LES PAULS & SGS

It’s barely comprehensible now, but the early Les Paul Standard was something of a commercial flop, discontinued after barely three years. Some of the most famous Les Pauls, like Clapton’s Beano guitar, were bought for a song in the mid 60s when next to no one wanted them. Still, the combination of mahogany, maple, and Gibson’s just-invented PAF humbuckers later proved unbeatable. In 1961, Gibson marketed the SG (Solid Guitar) as a replacement Les Paul model, but Les refused to endorse it. The difference in the guitars’ tones is alluded to from their appearance: the deep-bodied, rounder Les Paul has a thicker tone with huge mids, while the SG is comparatively leaner, with a biting top end.

Fans of the Les Paul guitar tend to be ardent purists, always seeking the most authentic recreation of 1959. Ironically, the guitar was designed by one of the most forward-thinking musicians of the 20th century. Les had prototyped his own solidbodies in the 1930s, one out of a railway sleeper and another, ‘the Log’, out of a 4x4” board with strings. He was looking to eliminate body resonance entirely to maximise sustain. In practice, the most desirable guitars are those that resonate exactly the right amount, producing long sustain with woody tone. The extremely heavy Les Pauls of the 70s and 80s are closer to Les’s vision, but