People who make blanket statements about Gibson, really need to try them in person. Gibson has guitars from $499 on up just as Fender does. I agree there is no need for $7,000 LP's, but there's no need for $4,000 or $25,000 Bolt together Fenders either just because they have the words "Custom Shop" or signature stamped on them either. Not that I wouldn't mind having one. Most big brands have a high end series. Look at the Adrian Belew Signature Fly at $9,000. The list goes on and on. People really take brand recognition and snobbery too far as well as the "Sour Grape Syndrome". If you want something and can't afford it, it doesn't make it overpriced or bad. People make things up just to justify their inability to afford something. I just accept the fact that I can't afford or even justify buying a guitar that expensive without designing it myself. I have lots of cheap affordable guitars that sound great to me. I don't care one bit about status symbols. I have some serious oddballs.

That post concerning 1978 is interesting. (Please don't hold it against me - I love my '92 Fat Strat), But when I turned 14 in 1979 my folks bought me the sweetest used guitar in the world: a goldtop Les Paul Deluxe with "baby" humbuckers. They told us the guitar was 4 years old at the time, making it, I suppose a '74 or '75.

Oh my goodness, that was the best playing guitar I've ever touched. It was truly a "fretless wonder".

But, back to the original subject, I can't say I've played a late model LP
that I've been very impressed with.

Quality control at Gibson has been lax the past few years and that goes hand in hand with employee dissatisfaction with management and work conditions.A recent survey by a corporate research firm deemed Gibson as having one of the worst employee morale problems in the U.S. I have found that older Gibsons and newer Epiphone equivalents to be of much better quality.

Unless you are way hung up on what your guitar says on the headstock, completely ignore Gibson and buy an Epiphone. The prices are way more reasonable and the quality is better.

The Epi version looks like a Les Paul
it feels like a Les Paul
it sounds like a Les Paul
it costs significantly less than a Gibson Les Paul

Sounds like a better value all around to me

This is quite opinionated, do you own both an epi and a Gibson lp?

Hi 63 Supro,I can't remember the company that did the research but I remember that some months ago I posted the web address of the company so people could see the results for themselves.They interviewed Gibson Employees past and present even executives and the concensus of of opinion was since Henry J. Jusziewicz took control of Gibson both morale and quality control had fallen off considerably.I'll try to look up my previous posts to find the link again.