Joe | soldguitars

2011 Gibson SG Special 60's Tribute

"Joe"

#105410487

An SG 'Special' made by Gibson USA. This had the usual mahogany construction that you'd expect with an SG, but without the fussy neck binding and crown fingerboard inlays (like "Merlot" has). Leave that stuff to the Les Pauls. I reckon that SGs work very well when they're simple, no nonsense tools, and this one was certainly that. Fitted with a pair of P90 pickups, which were a shock to be honest! I was expecting them to be weedy single coils (... they ARE single coils, and single coils are weedy, right?). I was wrong. They're HOT pickups, and are genuinely useful through a driven amp.

The finish on this (or lack of it) was matt, which adds to the "no fuss" feel. I like it. No layers and layers of shiny nitro to pick up fingerprints. This was a really resonant one, and was as lightweight as you'd expect an SG to be, albeit a little neck-heavy. The star of the show was the 'inbetween' position (both P90s on) ... which was MONSTROUS (and hum-cancelling, which is a bonus, especially when you're running a fair amount of gain).

This was a quarter of the price of Gaffer, so is clearly Gibson's idea of a budget guitar. Thats fine by me. Like I said, I like SG's when they're lain and simple. This one ticks both those boxes. Interestigly, the fretwork on this was pretty terrible when I got it. The action and level was fantastic (thanks to Gibson's million dollar PLEK machine), but the fret-ends were sharp and nasty. An easy fix, of course ... half an hour with my fret-end file and all was well.

Given that this was (for a USA Gibson) cheap as chips, it is pleasing that it sounded great, and (following the fret-work) played really nicely. I'm not sure that I agree entirely that the lack of the typical multi-layered nitro finish that you get on more expensive Gibsons is of any real benefit ... this resonated very similarly to "Merlot", my SG Standard.

All in all, this was a throughly decent guitar. If your pockets aren't deep enough to stretch to a more flamboyant Gibbo, and you're willing to sacrifice stuff lieke a shiny finish, neck binding and fancy inlays, then these things do the job, and do it very nicely.

This was ultimately sold due to lack of use ... it sat next to my SG Standard on the racks, and I just wasn't picking it up often enough to justify it being here. But it was nice while it lasted ...