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It showed up 5 minutes before I got home from work, perfect timing and it just worked out that my buddy Nacho’s trip got cancelled so he could wait here to sign. The tracker wasn’t updated until around 4:45AM when it finally said it was moving again.
I can’t believe this thing is 25 years old. I’ll definitely take care of this thing a bit more than I generally do my guitars while I own it. Original owner had the action so low I couldn’t play it, that’s the 2nd guitar in a row I’ve gotten where the action was as low as possible before buzzing would come into play and I gotta say, both those guys did a pretty damn good job because that action was LOW. I took all the strings off and did my usual; polished the frets, oiled the neck, waxed the body, set it up/intonation, etc. Intonation was already dead on.
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One thing that REALLY surprised me was when tuning it, the needle does not jerk back and forth, whatever it’s tuned to the note stays right there, completely unwavering. I’ve never seen any guitar do that. You get that initial movement when you first hit the string then it stops moving. That’s pretty cool!
If you blindfolded me and swapped between this and a Gibson, I’d never know the difference. This thing feels on par and in some cases, better than any Gibson I’ve ever played. The fit and finish is flawless, I can’t find a single imperfection on this and it feels just as tough as any Gibson I’ve ever played. I’ve played a few Standards that definitely did not feel this well put together.
Gripes-
Frets are tiny. They aren’t worn at all and the overall condition of this guitar tells me it wasn’t played a whole lot, so I wouldn’t think it’s been filed/crowned over the years. These look factory installed and untouched. Not as low as a fretless wonder, but not far from it.
Pickups are very bleh, but I was expecting that because I read the stock pickups weren’t so great. Dialing in a Marshall with them it just sounded like ‘generic humbucker/Marshall’ Exactly why I got the Aldrich for it, which I think is going to look pretty slick as well.
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I almost attempted to change the pickup, but I need to make a new thread because I’m a moron with pickups, especially with the wiring in a Les Paul. What exists in there is nothing like what’s going in, as far as the wires go and I don’t want to f*ck it up or it’ll sit there unplayed until I have the desire to torture myself again.
Initially, I didn’t like the way it played. It’s not that IT plays bad, but I can’t play on this like I do my other guitars, which should be fairly obvious because it’s an entirely different guitar than my other ones. I had to adjust my playing when I started playing Strats again, so I’ll give it a little bit first. Neck if a comfy thickness, I was worried it was going to be slimmer than I wanted but no complaints there at all. Really nice piece of rosewood for the fingerboard as well.
Going to make a thread about the pickups and then I’m off to learn some Les Paul tunes!
Oh yeah, I’ve never seen a tweed LP case before, this is pretty nice!
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