Gibson Les Paul Standard 50s P90

I own a CS R8 and this one is not even close when it comes to building quality. However it sound good and plays well after some initial setup - That's the big difference between CS and the standard factory, craftmanship. Had to replace a pot after a month. Owned my CS R8 for almost 20 years now and I've never changed a thing except strings. However - there's a big difference on the price tag...

Use:
Home and band rehearsal use, through Fender amps with some low-gain overdrive

This is a great sounding, looking and playing guitar. The P90 pickups are much hotter than a more traditional single coil, and are very responsive to picking input. The volume and tone controls are also very responsive, you can find many different sounds by rolling them back a little. With a driven amp or overdrive pedal vol. 7 will be just starting to break up a little, vol. 10 gives beautiful rich overdrive.

The neck feels great, not too chunky, but a nice handful. The frets seems a little bit lower and narrower than some other Gibsons I have played, but it doesn't make the guitar any more or less playable to me.

The fit, finish and quality is a marked improvement over a new 2017 Gibson I purchased recently. The case candy includes the usual documentation, baby photo, manual etc, but also a faux-leather strap, polishing cloth and a nice Gibson multi-tool.

My one single criticism is that in my opinion, the nut was not cut as well as it could be. Particularly the G string slot was too high, meaning fretted notes on the first few frets were sharp. This is easily resolved with a trip to your guitar tech, or by yourself if you have quality nut files.

Overall this is a fantastic guitar, It's as close to original early 50's spec as Gibson have made outside Custom and limited run stuff, and its reasonable priced.

This guitar is truly one of a kind, the P90's offer contrasting dynamics for a variety of different styles. There is such a full sound on the bridge pickup and it cuts through a mix really well, the middle position offers a mixture of the warmth of the neck pickup and bite of the bridge pickup. The clean sounds a very good, the neck pickup has a higher out put than the bridge when it comes to clean sounds but a boost pedal can really help this. The finish is glorious and instantly makes you want to pick it up and play for hours. I play through a VOX AC30 TB 1993 and its honestly the best sound I have ever gotten out of a les Paul, for me I wanted to start a collection of Les Pauls from 50's 60's 70's and now that Gibson have released all the models I will definitely be completing my collection in the near future. I would highly recommend getting the guitar set up, after I changed the strings I noticed intonation issues and tuning issues but that's to be expected. All in all this guitar is amazing in every sense and I would highly recommend it to anyone.