The
Gibson Les Paul Traditional 12 String Electric Guitar is an instant classic that is quite possibly the most powerful sounding and best playing 12 string electric guitar ever created! This incredible instrument is equipped with all the hallmarks of the popular Les Paul Traditional, including its legendary tonewoods, groundbreaking hardware complement and sensational humbucking pickups, with minor alterations to make it a solid and smooth-playing 12-string electric.
To top it all off, the Gibson Les Paul Traditional 12-String is available in your choice of the most popular Les Paul finishes in high-gloss nitrocellulose lacquer, and complemented with traditional vintage-cream binding and pickguard and gold speed knobs. This guitar joins the ranks along with the other 12 string Gibson electrics that have left a stamp on music for many decades.
Gibson Les Paul Traditional 12 String Electric Guitar Features
- Choice Mahogany body with carved Maple top
- Grade-A Maple neck with fast, comfortable '60s profile
- Powerful '57 Classic and '57 Classic Plus pickups in the neck and bridge
- Modified 12-string Tune-o-matic bridge and stopbar tailpiece
- High-quality Mini Grover tuners
Tonewood
Like all of the finest Les Pauls, the Les Paul Traditional 12-String from Gibson USA starts with a body made from choice mahogany, weight relieved for your comfort, and capped with a carved maple top. This combination offers a time-tested marriage of tonewoods that combines the best elements of mahogany's depth and richness and maple's clarity and definition.
To this foundation, Gibson USA gives the Les Paul Traditional 12 string a glued-in Grade-A maple neck for the extra stability demanded by the string tension of this guitar. The neck is carved to a fast, comfortable '60s profile that measures .800 inches deep at the 1st fret and .875 inches at the 12th, and is topped with a Grade-A rosewood fingerboard with 22 medium-jumbo frets and traditional acrylic trapezoid inlays.
In order to accommodate six extra strings without cramping your playing style, Gibson USA ekes out a little extra real estate on the 'board by extending the width of the PLEK-cut Corian™ nut to 1.750 inches. The extended headstock remains true to Les Paul style, with a mother-of-pearl Gibson inlay and gold ‘Les Paul Model’ silkscreen, a truss-rod cover engraved with ‘Traditional,’ and 12 high-quality Mini Grover tuners.
Electronics
The pickups are the final key factor in blasting the Gibson Les Paul Traditional 12-String through sonic territory into which 12-string electric guitars rarely venture. A '57 Classic in the neck position and a '57 Classic Plus in the bridge provide singing chime, sweet in-between tones, or brilliant leads at the flick of a three-way switch, providing more guts and glory than you've ever heard in a 12-string before. Both pickups are made in the style of Gibson's legendary PAF humbuckers, with Alnico 2 magnets and 42 AWG wire, with extra turns in the bridge pickup's coils for added grind and gusto.
Hardware
An iconic Tune-o-matic bridge and stopbar tailpiece, both modified for the 12-string, provide firm anchors for excellent resonance and sustain, and easy intonation adjustment. All in all, the Les Paul Traditional 12 string guitar is one of the most powerful and versatile 12s ever produced.
Gibson 12 String History
Gibson has a long and glorious history of crafting top-notch electric 12-string guitars, from the elegant ES-335-12 of 1965, to the EDS-1275 that enabled Led Zeppelin's Jimmy Page to segue seamlessly from the 12-string intro to ‘Stairway to Heaven’ to the ripping 6-string solo in live performance. Now Gibson USA merges its 12-string expertise with a legendary electric for what might be the most powerful-sounding and best-playing rendition of the breed ever created: the Les Paul Traditional 12-String.