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Those Gibson Midtowns


twotimingpete

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I didn't buy one, but I did play one before buying the LP Traditional.

My thoughts.....it's a great guitar. It's not a true "semi-hollow" but it was fairly loud and resonant. Neck felt good and fairly slim for Gibson. I still personally don't like the thick nitro on necks though as I have sweaty hands when playing and get the sticky neck.

I played it for about 15 minutes and my bassist played for about 15 as well. Both of us thought it was a great guitar. In the end, it's just not my style though and the deal on the LP was too good. I was super close to buying one though.

To me, it felt A LOT better than any of the 60's/70's reissue series that are slightly less expensive.

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no pics of mine as yet but I got the Wine Red finsih I'm REALLY diggin' it. The neck is great, out the box the setup was good, I still made some small action and pickup height adjustments to suit my playing. Tone wise it's solid, the cleans are great and you can get a nice range of OD tones just messing with the volume and tone settings, I haven't gotten a chance to try it with much high gain or fuzz as yet. I guess my ONLY complaint is that it only has one volume and tone but that's not a deal breaker for me. I should be getting my new amp this week, once I do get it I want to try and to shoot some video this weekend, will post if it comes out good.

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I don't have pics of my blue Midtown P90 that I just bought last night but I bet it'll play just as nice as my custom.

I bought this midtown custom last week. It plays great, sounds great and it will replace my ES335 as my gigging hollow body. The fit, finish and the workmanship is top notch. I love mine.

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I had a Midtown custom for about a year. Very cool guitar for 335339 style sounds. It was a lot punchier than my 335, might be the burstbuckers... It think it was also the smaller body size, so it gets more of a solid body tone. The fit and finish was good, but not great. I paid $1200 for it, and thought it should be a little cleaner out of the box.

The flat top was a little strange at first... its a hard edge on your right arm. I still don't see how Gibson can charge $2000-3000 for a carved top, and basically the same guts as the midtown.

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I'm not convinced there's always much of a correlation between what Gibson's costs are to make a guitar, and what Gibson asks for that guitar.

I suppose the flat top on the Midtown saves a manufacturing step. And maybe the Richlite fingerboard is cheaper than the ebony the Feds keep confiscating. I really like the sound and feel of the Midtown Custom, so maybe I like the Burstbucker sound.

I had the opportunity to do a direct A-B comparison between the Midtown standard with the P90s Gibson puts on those, with the ES-335 with the tapped P90s, and the 335 (at twice the price, of course) was VERY clearly richer, thicker, and cleaner. My conclusion: NOT the same pickups, although the larger 335 body also made a difference. The tapped P90-Burstbucker difference makes these very different instruments anyway. I'd love to be able to afford a Midtown Custom.

One (fairly) nearby GC has a Midtown Custom they dropped. The guitar landed on a tone knob, which then split the plywood completely through, right across the top to the edge. The damage is also quite visible, since the black finish chipped off along the split. Not the sort of damage that can be repaired with replacing the entire top. So the GC cut the price from $1500 to $1350! This happened about 8 months ago, and that guitar is still sitting there. With that kind of damage I'd expect about half off, and I guess so would everyone else. If they DID offer half off, I'd take advantage of their trade-in 15% deal, unload a bunch of stuff I never play and accept the damage. But they won't so I won't either.

Anyway, the Midtown is a nice guitar at a good price.

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Got my fireburst standard today, just finished doing a quick setup, pickup height adjustment and played it for a half hour. I want to put 11s on it so I will wait to really dial it in but I am fresh out right now. facepalm.gif

Anyways, quality looks great on mine so far the only thing I noticed was finish tabs over the tailpiece bushings but when I re-string I will take those out.
I don't mind that I couldn't get the Pelham blue one. This fireburst looks sexy.

The big worry for me was the slim taper, with my tendancy to go for bigger fender necks as of late and really digging the gibson 50s profile necks of the tributes I almost didn't pull the trigger. It is comfortable though, the rounder gibson profile compensates for the taper and it feels good. This thing rocks, I feel like it will be able to cover alot of bases. I like the weighting and feel over the 335s I have tried and had written off. This is my first semi hollow though and it is seems like the right first step. Hell of a deal I could not pass up.

Pick one up if you are on the fence...don't miss out.

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Got my fireburst standard today, just finished doing a quick setup, pickup height adjustment and played it for a half hour. I want to put 11s on it so I will wait to really dial it in but I am fresh out right now. facepalm.gif

Anyways, quality looks great on mine. So far the only thing I noticed was finish tabs over the tailpiece bushings but when I re-string I will take those out.
I don't mind that I couldn't get the Pelham blue one. This fireburst looks sexy.

The big worry for me was the slim taper, with my tendancy to go for bigger fender necks as of late and really digging the gibson 50s profile necks of the tributes I almost didn't pull the trigger. It is comfortable though, the rounder gibson profile compensates for the taper and it feels good. This thing rocks, I feel like it will be able to cover alot of bases. I like the weighting and feel over the 335s I have tried and had written off. This is my first semi hollow though and it is seems like the right first step. Hell of a deal I could not pass up.

Pick one up if you are on the fence...don't miss out.

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Quote Originally Posted by megawzrd View Post
Got my fireburst standard today, just finished doing a quick setup, pickup height adjustment and played it for a half hour. I want to put 11s on it so I will wait to really dial it in but I am fresh out right now. facepalm.gif

Anyways, quality looks great on mine. So far the only thing I noticed was finish tabs over the tailpiece bushings but when I re-string I will take those out.
I don't mind that I couldn't get the Pelham blue one. This fireburst looks sexy.

The big worry for me was the slim taper, with my tendancy to go for bigger fender necks as of late and really digging the gibson 50s profile necks of the tributes I almost didn't pull the trigger. It is comfortable though, the rounder gibson profile compensates for the taper and it feels good. This thing rocks, I feel like it will be able to cover alot of bases. I like the weighting and feel over the 335s I have tried and had written off. This is my first semi hollow though and it is seems like the right first step. Hell of a deal I could not pass up.

Pick one up if you are on the fence...don't miss out.
Uh...hhuh...huhh...You said "semi".

Beautiful guitar!
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