Post by virtuallyvlad on Jun 22, 2020 15:19:58 GMT
Hi Guys
New to the forum.
Here's a story from the Virtual world of Vlad.
After playing guitar for nearly 40 years, (I'm quite tired now ) I have spent all of my playing life on 25.5" (650mm) scale length guitars. Yup - the Fender style!
I never really liked the look of the Gibson guitars, although I remember playing a Les Paul in about 1984 (don't know what age it was - but not new), and thinking "Actually, this feels like a really good quality guitar."
However, for some reason I have always had a secret admiration for Gold Tops. Particularly the P90 ones. Due to financial constraints, I was never going to get one. That is until I noticed the Thomann 450GT P90 guitars were getting really great reviews and cost so little that I could afford to try one.
At £129 inc shipping, it had to be done. Problem was - no stock, and none in the pipeline. Then after a few days of visiting the site, I found a B-stock item had popped up. This was £121! I've had B-stock stuff from Thomann before with no problems at all, so I took a chance.
So - it arrived and it took me a month to find what I think may have been the reason it was B-stock. This was when a small piece of the chrome plating fell off the tail stop. I had probably not seen a slight ding was there in the first place. Everything about the guitar was a good as I would expect from new. No marks or scratches from being played or knocked about if it was ex-demo. Really couldn't fault it. In fact, it seemed every bit as playable as all my other guitars. No feeling of cheapness at all. The pickups sound great, and I dropped the action a bit thinking it would start buzzing - but all was well!
I suppose I could point out that the colour is nothing like the gold top colour. It's much more of a deep yellow/orange/gold. It's certainly bright. It's metallic and bit odd. But I wonder if that is reason the guitar is so good??
Here's the rub. After nearly 40 years, I have now found that the 24.75" (628mm) suits me far better than the longer scale guitars I have played for so long!
Everything seems to fall into place far easier than before! I can't stop playing this Harley! I don't know whether this particular guitar is special (for £121?!?), or this is how all Gibson scale length guitars feel.
So now (of course) I am after one with the humbuckers to increase the available range of sounds. But that's another story for which I will open a another thread.
Long and short of it is - so far - I can find no reason not to buy HB guitars! Put it this way. It cost me £121 to discover this. I could now go and buy a Gibson P90 gold top for anything between £1800 and £2500 to discover whether it is in any way better. I can't afford to do that - can you?
All the best - VV
New to the forum.
Here's a story from the Virtual world of Vlad.
After playing guitar for nearly 40 years, (I'm quite tired now ) I have spent all of my playing life on 25.5" (650mm) scale length guitars. Yup - the Fender style!
I never really liked the look of the Gibson guitars, although I remember playing a Les Paul in about 1984 (don't know what age it was - but not new), and thinking "Actually, this feels like a really good quality guitar."
However, for some reason I have always had a secret admiration for Gold Tops. Particularly the P90 ones. Due to financial constraints, I was never going to get one. That is until I noticed the Thomann 450GT P90 guitars were getting really great reviews and cost so little that I could afford to try one.
At £129 inc shipping, it had to be done. Problem was - no stock, and none in the pipeline. Then after a few days of visiting the site, I found a B-stock item had popped up. This was £121! I've had B-stock stuff from Thomann before with no problems at all, so I took a chance.
So - it arrived and it took me a month to find what I think may have been the reason it was B-stock. This was when a small piece of the chrome plating fell off the tail stop. I had probably not seen a slight ding was there in the first place. Everything about the guitar was a good as I would expect from new. No marks or scratches from being played or knocked about if it was ex-demo. Really couldn't fault it. In fact, it seemed every bit as playable as all my other guitars. No feeling of cheapness at all. The pickups sound great, and I dropped the action a bit thinking it would start buzzing - but all was well!
I suppose I could point out that the colour is nothing like the gold top colour. It's much more of a deep yellow/orange/gold. It's certainly bright. It's metallic and bit odd. But I wonder if that is reason the guitar is so good??
Here's the rub. After nearly 40 years, I have now found that the 24.75" (628mm) suits me far better than the longer scale guitars I have played for so long!
Everything seems to fall into place far easier than before! I can't stop playing this Harley! I don't know whether this particular guitar is special (for £121?!?), or this is how all Gibson scale length guitars feel.
So now (of course) I am after one with the humbuckers to increase the available range of sounds. But that's another story for which I will open a another thread.
Long and short of it is - so far - I can find no reason not to buy HB guitars! Put it this way. It cost me £121 to discover this. I could now go and buy a Gibson P90 gold top for anything between £1800 and £2500 to discover whether it is in any way better. I can't afford to do that - can you?
All the best - VV