Scott Henderson Discussion

[Yusstyna]

Hey Scott,

What makes a great sounding Les Paul to you?

I’m looking for one (not necessarily from Gibson) and am wondering what are things to look for such as body weight, pickups and what are the factors that go into a great sounding LP guitar. I’m looking for a fat, open, resonant sound (a Tele on steroids as they say). The Gibsons that I tried usually sound chunky, muffled and dead...

Any experiences with great sounding vintage Les Paul’s? What would you say are the key elements that make those old guitars sound great?

Any modern brands that you think make a great LP style guitar?

Thanks Scott!

[Scott Henderson]

The vintage Les Paul's were much lighter than the ones they make now, except for the ones which have holes drilled under the maple top, and those sound terrible. You can easily find out if if you have one by just tapping on the top - you'll hear a more hollow sound if you tap over one of the holes - they're big. I was lucky to find a Les Paul in the 90's which is relatively light, but not as light as the old ones.

A major problem with Les Paul's is that Gibson has been putting 350k pots in them since the late 70's, and that's why they sound muddy and awful. The reason they do it is because the harsh treble from their terrible pickups needs to be cut. The first thing to do when buying a Les Paul is to change the pots to 500k and put in good pickups. Mine has a Seymour Duncan '59 in the bridge and Jazz in the neck. That makes a HUGE difference and will make a factory Les Paul sound like a decent guitar.

The guitar I used on Dog Party and Tore Down House was a cheap 90's re-issue Fender Strat that I bought for 800 bucks. It sounded incredibly bad, but I bought it because it was a good weight. I put in Lindy Fralin Woodstock pickups for Dog Party, and Suhr V60LP's for Tore Down House - the pickups made all the difference.

The wood is also a factor, but wood is inconsistent. When Suhr makes me a new guitar, they make 5. I pick my favorite one and they sell the other 4 to dealers. Those 5 guitars always sound very different, even though they're all made of lightweight alder with the exact same hardware. That inconsistency exists with all guitars, including Les Pauls. I don't know enough about wood to tell you why some sound great and others don't. I'm not familiar with other companies who make Les Paul style guitars, but I'm sure there are some who make better ones than Gibson!

[Yusstyna]

Thanks for your reply Scott!

What would you say is a good weight for a LP?

I’m trying one out now that a guitar builder friend of mine made and it’s incredibly lightweight without chambering (around 3,5 KG). It sounds much better than any Gibson LP I’ve played but is lacking some fatness I find (already in the acoustic sound). It’s very resonant and loud acoustically, I actually find it has more of an acoustic guitar quality to it. Very open sounding with nice highs and solid bass but lacks quite some meat. This is unplugged. I realize that pickups are a huge part of the sound and it sounds decent plugged in but lacks that midrange umpf and roundness. I’m wondering how much of that is in the weight of the instrument and how much in the inconsistencies of wood you mentioned and other factors.

Thanks!

[Scott Henderson]

I wish I was qualified enough to answer your question - this is more a question for John Suhr. In my experience with strat-style guitars, 7 ½ pounds is a great weight. Lighter guitars have more midrange and heavier guitars have more bass and treble. I don't want all my guitars to sound the same, so that's a good thing, but if it goes to extremes (like an 8 pound strat), I usually don't like it.

My Les Paul weighs 9 pounds, so that's probably quite heavy compared to the vintage ones. I like the way it sounds, so I guess that's the bottom line. As far as wood, I think even John thinks that's a crap shoot. It's not just the body, the neck is also a really important factor in the tone, and also the combination of the neck and body make a particular sound, which would be different if that was changed. The key word here is unpredictable!

[Chickentonight]

Just a little quick note here,

I have an thinline esp as my les paul style guitar. Some say it's a mixture between les paul and an sg. Not as heavy sounding as a true LP and with more bite of an sg. Seems good to me. And doesn't weight a ton.

[Thumberstrummer]

Hi Scott.
The life lesson confirmed by you, that many guitars of the same model / specs may be inconsistent mainly because of wood behavior and body / neck match, IMO is particularly true for LPs. Consider also that a large part of Gibson manufacturing process (mainly in the assembling and coating stages) is still carried out by hand
As a rule of thumb, when I'm peeking at a guitar I ALWAYS go to a shop where I'm allowed to try several ones of that same model I'm interested in.
Thanks to this approach I've always been able to get all the more-than-decent guitars I own, without breaking the bank.
LP wise, I bough a used (mint though) LP standard '60 - late 2019 model, which is said to be in charge of bringing Gibson back on the track, after years of sales drop and weird unappreciated variations on the LP theme.
I'm luky enough to have a good shop just around the corner (owners are good friends). Thanks to that I've had the chance to try extensively hundred of guitars, of dozens of brands / price level / specs.
What I can say today is that a golden rule to identify upfront a good sounding guitar doesn't exist. When it comes to LPs, I've hit good & cheap Traditional LPs playing way better than pricey Custom Shop LPs (and many dead sounding in both categories), and several weight relieved LP sounding extremely good vs full body ones. It also depend on your expectations about that guitar use - a chambered body (that's what some weight relieve schemes used by Gibson look and sound like) may be definitely helpful if you want your guitar to step here and there in a jazz clean tone territory...
If I do not have a steady reference for understanding what an axe is supposed to be like, to sound good, I can definitely agree though that components (like pots, p.ups and caps) can make a huge difference.
My philosophy is - if it sounds good, don't touch it. In fact I happened to find out that the resonant peak of one particular guitar may match better a 400 Kohm pot than a 500k one...
BTW I'm very happy with my Std '60 LP, chosen among several tried before puchasing it. It's also a good pony for some experiments, as well as wiring (only) the neck pick up tone 50 style, which makes the interaction between vol and tone totally different from modern wiring. It works more or less like a treeble bleed (which I don't like), but way better, natural and with more control. Most of the vintage Gibbys and CS ones are wired that way. With a push pull pot you can switch between 50 and modern wirings, getting the best of both worlds.
Another point to take into consideration is that vintage LPs normally used to mount Alnico II pick ups. Their minor power vs Alnico V, widely used nowadays, along with a proper value pots swap (like you say) can make an LP sound very close to one of its elder, blasoned relatives.
My two cents… sorry for such a long post
_________________
Germino Club 40 plexi replica + EJ Strat w Suhr ML st. pups. I'm not asking for more so far (but... who knows...?)

[Scott Henderson]

Thanks for the post! I haven't liked the chambered Les Pauls I've tried, but that's only a few so it's totally possible that some of them sound good - however I doubt if they sound like a vintage LP, since those aren't chambered.

Pickups are such an important factor in great sounding vintage guitars, but both Gibson and Fender have gone through long periods of time where their pickups were horrible. The guitar I used on Dog Party and Tore Down House was a cheap '68 re-issue 90's strat, which I bought because it was a good weight. It sounded really bad, but I put Lindy Fralin Woodstock pickups in it for Dog Party and Suhr V60LP's for Tore Down House. That made a huge difference in the tone of the guitar. Those old PAF pickups in the vintage LP's sound amazing, but I think companies like Suhr and Seymour Duncan have come pretty close to duplicating them, and those pickups also made a huge difference in the tone of my cheap 90's LP.

[peter_heijnen]

[Yusstyna]