My Les Paul
I started playing guitar in 1982. First I got an crappy acoustic guitar for Christmas, but in February 1983 I was already so hungry for an electric that there was no other choice but to get one.
So in the market for my first guitar the first one I got for trial was a Les Paul, It was a really nice red burst vintage Tokai Les Paul, but god damn it, somehow stupid little me wanted a Stratocaster. And soon, I had a really crappy eastern-block el cheapo Musima Stratocaster.. Bad bad decision. I could now have been a Les Paul player for 25 years, but no.. I ended up on a 25 year long journey among Stratocasters and 'Superstrats'.
That is coming to and end now.. After a long (25 years) consideration, I came to the conclusion that I really need to get myself a Les Paul too... There is nothing like that sweet mahogany singing.
After studying hard what is available, looking at Gibsons, Epiphones, Tokais, whatnot, I came to the conclusion that right now, the Epiphones and specially with their new factory in China that is said to be pumping out awesome guitars at a low price (at the moment with the weak dollar against strong Euro and all), to go for an China Epi.
But then.. which one to get?
I looked trough the whole range of what Epiphone had to offer, and from the huge pile of guitar player and guitar world magazines I have been reading during the past 25+ years, I always remember the Les Paul Goldtop with it's P-90 to appear on many many top productions. So that one was one of my ones on the top list immediately. Then I thought that the P90s are really nice mics, but so are PAF humbuckers too.. so.. what to do... hmm hmm.. The only answer was to get TWO Les Pauls.
So with the '56 Goldtop checked I started looking trough all the other ones that were offered... That was some hard decisions, because they are all nice guitars. I even had my eye on an SG for a while, but decided that I am in market for Les Pauls now, get the SG later.
I'm rarely into 'fancy new stuff' and didn't even take a look at the 'Ultra' model because of it's name. But after ignoring it for a week, i took a look at it just out of pure boredom and wow. That Shadow nanomic on it seemed awesome!
I listened to some demos and it really works. I always hated piezo mics, but this time Shadow really nailed it on that one. So my quest for the second Les Paul was over. The Midnight Ebony (sounds like a porn movie) looked really nice with it's quilted maple top, so I just fell in love with that. And in a way it's a perfect companion to the Goldtop. I mean, getting the whole historic soundrange of Les Pauls from a p90 sound from the 50s right up to the modern tones of the 00s with the Ultra, plus some acoustic tones, and I even like to think the Ultra could pull off a 335 kinda sound with a tiny blend of acoustic tone mixed in with the humbuckers.. well see when it arrives.
So yesterday I want to the local dealer, an old school mate, and ordered the Epihone Les Paul '56 Goldtop and the Epiphone Les Paul Ultra II Midnight Black. He said they would be here in about a week..
I will keep update when they arrive...
- Jesse -
