As I mentioned in my last post, I have decided to sell my Les Paul. My main issue with it is the neck. I am primarily a lead guitarist, and the neck on the LP is so fat that it makes soloing fairly difficult. It’s great for rhythm and some minimalist lead stuff, but anything too fancy just becomes pretty tough.

Anyway, I’m currently toying with these choices (among others):

1) PRS DGT

First of all let me say that I am not a PRS fan. I think that most of them look extremely gaudy with all the highly figured maple tops and extreme bursts. I would much rather see a natural-looking woodgrain or a solid color paint job. Anyway, the DGT is a signature model (another thing I try to avoid). This guitar is the product of a collaboration between PRS and David Grissom, a long time user of the PRS McCarty model. Grissom added a lot of tweaks to the basic McCarty such as a trem, modified pickups, a coil tap (to switch between humbucking and single coil modes), separate volume controls for the neck and bridge pickups, a thinner neck, and fatter frets.

I think that this guitar would be like a Swiss Army knife. On paper, it looks like if should be able to cover all kinds of tones. I have been talking to a guy on TGP for the last couple of days about a potential trade. The values of these two guitars are pretty similar, so it’d be an even swap.

2) Gibson ES-339

You are probably familiar with the ES-335. Well, the 339 is a slightly smaller version of the 335. This guitar is about the same size as a Les Paul. Obviously (maybe), this is a semi-hollowbody guitar, so it’s very lively and resonant. I like the looks of these guitars, and they have really good access to the upper frets. I would choose the 30/60 neck option, which is basically the modern/slim neck profile. I think I would like these guitars, but I really need to play one before I make a decision.

Again, several guys on TGP have inquired about trades involving this guitar. One guy even offered to throw in a WCR pickup of my choice. That’s a pretty attractive trade. Most of those trades have been for the cherry finish. I’d prefer the tobacco burst, but I guess it’s not that big of a deal.

I guess I need to plan a trip out to Guitar Center to take a few out for a spin. I hate going to that store, though. It’s so hard to hear anything with all the Hendrix/SRV/Creed/Metallica wannabes wanking away.

This entry was posted on Sunday, March 7th, 2010 at 10:02 pm and is filed under guitar.You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.