Things not to do to your 59 Les Paul: #1

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james

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Thought I'd post this to lighten the atmosphere:

http://guitarhq.com/gallery/lp59mod.jpg

One of those "seemed like a good idea at the time" mods.
 
Yeah, this cropped up on the Harmony board a while back - a lot of howls of protest, tho interestingly the majority view (which i share) was that if it means that this became a uable guitar fro some guy, that's much better than it hanging on a wall unused somewhere, being treated as a museum piece...

It's probably the first 59 I@ve seen that i might like to own (being a lefty)....

I'm NOT a fan of vintage gear (i tend to believe that the reissues are, as a general rule of thumb, likely to be more reliable, better guitars, and a fraction of the price in the long run - if not the same investment, but then it comes down to why you buy a guitar in the first place - as an investment or to play... or both...), but having said that, if this is a real photo (some on harmony seemed to reckon it was doctored), and i could buy that guitar for buttons.... I'm sure it still sounds good, and i could tell people I owned a 59 and watch their jaws drop, heh heh heh.

If it is real, i guess it was done in the early 60s when these guitars wer pretty much worthless (as were Strats until a certain James Marshall Hendrix picked one up - oh, and Bob Dylan went electric with one...)

I'd want to do away with all that plastic round the knobs, tho....
 
On 2002-02-27 10:32, james wrote:
Thought I'd post this to lighten the atmosphere:

http://guitarhq.com/gallery/lp59mod.jpg

One of those "seemed like a good idea at the time" mods.
That's real shame. It looks like it was done in the period however. As for the vintage models, they do seem to have a wonderful feel and tone or we all wouldn't be talking about how good these reproductions are. And they really are. But next to the originals It's easy to pick the best one. As for tone and vib It's also very hard to beat a guitar built by tony Zemaitis with John birch pick-ups.
 
I almost choked on my doughnut when i saw this! Then I read other peoples comments on it probably being modified in the 60's or something and it started to make sense. That tremolo is a bit of a monstrosity though, and would be the first thing to go if it were mine, but of course it's not.
Just as an aside though, even though it has been completely bastardised, it does still have that name on the headstock, and it is over 40 years old, so my guess is that even in that condition it's got to be worth a bob or two. After all, like the man said I bet it still sounds fantastic (apart from that crappy tremolo).
 

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