I've always played fender single coils, and mostly never felt the need to get a humbucking axe. I briefly owned an Epiphone Les Paul Standard a few years ago, but hated it, I think the Epiphone Alnico Classics fitted to it at that time was just terrible. Too muddy and dark.
Recently I started to feel the urge to explore different sounds and started looking around for specifically semi-hollow/hollow body humbucker guitars, I really like the extra dimension added to the sound by the hollow bodies, and it's something completely different from my fender tones. (On a side note, I also considered a Gibson Les Paul Studio due to the fairly good price/quality/sound combination)
Ideally I would have loved to own a Gibson ES335, but since I don't know any Guptas, I had to look for the better priced alternatives. I considered the Epiphone Casino, Epiphone Dot, Epiphone Wildkat and Epiphone Sheraton II Pro. Did not look at Ibanez since I felt it was too Jazz orientated (I might be very wrong). The Gretsch models I could afford did not appeal to me, I think mostly because of looks (yep, I'm a bit superficial like that with guitars - especially since my fenders aren't exactly amazing "lookers").
Following a lot of online research I excluded the Dot (don't like the pickups) and the Wildkat (body a bit too small). (I still had the Gibson LP studio as a wildcard option in the back of my mind).
So last week I visited Mars Music in CPT to test the Casino and Sheraton, and if possible a LP studio. Luckily they had all of these models in store, even a very well priced secondhand LP studio.
So after playing all three I was sold on the Sheraton, it completely blew the other two away. The Casino felt a bit uninspiring and cheap, and the Gibson, although beautifully finished (I just love the mahogany grain on the body and neck) just did not move me as much as I would have expected (I guess I created a sort of Gibson hype in my head). So the Sheraton it was, and not only due to me not liking the others, this guitar seriously impressed me. The finish is beautiful and the ProBucker Humbuckers provided a beautiful tone which matched what I was looking for. Definitely a huge improvement in sound when compared to my old Epiphone LP Standard and it also has the coil-tapping function which provides some more sound variety (I like using both pickups with one coil-tapped to add some sparkle).
I ended up buying an ebony/gold one from Music Experience, who had the best price. Very happy with the purchase.
Recently I started to feel the urge to explore different sounds and started looking around for specifically semi-hollow/hollow body humbucker guitars, I really like the extra dimension added to the sound by the hollow bodies, and it's something completely different from my fender tones. (On a side note, I also considered a Gibson Les Paul Studio due to the fairly good price/quality/sound combination)
Ideally I would have loved to own a Gibson ES335, but since I don't know any Guptas, I had to look for the better priced alternatives. I considered the Epiphone Casino, Epiphone Dot, Epiphone Wildkat and Epiphone Sheraton II Pro. Did not look at Ibanez since I felt it was too Jazz orientated (I might be very wrong). The Gretsch models I could afford did not appeal to me, I think mostly because of looks (yep, I'm a bit superficial like that with guitars - especially since my fenders aren't exactly amazing "lookers").
Following a lot of online research I excluded the Dot (don't like the pickups) and the Wildkat (body a bit too small). (I still had the Gibson LP studio as a wildcard option in the back of my mind).
So last week I visited Mars Music in CPT to test the Casino and Sheraton, and if possible a LP studio. Luckily they had all of these models in store, even a very well priced secondhand LP studio.
So after playing all three I was sold on the Sheraton, it completely blew the other two away. The Casino felt a bit uninspiring and cheap, and the Gibson, although beautifully finished (I just love the mahogany grain on the body and neck) just did not move me as much as I would have expected (I guess I created a sort of Gibson hype in my head). So the Sheraton it was, and not only due to me not liking the others, this guitar seriously impressed me. The finish is beautiful and the ProBucker Humbuckers provided a beautiful tone which matched what I was looking for. Definitely a huge improvement in sound when compared to my old Epiphone LP Standard and it also has the coil-tapping function which provides some more sound variety (I like using both pickups with one coil-tapped to add some sparkle).
I ended up buying an ebony/gold one from Music Experience, who had the best price. Very happy with the purchase.
