I only have one Gibson Les Paul I am sad to say. A Deluxe with a rosewood fingerboard and to the best I can figure from the serial number it was born in 1973.
I bought this guitar in 1981 from my buddy
Syd Kitchen, who recently passed away in Durban. RIP Skydlles.
I had played the guitar at some point when I was hanging out with Syd....he was like "check this out..." and he pulled it out to show it off and I just about almost fell over when I played it. Almost landed in the drool too I tell ya!! You see I had a two guitar fusion band with
Mark 'Spook' Kahn and myself sharing the guitar work. Spook played a Deluxe with the mini buggers on it and I just LOVED the sound and feel of his Deluxe. But when I played others they did not feel quite the same. Syd's guitar was spot on to how Mark's felt to me, identical except for color...Marks was a nice dark sunburst.
But I digress...... like I said, Syd's guitar was also a Deluxe...mini buggers and all and I had to have it. Of course he said no and I bothered him for a long time...I forget....6 months, more. Every time I saw him or talked to him on the phone I would ask..."when you gonna sell me the Deluxe?" and he'd laugh his ass off. The bastard!! ? He was tormenting me.
So imagine my surprise when all of a sardine one day he gets a hold of me and asks."....so hey Lis, do you still want to buy my guitar?" Not even considering he meant the Deluxe, I asked which guitar he was talking about and he said " mine, the Gibson Les Paul you keep asking me about!" I'm like.... ???"serious-you are selling it" ....LOL....to which he replies..." ja man Lis, my chiropractor has told me it is too heavy for me, he insists I have to get rid of it as it is pulling my back out of alignment and my shoulder also!"
Finally it was mine. However!!!!! >☹
What happens at the very first gig like two night's later? Our vocalist knocks it over while he is running his PA speaker cables and he snaps the headstock off!! >☹ >☹ >☹ You have no idea. Another guitar player who was playing at another hotel just down from where we were, I forget his name how bad of me, used to come and see me play in their breaks and he lent me his spare sparkly emerald green Gibby LP Custom....chunky neck and a very nice guitar......so I got the gig done thanks to his awesomeness.
Anyway, I went back to my Strat while Syd glued the headstock for me with some ".......glue they put ships together with Lis, it will be stronger than before I promise you!" It stayed in a clamp for about a week.
He was quite right. It held to this day. In fact, when my Samoyed knocked it over in the studio somewhere around 2001 and snapped the headstock off .......again..... >☹ >☹ >☹.....it cracked right next to, parallel to Syd's glue job. Syd's glue job was so strong it heal and the wood cracked right next to it. The new glue job is holding well so far. No more guitar stands for the LP.
Well anyway, back to when I got to the USA and was playing a lot of really hard rock I felt I needed full size buggers so like a dweeb I had a luthier I know route the body out. Worst move I ever made. The full size humbuckers are nice but the guitar lost a certain character.....trust me, it still sounds bitchin' and I intend to put either Antiquity's, Classic '57's or the Fralin Pure PAF pups in. I love this guitar though. Syd came to LA in 2008 and I picked him up to spend a day with my family.......I took great pride in showing him I still had it, battlescars and all and he played it in the studio. He was like " you need to take this guitar out of my hands......." LOL. I said the same about his Marc Maingard of course.
So....my lone 1973 Gibson Les Paul Deluxe.
