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The World Of Gibson Guitars. Information For Guitar Addicts.
Gibson Guitars are an icon of the guitar industry. Gibson is currently a major player in both the electric guitar and acoustic guitar market. The company was originally named after Orville Gibson who made mandolins in Kalamazoo, Michigan at the end of the 19th century. Gibson used the same method to initially make the big body archtop acoustic guitars.
Gibson Guitars are an icon of the guitar industry. Gibson is currently a major player in both the electric guitar and acoustic guitar market. The company was originally named after Orville Gibson who made mandolins in Kalamazoo, Michigan at the end of the 19th century. Gibson used the same method to initially make the big body archtop acoustic guitars.
Gibson Guitars were one of the first to come up with the adjustable truss rod inside the neck of the guitar to give it strength. This remains in use today to also allow guitarists to impact on the neck relief.
Even today, just about every guitar has an adjustable truss-rod that runs through the neck of the guitar. This was developed by Gibson Guitars in the early days to give strength to the neck. The floating pick guard is also an innovation of Gibson.
In the 1930s, Gibson began to experiment with electrifying and amplifying the sound of the guitar. The initial ES range of electric acoustic archtop guitar was a big leap forward. The ES stood for Electric Spanish. The term Spanish was simply to distinguish it from the popular lap Hawaiian guitars of the time.
Gibson Guitars were also responsible for introducing the cutaway shape. This was not so important with acoustic guitars but with the introduction of electric acoustics and solid body electric guitars, the amplification meant that the top end of the finger board could be heard. This opened up a whole new world of sounds and allowed the later emergence of the lead guitar soloist.
The ES-175 with the pointed cut away was the first of Gibson’s really successful electric guitars. After Fender released its broadcaster guitar in 1950, (the forerunner to the Telecaster), Gibson Guitars put their efforts into developing their first solid body guitar which became the Les Paul Standard.
In the early 1950s, it was not only Fender and Gibson Guitars who were putting research into the concept of the solid body guitar. Bibsby guitars were also carrying out some work as were Rickenbacker and National.
In the 1940s and 1950s, Les Paul had his own radio program and was a very popular guitarist. He dabbled with his own inventive work on amplification and developed his own solid body guitar, called the “log”. Paul took this concept to Gibson Guitars who unfortunately were not interested. It was only after 1950 when Gibson Guitars saw how popular the Fender solid body was that Gibson reapproached Les Paul looking for his assistance.
The world was ready for solid bodied guitars for a number of reasons. The construction process was much simpler and more reliable than than that of the acoustic guitar bodies. Another feature was that the acoustic body tended to alter the true sound. The solid body guitar did not do this and it had the added benefit on greatly increasing the sustain of the natural sound. The other major benefit with the new world of amplification was that the acoustic guitar bodies tended to have much more of a problem with feedback than the solid body guitars.
The first Les Paul Standard guitar was released in 1952. Les Paul received an endorsement contract for a 5 year period which was worth 5% of retail sales. The first Gibson Les Paul cost $210 and was referred to as the Gold Top.
One year stands out for Gibson Guitars and that is 1958. In this year Gibson altered the shape of the Les Paul Special and Junior by adding a second cutaway. This eventually led to the SG model, (stands for Solid Guitar). They also have the original Les Paul a cherry sunburst appearance and this remains to today a beautiful guitar.
At the same time, the general guitar playing public were getting interested in the look of their guitars and not just the sound and feel of the guitar. In response to this Gibson introduced some crazy shapes which were to fill a future niche market. These shapes were the legendary flying V and the Gibson Explorer. The double necked guitar was also produced at the same time. Gibson Guitars have since remained a force for guitar players worldwide.