Epiphone Elitist Les Paul Custom

Bought from Ebay. $950 (approx.) Bought it because of the great reviews it got and the price it was going for made it seem like a real steal.

Fit and finish is flawless. Feels like a $3,000 guitar. Sounds amazing. Indescribable with a Marshall. Sustain as long as I want it...no more, no less. Notes ring clear when clean and simply scream on distortion. Sound gets better and better. Neck feels perfect. Can't put it down.

It's heavy. Hard to balance when sitting down. It's actually better to play this classical style (guitar on left leg). Action was too low for me, but it was easily fixed.

It's a work of art. I got the black one and it's a beauty. Gold hardware gives it life. Inlays and fretwork are superb. Premium mahogany and maple with bound rosewood fingerboard. Even better than some originals I've encountered.

I really don't see any reason why this guitar is priced like it is. I have a Gibson SG Special and the SG simply doesn't compare in terms of craftsmanship (they're priced the same). This guitar is in a league of its own. If you're thinking about resale value, get a Gibson. If you're thinking about a guitar you can keep and will make you a better player get an Epiphone Elite.

This review was originally published on http://www.musicgearreview.com

The Epiphone Les Paul Custom is, without a doubt, the most popular guitars that Epiphone has in their lineup. The guitar features a mahogany body with a mahogany neck, gold hardware, 24.75'' scale length, carved maple top, optional pickguard, ebony fretboard, 22 frets, trapezoid inlays, tune-o-matic bridge, binding, two humbuckers, two volumes, two tones and a three way switch.

UTILIZATION

This is one of the very few Epiphones out there that is a true Custom copy. This one actually has an ebony fretboard, and that really does change the sound and feel of this instrument for the better. The nut wasn't too bad on this, thankfully. However, the frets were a bit iffy. They weren't perfectly level, and you could tell that once you start lowering the action. They could have been crowned a bit better. Upper fret access sucks, just like every other Les Paul out there, but you learn to deal with it.

SOUNDS

This one had some EMGs swapped in it, so I'll be going by those in this review. The guitar had an EMG 81 in the bridge, and it ripped. However, the guitar itself was fairly bright, and I think the 81 wasn't a great match in the bridge. Considering that it's an all mahogany body, that's a bit surprising, but it happens sometimes. There are just certain woods that sound brighter than others, and this was one of them. The EMG 85 in the neck was just about perfect, however. It was warm and fat, but it also had some slight cut going on thanks to the naturally bright sounding mahogany going on.

OVERALL OPINION

If you're looking for a Custom but don't want to pay the price, check out these. They can be somewhat hard to find, but they sound pretty good, have some decent QC going on and are actually true Custom clones. In fact, these things can actually rival other copies such as Edwards and the such.

Gibson is one of the biggest guitar makers in the world. They make many super high end and custom guitars for professional guitar players and collectors. They also make many guitars for beginners and working class guitar players. Many of these guitars are sold under Gibsons Epiphone brand. Epiphone is Gibsons foreign made line of guitars. They are built to much of the same specifications as a real Gibson but have much lower costs due to the overseas production. This is the Epiphone Les Paul Custom in Wine Red. It pretty much has all the same features as a real Les Paul Custom apart from the ebony fretboard. The Custom is bascially a dressed up Les Paul standard. It has more binding on the body neck and headstock and has larger block inlays. I think the large block inlays give the guitar a classy look. The guitar has s 22 fret rosewood fretboard with the large block inlays. The headstock is fully bound. The body is solid mahogany. Customs do not have the maple top on the body. The color is a lovely wine red with gold hardware to give it class. It reminds me of the cherry color you see on many SG's It has dual humbucking Epiphone pickups in the standard Les Paul configuration. There is a volume knob and tone knob for each pickup and a 3 way switch to switch among them. The bridge is your standard tune o matic and stop tail like you would find on most every Les Paul.

UTILIZATION

Which the specs being much of the same as a Gibson Les Paul Custom it shares all the quirks you would get on the real Gibson. Gibsons traditionally have larger necks than other guitars. In the 50s the necks on Gibson guitars were huge. They were commonly referred to as baseball bat necks. In the 60s Gibson switched to a slimmer profile. This slimmer 60s profile is the most popular neck profile on Gibsons and it is found on most Gibsons and Epiphones today. The upper fret access on this guitar is typical for every Les Paul. Since the body joins the neck at the 17th fret you will have to reach around the body of the guitar to get to frets higher than this. This strong joint helps with tone and sustain but limits upper fret playability greatly. The neck binding on this guitar and generally helps to limit the amount of sharp fret ends you feel when playing. The gold hardware will tarnish with playing but this happens on just about any guitar with gold hardware.

SOUNDS

The guitar itself has a good innate tone built in but it is let down by the low quality pickups. This is a common problem with lower end guitars that come with no name pickups. You do not get much attack with these pickups. Since these pickups do not have much definition the neck position can get really muddy. With a high gain amp the sound might get muddy due to the lack of definition. With some types of music these pickups are great. If you want a bluesy sound these pickups will do really good and you will be able to get a smooth tone out of them. With a pickup swap this guitar can sound great so I would recommend to anyone who has one of these Epiphones to try it out with some after market pickups. A set of Seymour Duncans would liven this guitar up greatly for rock and hard rock. If you are looking to play metal a set of EMG pickups will work nicely. There are Epiphones that come with EMG pickups stock so if you are planning to do this swap you may want to check out an Epiphone that comes with them from the factory and save some money.

OVERALL OPINION

Its nice that Epiphone is making this Les Paul Custom in this rare and classy finish. It is different than the white and black Les Paul Customs that are so common. The quality on this guitar is good and I find the quality on the high end Epiphones better than the quality on the lower end faded Gibsons. There are a few smaller companies making much better quality guitars for the price of these Epiphones. A company like Agile will give you an ebony fretboard and Seymour Duncan pickups for the price of this Epiphone. If you want to stay loyal and support Gibson you can check out this Epiphone LPC in Wine Red.

The Gibson Les Paul Custom is probably one of the most coveted guitars out there, so it was only natural that Epiphone would make their own version of it. This guitar features a mahogany body with a set mahogany neck, a rosewood fretboard with 22 frets, block inlays, a tune-o-matic bridge for tuning stability and maximum sustain, two humbuckers, two volumes, two tones and a three way switch.

UTILIZATION

I'm a bit on the fence with this. While Epiphone calls it a Custom, it's really not. For one, it doesn't have an ebony fretboard. That's a big killer, in my opinion. The ebony fretboard is one of the number one reasons to buy a Les Paul Custom in the first place. That said, it still sounds nice. This actually sounds pretty close to a Gibson Studio, and considering the price, it's pretty much on par with the Gibson equivalent. Access to the upper frets is still very iffy considering the neck joint, and the guitars still tend to be body heavy, so sitting with them can be a pain.

SOUNDS

I'm not a fan of the stock pickups in this. To me, they sound weak and muddy. The bridge pickup in this can do some hard rock and whatnot, but I'm a metal guitarist. I like higher output pickups that can really drive the amp hard. This pickup wasn't able to give the amp the punch I like. The neck pickup was also muddy and undefined. On top of that, it had some annoying treble that I couldn't seem to dial out no matter how hard I tried, and I contribute that solely to the pickup as it didn't have that sound unplugged.

OVERALL OPINION

If you're looking for a Gibson Les Paul Custom rival, look into either getting an Edwards, a Burny or something else like that. You'll get a guitar that's a lot closer to the Custom than this one. That said, this is a pretty solid guitar, and I bet it would be totally killer if you replaced the pickups in this thing.