and have owned the following brands, Gibson, Fender, Epiphone and Jackson. There are several reasons why I continue to like Gibson over all other brands.
One is the tone, the tone is amazing even through a crappy amp and no effects. You don’t have to “shape” the tone to get a good sound out of a Gibson. Next is the quality and durability of the hardware. My V is about 30 years old, I got it in 1984. It has been through all sorts of weather, temperature differences and humidity changes, I can take it out of the case and it’s right in tune every time. The same holds for my 335. I don’t know what “stock” parts are like at the Gibson factory but I get better performance out of them than expensive high end custom hardware. It might not be the hardware alone but whole platform, a sort of Gestalt that comes about when Gibson puts it all together.
The pick ups also seem to be pretty good. The tone I mentioned earlier is there even acoustically, they have great tone and sustain. But I’ve noticed that when I go to open mic nights and plug my 335 into someone else’s gear it screams, blowing the other guitar away in volume, without changing the settings. It just seems to have more balls.
There is one thing I have to gripe about. Gibson doesn’t seem to take the cleanliness of the fingerboards very seriously. At times I will pick up a Gibson off the rack and it looks like a kid worked it over with rough sand paper. It’s little details like this that count when you charge 3k$-4k$ for a new guitar. It may not make a difference in the playing or tone but when you pay that much for a guitar I think you should be able to get details like that taken care of. I’ve seen beautifully finished detailed fingerboards on 300$ guitars but they sound and play like crap. It may only be cosmetic but it counts and I wish they would do better. When I brought my 335 I got a free set up and fret dressing from the store that sold it to me and they finished up some of the details for free. That was nice of them.
I still play guitars in music stores across the country and around the world and nothing matches my Gibson in terms of sound and feel, so despite my complaint about sloppy fingerboards I would buy Gibson before any other brand.
So far.
copyright 2013 David R Bergman
Current Gibsons reputedly have Plek finished necks at the factories, so in theory should be pretty good when they’re on the rack in a shop… like you, though, I have been underwhelmed with the few Les Paul’s I’ve tried in shops recently, but my sample size is probably not statistically significant.
Interesting point Jonathan. My 335 is from the mid 90s, perhaps things were different then, but I still see scratchy finishes on occasion. I have always wanted a Les Paul and for some reason never purchased one.