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tjon901 « Unique sounding Gibson »
Published on 08/15/11 at 14:20When the Nighthawk came out Gibson was trying to break out of their normal rut. They were looking to give their loyal customers a guitar with a unique feel and tone. This is what they did with the Nighthawk. It looks familiar but the sounds and feel of it are pretty different. They took the classic Les Paul. They widened the body but the body is still smaller overall and opened up the cutaway. They extended the neck scale to 25.5 inches. The neck is mahogany with 22 frets. They also designed 3 new pickups for the guitar. They put a high output slanted humbucker in the bridge. They put a Gibson mini humbucker in the neck and a specially designed high output single coil in the middle. With coil tapping, as many as 10 different combinations were available. There is a large Fender style bridge with string through stringing. It has a 5 way blade pickup selector and the tone control is a push pull that can split the bridge pickup. There were other versions of the nighthawk with different pickup configurations but this was the most popular.
UTILIZATION
This guitar feels a bit different than a normal Les Paul. You may not notice by looking at it but the guitar has a 25.5 inch scale. Which means there is more room to play on the fretboard and the strings have more tension. You may or may not like this. More obvious is the larger cutaway that allows better fret access on the upper frets. The bridge is more of a fender style with individual saddles. It has a string through design which offers great sustain. It also will not fall off when you change strings. The neck is pretty beefy with a comfortable D shape
SOUNDS
This guitar has a crisper sound than a normal Les Paul due to a number of things. The bridge is more directly mounted to the body which transfers more resonance through the guitar. This combined with the string through design gives more instant attack. The longer scale on the neck gives more tension in the strings and that also increases the crispness of the attack. This combined with the 3 different pickups provides many tones. The mini humbucker is very smooth in the neck. Almost like an old PAF. At some positions it gives out a very Telecasterish sound. This may be because of the slanted bridge pickup putting out more treble frequencies and the extra tension. The single coil is great to mix in with the other pickups because it will add extra clarity and ring ontop of the thick humbucker sound. A major disadvantage to the slanted humbucker in the bridge is that it would be very hard to replace if you didnt like the tone or it was damaged.
OVERALL OPINION
This guitar kind of got mired in the back when it first came out. Now with Gibson doing reissues of everything not from the Norlin era it could come back and be popular. It is one of the more versatile sounding traditional guitars that Gibson has ever put out. If you see one at a guitar store or something used you should check it out. You will be surprised at the myriad of tones you can get with this guitar.
UTILIZATION
This guitar feels a bit different than a normal Les Paul. You may not notice by looking at it but the guitar has a 25.5 inch scale. Which means there is more room to play on the fretboard and the strings have more tension. You may or may not like this. More obvious is the larger cutaway that allows better fret access on the upper frets. The bridge is more of a fender style with individual saddles. It has a string through design which offers great sustain. It also will not fall off when you change strings. The neck is pretty beefy with a comfortable D shape
SOUNDS
This guitar has a crisper sound than a normal Les Paul due to a number of things. The bridge is more directly mounted to the body which transfers more resonance through the guitar. This combined with the string through design gives more instant attack. The longer scale on the neck gives more tension in the strings and that also increases the crispness of the attack. This combined with the 3 different pickups provides many tones. The mini humbucker is very smooth in the neck. Almost like an old PAF. At some positions it gives out a very Telecasterish sound. This may be because of the slanted bridge pickup putting out more treble frequencies and the extra tension. The single coil is great to mix in with the other pickups because it will add extra clarity and ring ontop of the thick humbucker sound. A major disadvantage to the slanted humbucker in the bridge is that it would be very hard to replace if you didnt like the tone or it was damaged.
OVERALL OPINION
This guitar kind of got mired in the back when it first came out. Now with Gibson doing reissues of everything not from the Norlin era it could come back and be popular. It is one of the more versatile sounding traditional guitars that Gibson has ever put out. If you see one at a guitar store or something used you should check it out. You will be surprised at the myriad of tones you can get with this guitar.