Gibson Les Paul Standard '60s - Bourbon Burst Review

Hands down the best guitar I've ever owned!

I've had what I guess is the typical history with Gibson Les Paul's over the years: they've ranged everywhere between being a total piece of crap, a Custom no less, that refused to stay in tune (from a long time ago) to a very nice, but heavy, tone monster, a Traditional Goldtop. Before buying this guitar I bought a Studio T which played nicely but it was just missing something.… read more When this opportunity came up, I jumped on it and I am certainly glad that I did! My sales engineer, Matthew Langston, was the man with the plan and he got this baby to me pronto. What I got was hands down the best guitar I've ever owned! The setup was perfect, the guitar has good balance and is not too heavy... but the tone!!! OMG! This baby not only plays like butter but sounds like what I've always believed a Les Paul should sound like. The harmonics I can get are unreal! It makes picking up the guitar and playing a pure pleasure! Thank you, Matthew and Sweetwater!

---

Cancel Comment

Looks Beautiful, Sounds Great

This guitar arrived intact, as expected, thanks to the excellent shipping packaging design by Sweetwater. Trying it out, initially, the action was set a bit high, and the G string sounded very dull. After replacing the stock strings with new Gibson Les Paul strings, and lowering the action to the recommended factory spec (6/64th - 4/64th), the playability of the guitar, for me,… read more is perfect. Comparing this to my Gibson Les Paul Studio, it seems to have a deeper, bassier sound, which I like very much. I never use any distortion pedals. I play clean, mostly jazz and blues, through a Twin Reverb. I'm glad it doesn't have the horrible sounding split coil feature like on the LP Studio. I say keep it pure and simple. I have to relearn my amp EQ settings for this guitar, since I was always using a more EQ bass boost to tame the bright tones of my Fender Strat Ultra and Fender Tele Ultra. The only modification I am going to make on this guitar is to replace the stock Grover Tuners with the Grover 502C Roto-Grip Locking Tuners. Special thanks to Rob Kramer for all of his help, and the Sweetwater team for furnishing me another gorgeous, high quality instrument.

---

Cancel Comment

Love it!

What more can I say? It's a beautiful Bourbon Burst Les Paul. Perfect out of the box and sounds beautiful! Thanks to the SW crew that helped me compare and play different ones in the store.

---

Cancel Comment

It’s perfect

For a classic style instrument, it's an absolute monster. The way it resonates with even simple strumming is beyond belief, it feels like it'll rattle your fillings out if you have them. You can tell it's special as soon as you take it out the box, open the case and sit it in your lap. Even the case, which was made in Costa Rica, just exemplifies quality and durability. Gibson also… read more has fixed the issue with the pick guard damaging the finish by now adding a felt washer where it touch's the body. I've already begun adding my own touch to the guitar by adding Schaller strap locks and soon as they come in, Grover keystone locking tuners to really set it apart.

---

Cancel Comment

11lbs of WOW!

After looking around a bit and comparing the different LP series, I settled on this one as my first Les Paul for a couple of reasons. First of all was the quality of the build in the Standard line. It's a birthday present to myself so I splurged a little. Secondly, the 60s neck profile feels amazing. And finally, the Bourbon Burst looks spectacular. This is an amazing guitar that… read more has unbelievable clean tones and amazing crunchy tones with the dials up. As an intermediate player, it's more guitar than I needed, but I'm 1000% satisfied. \m/

---

Cancel Comment