A bit of a history lesson

After spending ages trying to find plans to build this bitch, and finally finding them, the suspense of waiting for them is killing me now! I'm going take my time building her though - not only meaning I'll be precise and meticulous, but there will be a lot of waiting time between steps, while I figure out plans to hoodwink the capitalists and find some money, so I can carry on. I suppose I'll have to get used to waiting, although, I must admit, patience has never been one of my virtues.

I can't even go and look at wood until I know exactly what sizes I'm looking for. I'm not planning on using bought blanks, but rather raw wood from the lumber yard, for the body, top, neck, and fingerboard. I know that a LP Standard body is 17 1/2" long, 12 3/4" wide, and 2" deep, (1 1/2" mahogany and 1/2" maple), but I need to confirm this on my plans, since I want them to plane it to a millimeter or so over-size, to make my work a little bit less. Converting all these measurements from inches to millimeters for us non-imperial locals is going to be another nightmare all on its own, since imperial fractions don't really translate into decimal millimeters all that well... I'll keep being a fraction of a millimeter long or short - not much you might say, but you will be surprised at how big a fuck-up half a millimeter can make! Sure, I can work in inches, but try telling a timber merchant you want it planed to 1 6/8 inches... they get this blank stare on their faces...

To keep my mind otherwise occupied, (I should really be studying), lets have a look at the history of the Gibson Les Paul.

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The Les Paul is the result of a design collaboration between the Gibson Guitar Corporation, and the musician/electronics inventor Lester Polsfuss (a.k.a. Les Paul), in 1951. Earlier, in 1945/6, Paul approached Gibson with a prototype solid-body guitar, simply know as "The Log", but the design was rejected. After Fender came out with the Tellecaster in 1950, and caused a public craze in the market, Gibson president Ted McCarty, called Les Paul back in 1951, and the collaboration was born.

It is unclear who contributed what to the design of the Les Paul model, but it was clearly very different from the competing Fender models. Gibson have been offering hollow-body electric guitars since the 30's, with a much more traditional shape than that of the Telecaster. This body shape, together with the glued in, set neck, served as a loose design template for the new Les Paul models. There is some controversy about the actual contributions Les Paul made to the design of the guitar that carries his name. The book "50 Years of the Gibson Les Paul", limits his contributions to two - advice on the trapeze tail-piece, and the colour. According to the book, Paul preferred gold as a colour, since it made the guitar "look more expensive", or as an second option, black, because "it makes your fingers look like they are moving faster in the box", and "it looks classy, like a tuxedo". McCarty also claims that when Gibson approached Paul, they presented him with a nearly finished product, and that they only needed advice on the tail-piece, and permision to add his name to the headstock to increase sales. Paul also requested that the maple top over the mahogany body be reversed, but Gibson declined this request. This would have made the guitar far heavier than it already is, and secondly, in retrospect, it would have been a sin to rob future generations of that wonderful flame maple tops under the finish!

A vintage 1952 Gibson Les Paul Goldtop. This puppy is for sale on e-bay we speak,
for a mere $28,000 - that's R213,000 to us locals!!!

The Les Paul "Goldtop" (1952-1957)

The original 52 Gold's were fitted with two P90 single-coil pickups, and a one-piece trapeze bridge/tail-piece, with the strings running UNDER the steel top-bar, as opposed to over it. The pickups were fitted with creme coloured covers, which became famous, and is still associated with this model to this day. However, there seem to a great variation in the models of this issue, and some were fitted with black pickup covers. None of the 52 Gold's were issued with serial numbers either, and is considered by some to be prototypes for the Les Paul models.

The original Goldtops were far from perfect though, and they had a lot of problems with intonation, and these problems soon became a design focus. To resolve this problem, the trapeze were replaced by a wrap-around tail-piece in 1953, and later, in mid to late 1955, this was again replaced by the Gibson designed Tune-o-Matic system, that is still used today. In 1957, the P90's were replaced by Gibson's new duel-coil Humbucker pickups, designed to reduce sonic interference, caused by AC electricity - an invention that changed the Les Paul's sound and stability for ever.

A vintage 1957 Gibson Les Paul Custom, with three Humbucker pickups.

The Les Paul Custom (1954-1960)

The second issue of the Les Paul, the Les Paul Custom, was made available in 1954. It was an all black work of art, and therefore it was dubbed "The Black Beauty". It featured a mahogany top on top of the mahogany body, (as opposed to the maple top of the earlier Goldtops), the new Tune-o-Matic bridge, a P90 in the bridge, and a new pickup with an Alnico-5 magnet, (designed by Seth Lover), in the neck position. Hardwear was available in gold or nickel silver plated versions, and the frets were much lower and flatter on the new ebony fingerboard, and it soon earned the additional nickname of "Fretless Wonder".

As from 1957, they were aslo fitted with two Gibson PAF (Patent Applied For) Humbuckers, and later became available with three of these, as opposed to the usual two. The three-pickup models were strictly speaking not "Fretless Wonders" though, as they were fitted with the original Jumbo frets.

The problem with the three-pickup model was that Gibson stuck with the standard three-way pickup selector switch, which meant that not all pickup combinations could be used. While the bridge and neck-only setting on the switch stayed the way they were previously, the old setting to use both these pickups was rewired to use a combination of the middle and bridge pickups. A common modification by users was to restore the original bridge-both-neck settings on the switch, and to install ANOTHER switch to control the middle pickup on its own.

A vintage 1955 Gibson Les Paul "TV" model - essentially a Gibson Les Paul Junior, with a special translucent yellow finish to reduce glare on early television broadcasts.

The Les Paul Junior (1954-1960),
and the "TV" model (1955-1960)

To expand the electric guitar market, Gibson released the Les Paul Junior, targeted at the bottom end of the price range for novice players, but it soon became popular with professional musicians, (such as John Lennon).

The Junior was basically a stripped down Les Paul - simply to make them available cheaper. Although the shape of the Junior was very close to the more upmarket Les Paul, it had a flat "slab" top in solid mahogany, as opposed to the carved maple top of the more expensive models. It also came with a single P90 pickup, simple volume and tone controls, and unbound body and rosewood fingerboard, with simple dot inlays. To sweeten the deal, they were also fitted the same stud bridge/tail-piece as the second issue Goldtops. It is also the first Les Paul model to have the absolute CLASSIC Sunburst finish that Les Paul's are known for - although the Sunburst finish was a feature on earlier Gibson acoustic arch-tops and hollow-body electric guitars.

In 1955, Gibson released the "TV" model, which was nothing more that a Junior with a special finish. Although Gibson called the finish "natural", it was actually a translucent mustard yellow, through which the natural grain of the mahogany could be seen - much like the "Butterschotch Yellow" that Fender came out with around this time. The reason for the name and the colour? Because of the quality of black and white TV broadcasts at the time, white guitars would produce to much glare on the screen, where as the "TV Yellow" did not - I shit you not... cross my heart and hope to die... stick a needle in my eye...

Left: A 1954 vintage Gibson Les Paul Junior in a Sunburst finish.
Right: A vintage 1958 Gibson Les Paul Junior with the double cut-away in Cherry Red.

To accomodate requests for easier access to the top frets, Gibson made a radical change the the design of the Junior and TV models in 1958, and revamped both models cosmetically, in addition to the double-cutaway. The Junior got a brand new coat in Cherry Red, while the TV model became rather Yellow.

The Les Paul Special (1955-1960)

In 1955, Gibson released the the Les Paul Special, featuring two mini Humbuckers, finished in a variation of the TV Yellow. In 1959, the Special was changed to incorporate the double cut-aways that was applied to the Junior and TV models a year before, but when this was done, the neck pickup cavity overlapped with the neck-joint cavity, and resulted in the necks breaking after moderate handling. Since the Junior and the TV only had one pickup, this was not a problem. The designers at the Gibson plant soon rectified their obvious mistake, by moving the neck pickup further back towards the bridge, (DUH!), and hey presto, a stronger neck joint. Note I said strongER... Even today LP's are know to have vulnerable neck joints - be careful when you choke them.

The ultimate Rock icon - A vintage 1958 Gibson Les Paul Standard.

The Les Paul Standard (1958-1960)

In 1958, Gibson changed the finish on the regular Les Paul model from the gold colour used since 1952, and replaced it with the distinctive Sunburst finish, and these later became know as Les Paul Standard's, to distinguish them from the earlier Goldtops. They did not have the distinctive look, now known as Cherry Burst, associated with them today when they left the factory. They were in fact Sunburst like the Juniors, but due to the quality of the red dyes used, the red faded very easy. Especially the units made in 1959 had a particularly "bad" red, which faded much more than the 58's. This "accidental" use of inferior dye caused the varied colour variations that the Gibson Les Paul Standard is famous for. The harwear specs were the same as the Goldtops, featuring the new Humbucker pickups.

Another change was the fact that the new LP Standards came with a two-piece maple top that was book-matched, creating a visible seam under the translucent burst-finish. In later years, many Goldtops were re-finished in the burst of the new Standards, (either by users or by Gibson, using old stock), but the original Goldtops had a SOLID maple top. If your vintage Paul has no visible seam in the top under a burst-finish, it's a tell-tale sign that it is a re-finished Goldtop. There is no exception to this rule, except for one of the very first original Sunburst Les Paul Standard - Serial number 8_3322 - which has an off-center seam in the maple.

A vintage 1962 Gibson SG with slide-pull vibrato system.
(Note the "Les Paul" truss rod cover, indicating that it is a pre-1963 specimen.)

Paul-lessness and the Gibson SG (1960-1968)

After being in production for only eight years, a decline in their market share, due to their high prices and strong competition from Fender's (much lighter) double cut-away Stratocaster, made Gibson decide to stop production of the Gibson Les Paul. In response to this, Gibson came up with a new guitar, which was much thinner and lighter than the Les Paul, with two sharply pointed cut-aways and a vibrato system. These changes to the design was made without consulting Les Paul, (the musician), and as soon as he saw the new guitar, he asked Gisbon to remove his name from the instrument, and parted ways with Gibson Corporation. Although this seperation ocoured in 1960, Gibson continued to use the Les Paul name on these new guitars until 1963, because they had a surplus of "Les Paul" logo's and truss rod covers.

Finally, in 1963, they changed the name of the new guitar to the Gibson SG, which was simply short for "Solid Guitar". (My capitalist friend with the credit card asked me what SG stood for the other day, and I didn't know the answer - now we both know, thanks to Wikipedia.) They continued to produce the cheaper Junior, Special, and the Melody Maker models with the newer body style, which became the standard Gibson electric guitar models, until the return of the Les Paul Standard Goldtop and the Les Paul Custom, in 1968.

The hero's of the day - An original Gibson PAF Humbucker on a vintage 50's Gibson Les Paul.

PAF to the resque!

During the time that the Les Paul was off the market, from 1960-1968, artists such as Keith Richards and Eric Clapton became real fans of the Les Paul, and gave them extensive exposure. The reason for their interest in these 50's models of Les Pauls, were the PAF Humbuckers, sounding like nothing else out at the time. Since there was a patent on the PAF (Patent Applied For) Humbuckers, nobody else could produce them, and the cheap knock-off's of other manufacturers simply did not give the same results. Fender did not even try to do something similar, and when they entered the Humbucker market in 1972, (15 years after Gibson came out with the PAF), it was with a radically different Fender Wide Range pickup.

For this reason, authentic 50's Les Pauls have become the most desirable and expensive guitars in the world. A '59 Paul in good condition can now sell for between $200,000 and $750,000 - that's more than R5.6 Million to us locals!!! Even in the late 60's, prices of the 50's Les Pauls went up so much due to popular demand, that Gibson would have been stupid not to bring them back to the market, and so, in 1968, we moved out of the dark ages of "Paul-lessness", and back into the age of Rock! The Paul was back!

*STILL A PROBLEM: Unfortunately, as I mentioned before, South Africa has been suffering Paul-lessness for the past few months, and will continue to suffer at least for the next few months - hopefully this is resolved ASAP!