MikeCardiff

iTrader: (2)

Gibsons have been overpriced and badly made for quite a few years now ( nearly as bad as some of the tat they made in the 70's ) - one of my mates spent £2K buying the Zakk Wylde bullseye custom, and the bullseye design hasnt even been applied symmetrically - a very basic quality control problem, and the guitar should have been rejected and repainted.

Agree with above that the inlays are badly fitted ( lots of filler around them ) the fretboard wood on some is shockingly bad quality, the wood for the body isnt that great on a lot either ( before they started drilling half of it away to reduce the body weight ).

Gibson are really trying to live on their reputation in the past few years, charging up to $5000 for a 'custom shop' ( which doesnt mean hand made by a craftsman, its CNC routed like everything else ) guitar that is worth less than half that is daylight robbery, or adding a $100 fancy figured maple top, and charging a couple of 1000 more because its something 'special'.

The last really good guitars they made were in the 80's when they had serious competition from the Japanese makers, and had to up their game. From the mid 90's onwards quality control and material quality really seemed to drop and the guitars are nowhere near as good.

Unfortunately what happens ( the same as with Fender in the 70's ) when accountants start running the company and everything is built down to a cost rather than up to a standard.

Telling sign is that a lot of the rock stars and Gibson endorsees you see dont play their own brand new $5000 signature models. Slash's main LP was a hand made copy that had never been anywhere near the Gibson factory, and most of his backup guitars were 80's models, not new ones.

Zakk Wylde plays 80's LP Customs, not his sig model. Joe Perry from Aerosmith uses a Burny ( made by Fernandez ) LP copy - Gibson put their logo on the headstock when they bought out the Joe Perry signature model, which Joe didnt play.

I am a big fan of Gibson, and have owned loads of LP's from the 60's to the late 90's, standards, juniors, customs etc... as well as various other accoustic, electric and semi-accoustic models, and I wouldnt even think of buying a new Gibson.