Gibson Les Paul Traditional with Bigsby Electric Guitar with CaseTo capture an option favored by many famous guitarists, Gibson USA brings you the Gibson Les Paul Traditional with Bigsby Electric Guitar. Everyone from Neil Young to Keith Richards, Joe Perry to Carl Perkins and original Son Volt lead guitarist Dave Boquist have recognized the extra dimension a Bigsby tailpiece offers. This limited edition Les Paul Traditional gives all the familiarity of the classic Gibson Les Paul, but with a twist!
Gibson Les Paul Traditional with Bigsby Features
- Mahogany body with carved Maple top
- Rounded 'Traditional' neck profile
- 57 Classic neck pickup and slightly hotter 57 Classic Plus bridge pickup
- Genuine Bigsby B-70 tailpiece with Schaller roller bridge
- Tone Pro Kluson tuners with pearloid buttons
- Modern weight relief to enhance resonance and reduce weight
- Limited edition run from Gibson
Loaded with an original Bigsby B-70 tailpiece, this Les Paul Traditional gives you all the fat, singing tone that the world's leading single-cutaway guitar is known for, plus the added versatility of a vintage-style vibrato unit for expressive lead work and tremulous rhythm playing. As such, it's suitable to a wide range of playing styles.
Body
The Gibson Les Paul Traditional with Bigsby is crafted with all the classic ingredients that helped make this model a legend, and it sports killer looks thanks to a stunning high-gloss Ebony Black nitrocellulose finish. A carved maple top contributes clarity and sustain, while a mahogany body adds depth and richness. Like all Les Paul Traditionals this guitar uses modern weight relief to enhance resonance and reduce weight.
Neck
A solid one-piece quarter-sawn mahogany neck is glued in with a traditional mortis and tenon joint and is carved to a 'Traditional' profile that measures .838 inches at the 1st fret and .983 inches at the 12th. Topped with a Grade-A rosewood fingerboard with 22 medium-jumbo frets, with a 12 inch radius for each choke-free bending, the neck culminates in a headstock with the preferred 17-degree backward pitch for improved string pressure in the PLEK-cut Corian nut.
Pickups
To launch all of this tonal goodness into the stratosphere, the Les Paul Traditional with Bigsby carries two of Gibson USA's most popular humbucking pickups, a 57 Classic in the neck position for sweet, warm vocal tones, and a slightly hotter 57 Classic Plus in the bridge for gutsy crunch and soaring lead tones. These acclaimed units are made with genuine Alnico II magnets and wound with 42 AWG wire, just like the legendary PAFs of the late '50s and early '60s, and offer a blend of depth and clarity that few pickups can match today.
Hardware
One of the most exciting additions to this Les Paul Traditional guitar comes, however, in the tailpiece that helps to give it its name. A genuine Bigsby B-70 tailpiece has been installed by Gibson USA for the subtle, smooth vibrato action that only this original unit can deliver. The Bigsby is partnered with a Schaller roller bridge—a unit based on Gibson's own Tune-o-matic, but with individual roller saddles—for improved return-to-pitch capabilities when the vibrato is used. The hardware on this guitar is capped off with a set of quality TonePros Kluson-style tuners.
Crafted to exhibit the best characteristics displayed by the Les Paul Standard over the six decades of its existence, the Les Paul Traditional guitar is a fitting heir to the guitar that Eric Clapton brought into the spotlight in the mid '60s, and which quickly became the weapon of choice for countless top players, including Mike Bloomfield, Jimmy Page, Paul Kossoff and Jeff Beck.