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I have been looking to get one of these for years - they are few and far between here in Australia. Unfortunately I haven't had much of a chance to gig with it yet, however just playing at home it sounds amazing. It practically plays itself - those 'fretless wonder' frets are something else.
Running it into a in line impedance transformer yields the cleanest 'sweetest' sound- the 'decade' switch also is more obvious sounding, but the inbuilt transformer has a warmer sound. Both are good.
It sounds great through my Quilter Aviator. The low impedance pickups are incredibly clear and detailed, yet still very warm. Low strings sound positively piano-like, but the high register is warm and smooth. I could imagine this kind of pickup sounding very good in an archtop.
I'm really looking forward to gigging with it. It's not a light guitar, weighs in at 10lbs, so a big strap is needed!
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02-13-2017 06:58 PM
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Les Paul would approve. His LPs all had low-impedence pups. Congratulations, and play it in good health!
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Oh wow, I've only heard of these. Congrats on a rare find.
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I've always wanted one of the 335-style LP Signature versions with low impedance pickups.
Its funny how these were closest to LP's vision but the least popular of the LP models.
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hah..i knew it was gonna be a low impedence lp just from the thread title!!...looks in good condition...the classic recording guitar..
the whole bartolini, emg low impedence pickup craze came out of that
nice...congrats
cheers
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I read somewhere in an article about Les Paul that where be bemoaned Hi impedance pups as they were a were a mistake. Their git to amp cable losses, noise and cable length problems are not an issue with the LP "Professional" or recording model.
Have fun with yours.
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Had an old band leader who played one. Good clean tones, not so hot for classic rock which was what we played.
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I purchased one of those brand new back in 1972.
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The range of tones that I can get from this guitar is pretty incredible. That ''decade'' control is really clever. On zero, it's a broad and hi-fi (almost acoustic sounding) as you could imagine, but as you turn it closer to 10 - the sound gradually more coloured. At about 3 on the dial it's very telecaster like, 5-6 is in P-90ish territory (bit of honk, fat sounding, nice treble), 8-10 is fatter (typical humbucker ish).
I was playing some Johnny Smith chord melodies and that lyrical mid-range sound that Smith generally had is quite easy to coax from this guitar.
Of course Les Paul's sound is there. All those 'zippy' riffs he had sound fantastic on this guitar.
I think the downfall of it at least from a marketing point of view was that it wasn't really a rock and roll guitar. It could sound good for rock and roll, but even with a transformer - those pickups are low output. Furthermore, the control panel isn't all that intuitive. It's not a "plug in and play" kind of guitar in that sense. The looks are different too. I love it, but I can see why people found it strange looking. Especially when it cost MORE than a Les Paul Custom.
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Great find! Very 80s. That Schaller bridge was quite the rage.
It would have looked beautiful in a solid glossy black, white or wine red.
Saddle up and play it in good health.
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I used this one quite a bit in the late '70's and early '80's, but mostly for recording because it weighed over 12 pounds. It was an earlier version called the Les Paul Personal and included a not very useful feature--an XLR mic input on the shoulder so you could sing and play and the same time. Besides the weight, I didn't like the "fretless wonder" frets and the need for an external transformer. Although the variety of sounds it could make was interesting, it didn't do standard humbucker sounds very well. After awhile I decided the negatives outweighed the novelty factor and I sold it.
Danny W.
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Unloved but exceptional - the ultimate "clean sound" guitar, which was what LP was trying to achieve
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Originally Posted by ugarte
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I remember first working on one of those and immediately buying Schaller bridges for a run of 4 guitars I was making that summer. Very late 70's.
Those guitars were superb professional tools.
But the rage in the late 70's was for "tools" to be playing ceramic Dimarzio "Super Distortion" PU's in Les Pauls heavy enough to be listed in "Jane's Fighting Ships".
Great guitar to have. I suppose it was never intended to be played standing up anyway - so the neutron star weight was not a big deal in principle.
Thanks for posting this.
Chris
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Congrats, very cool guitar,
here's a link to a recording of the flexidisc demo that came with the instrument,
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I owned the Epiphone version twice. Originally Posted by ugarte
The pickups are low-impedance but it has a hard-wired transformer so the only output is "regular" impedance. Hot-wiring it for dual output didn't look as easy as that sounds either.
I liked the shape -- "Stop-bar ES-330 with giant LP cutaway" is a fair summary. It had a lot of cool aspects. Rumor is that Mr. Les Paul actually dug the model a lot, which was never guaranteed.
It had some very good sounds for jazz. Highest-out neck, highest-out middle, medium neck and medium middle all sounded good and each of the highest, medium and lowest outputs on the transformer offered noticeable tonal variations. But that was also part of the problem: At least with my 0.012 / wound G 'Jazz' set, the three transformer settings were so different from each other, both in volume and to a lesser extent in tone, that they really benefited from dedicated EQing. I didn't want to go that extent so both times the guitars escaped.
Maybe it would be less of a problem strung with a rock string set.
If I found another one I would be tempted . . . again . . . must resist . . . power of LPSig . . .
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I looked in my files and found that I bought my LP Personal in 1976 for $325 and sold it three years later for $370
Danny W.
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Danny W- you made a profit!
I paid $2700AUD for my LP Recording (approx $2000 USD). They are cheaper in the US - but the idea of transporting a guitar all the way here, particularly a rarer one is a bit scary. When this one came up for sale in Australia I jumped for it. I got it for a bit less, the shop took my 1977 Gibson L6-S as partial trade for it.
The LP Personal is one of the rarest of the Low Impedance Gibsons -- only one that is rarer is the Les Paul Jumbo, an flat top electric acoustic. I don't think I've ever seen one come up for sale... occasionally I see a few Professionals show up (all in the US), often many butchered Recordings too (hacked for humbuckers).
I have a jazz gig tonight - will use the Les Paul. I put .12 Thomastiks on it and it sounds really good. The test though is how it sounds in an actual gig scenario with a band.
Was reading about Tony Mottola - he had a custom built ES-355 fitted with Low Impedance electronics and 23! frets. Very cool!
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Well, I am very happy with the sound of this guitar. I used an external impedance matching transformer into my Quilter Aviator and with the decade switch on 5-6 I had a really nice smooth mid-range focused sound, very Johnny Smith - obviously not quite the same, after all this is a solid body not a carved top acoustic. I love the those low impedance pickups- the clarity is there, but so is the warmth.
The treble control is good - it's not like the regular 'tone' control that goes from mud - bright. It focuses only on the higher treble frequencies so even on zero it's not totally muddy, although it's still capable of very dark sounds.
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Congratulations entresz on getting hold of one of these fantastic instruments. I bought mine in 1975 and still have it. Unfortunately I've used it so much that it is really worn out, and so I don't use it now. When I first got it I didn't like the way the circuit affected the sound, so I rewired it and built a preamp (two actually; one added to an overdrive pedal and later on one added to a volume/wah pedal). After all, what's the point in having low impedance pickups to reduce noise and hum in the cables, then stuffing the sound through a measly little transformer before it even gets to the jack socket?
The best thing about the guitar, as you have discovered, is that it can imitate the sound of just about any other guitar; even an acoustic. Sometimes I would be playing and people would look round in astonishment because they thought I had picked up a different guitar. Not everything was wonderful however; the finish started to lift away from the body and it has been stripped and re-finished twice (badly). The jack socket is mounted in the plastic control plate and inevitably there are now small cracks around it. It is a heavy guitar, so I had a nice wide soft leather strap custom-made. Even so, after standing for an hour my shoulder would start to ache.
I'd love to get it restored and play it again, but it would cost a fortune (re-fret, re-finish, maybe even new fretboard too!). For now, I prefer to indulge in my new-found love of semi-acoustic archtops!
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