Gibson 2019 Modern Collection

With Gibson hitting the headlines for reasons good and, well, not so good, it’s time to see if its iconic electric guitars are equally as newsworthy…

- Ed Mitchell

If you’re just getting back from a mission into deep space you might have missed the recent drama surrounding Gibson Brands, Inc. Here’s the bullet points. Bankruptcy looms in 2018. New CEO James ‘JC’ Curleigh is appointed in November that year. The iconic brand is saved. It’s all going well. Then, Director of Brand Experience Mark Agnesi releases his now infamous, and hastily-withdrawn, ‘Play Authentic’ video. Gibson sues Armadillo Distribution Enterprises, the owners of Dean and Luna Guitars. The guitar-playing community turns ugly. Gibson switches tack “from confrontation to collaboration”.

Now, we all love a bit of gossip but the question rattling around in most of our noggins is surely, ‘what about the guitars?’. Let’s just say that Gibson hasn’t always been on top of quality control in the past few years. Some stuff (remember the Firebird X?) has been downright weird. With ‘JC’ at the helm, will we get the Gibson guitars we deserve?

To get to the bottom of that enquiry, we’ve taken delivery of three models from the brand’s 2019 Modern Collection: the Les Paul Tribute, Les Paul Special Tribute DC and the legendary SG Standard. First impressions are positive. Let’s take a closer look…

SG STANDARD

Better the devil you know...

You probably think that the Les Paul Standard is the biggest selling Gibson of all time… Well, you’d actually be wrong. The SG Standard has been kicking its older sibling’s ass in finding good homes for decades. Of course, that iconic double-cutaway design was originally the replacement for the poorly-selling single-cut Les Paul. It was only officially renamed the SG in 1963.