Advice on Gibson SG P90 Specials

[Pieman]

Several years ago I bought the Gibson 50th Anniversary Townshend P90 Special when Wildwood was clearing them out for $999.  It sounded terrific. really terrific.  I don’t remember how many Hamer P90 Specials went through my hands because they didn’t do it for me as much as I kept looking.

I wasn’t bonding with the 50th Anniversary neck wise, scale length, width and radius but I’m willing to give it another try, I can get a long with most any neck shape. The used 50th s out there are too high IMHO and I haven’t seen a clean one. Maybe I’ll wait but why. You may have seen the Greg Koch demo.

Gibson has had a recant similar version (not Alpine White) but with features similar to the 50th, including the lightning bar wraparound tail piece. Retail is $1600.

Any alternatives to the current Gibson SG Special Heritage?  P90s, wraparound  Not interested in humbuckers or Epiphone versions. used VSOP? something or other? Not a Junior   not an Eastman. what about TOM versions.  Any other advice such as replacing the lightning bar? thinking the tailpiece is key.

I’m sure many of you have been down this road. thanks in advance.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[HSB0531]

13 minutes ago, Pieman said:

Several years ago I bought the Gibson 50th Anniversary Townshend P90 Special when Wildwood was clearing them out for $999.  It sounded terrific. really terrific.  I don’t remember how many Hamer P90 Specials went through my hands because they didn’t do it for me as much as I kept looking.

I wasn’t bonding with the 50th Anniversary neck wise, scale length, width and radius but I’m willing to give it another try, I can get a long with most any neck shape. The used 50th s out there are too high IMHO and I haven’t seen a clean one. Maybe I’ll wait but why. You may have seen the Greg Koch demo.

Gibson has had a recant similar version (not Alpine White) but with features similar to the 50th, including the lightning bar wraparound tail piece. Retail is $1600.

Any alternatives to the current Gibson SG Special Heritage?  P90s, wraparound  Not interested in humbuckers or Epiphone versions. used VSOP? something or other? Not a Junior   not an Eastman. what about TOM versions.  Any other advice such as replacing the lightning bar? thinking the tailpiece is key.

I’m sure many of you have been down this road. thanks in advance.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

And demoed by the great and always funny Greg Koch.

[RobB]

There was a run of SG Special Classics w/bound neck, P90s and a TOM that were pretty damned nice. I tried a few (all cherry transparent) and they were all nice guitars. 

If your heart is set on a wrap tail, I found the Music City to be an excellent replacement for the stock lightning bolt wrapper on my Bacchus LP Special. It intonates well and sounds great. I used TonePros locking studs to dial in the action perfectly and eliminate bridge-tilt. 

[murkat]

Make sure the neck joint is solid. Double cut specials ( and even some vintage sunbursts ) are prone to this. To test, place guitar on table, leaving body rest on a towel, raise neck and lightly up down motion. If tuning pitch warbles Per motion, you may consider a return.