Gibson Les Paul Special SL

This axe is pretty no-frills; twin P-100 pickups, two tone and two volume controls and a selector switch. It has a screwed-in pickguard. The best feature is probably the Gibson Deluxe tuners that are found on the headstock. But for the price you're paying, you can't expect many frills. This guitar is a no-thought axe. Just plug it in and play the damn thing. And it really works for that.

This guitar sounds like a Gibson despite the low price tag...I played several other Gibson Les Pauls (a Custom, a Standard and a Smartwood), and they sound similar. It seems that the only differences are the ornamentations on the other models. Obviously, they're beautiful guitars. But if you're willing to forego the mother of pearl inlays and Bullion Gold finishes, then you will get the same sound out of this axe that you will out of the big brothers. The P-100s do not cancel as much hum, though, but it actually gives the guitar more character.

This action was a bit high when I purchased it so I had the salesman lower it. Once he did this became a lean, mean machine. The finish is gloss black, and mirror-like. In the lights, this guitar can blind you. There's a small cutaway on the back of the guitar to fit under the stomach...probably taken from the Fender competitors, but it works. The guitar also feels a lot lighter than it's big brothers. Probably all those extra features that you're paying a thousand bucks more for...

This guitar could go through World War II and come out with a few dents and scratches, but still play flawlessly. It's built like a tank, and can take a pounding. Not that you'd want to have it take a pounding, but it's great to know that it's there when you need it. No need for a back-up with this puppy.

I've never dealt with Gibson's Support, but they're website is truly inspiring. It has an unmatched collection of information. I firmly believe that if I did deal with them, I'd come away smiling.

This guitar sounds like the uptown Gibsons, is built to withstand an air raid and will last longer than the cockroach. If you're willing to give up the gilt and flash of pricier LPs, then this guitar will please you endlessly.

gibson deluxe tuners..nice flat top. great price for a gibson! i will definetly be using this guitar for a long time..fast neck...fits any guitar need...great for a jazz or blues musician. some might say not but it works great with a twangy sound when you have a clean tone! hard to explain! guess youll have to find out for yourself.

great sound ! i like to play jazz rock and this is a great guitar that wont fuzz out when i dont put distortion on for those lighter songs....works great with all effects and sounds.

mine was used and had great action so yea...perfect condition sweet cinnamon / natural finish. nice hardware...tuning pegs had to be slightly tighetened.

works great all the time...the only time it doesnt sound good is when im playin like crap. definetly could be used without a backup because its built to last and is great for all sounds.

gotta love a gibson!

Made in USA 1999 or 2000. 22 beautiful jumbo frets. Solid mohogany. 2 vol. and 2 tone controls. Standard Gibson 490s and 498 Les Paul pickups. Tuneomatic bridge. A very standard but excellent Les Paul without the bells and whistles

You can play any style and get a perfect tone. I play Fender and Marshall amps and get a very big full rich bright tone. No dislikes hear.

The guitar can with high action but lowered it is minutes. No flaws at all. Finish was perfect as well as the constuction.

Strong as metal, well almost. Built to last a hundred or so years. No need for backup.

not dealt with.

This is the BEST Les Paul on the market. Reason: light weight, better, stronger more durable finish, no pickguard to get in the way, flat top for faster more accurate picking. No binding which keeps the strings from catching on the bindings. Has a much needed contour in the back of the body which makes playing this guitar a real joy.

Basically a LP Standard without the maple top, yet with a "classic" slim neck. Rosewood fretboard with smaller inlays than a standard. Mine has an ebony finish. Having two volume and tone controls is a big plus! It came with a very nice gig bag. One might consider adding a flat pick guard.

I play a little bit of everything directly into a Marshall 8040. However, most of the time I'm just messing around in the house with it unplugged. And let me tell you, this guitar is bright and full without an amp! With an amp, it's smooth and glassy on clean and provides clear unsaturated distortion on the boost channel.(My preference it to turn the gain up just to the point of saturation, and then back it off just a bit) Led Zep and STP is about as heavy as I get, and the tone from this guitar is more than adequate.

The action's a little high. I will probably have it lowered in a couple of weeks. The fit is tight- no flaws. The rosewood fretboard arrived very dry and in desperate need of conditioning, yet in tip-top condition. Mine has a natural dark streak all the way down the board. It gives it a lot of personal character.

I belive this guitar will well outlast any abuse I give it. The true test will be when my 2 year old gives it a work out... She attacks the strings much harder than I do.

I have never dealt with Gibson personally. I did find their website to be informative.

I have been playing off and on for about 7 years. Honestly, more off than on. However a fire has been lit under me recently, and for the last 6 months, I've been hyper-focused on playing. The natural progression was to buy some new gear. Volia - a new Gibson guitar!

I have a 1938 Martin acoustic- VGC, which is more of a conversation piece than a serious player's guitar. I also have a Samick(?) Strat copy I purchased new in 1994. Honestly, I did not know much about the LP Special, until a catelog arrived in the mail. What a bargin! A Gibson LP for <$500. This guitar is everything I want a guitar to be. It sounds great, looks great and it's a Gibson. If something were to happen to it, I would buy another one if possible - for I hear they are going to be discontinued. So far, I have found nothing to dislike about this guitar. I considered purchasing an epiphone LP standard, custom, or classic. For <$100 more, I went with the LP Special. No regrets.

2001 Model, Solid Mahogany, Selector switch, 2 volume, 2 tone pots. Duel Humbuckers, came with gig back, Basic a simply but great instrument. You can find all the details from the other reviews

it sound great on Blues, Surf music, Rock about anything I want to play
I tried thru several amps from Fender 65 twin reverb to Pevey tranformer 212 it sounded great in them all

The only gripe and it took a few seconds to corect was the Nut was too tight on the G string it very noticeable when tuning.
other wise it came very well set up.

I only had it a short while but this thing is built to last a lifetime
my grandchildren will be playing it.

never had to deal with them but have heard good things about them

I own two strats, wildkat and Martin SPDC-16gter
I read your reviews and decided it was a sound investment you where correct.
If it was stolen I would go find another one for sure
I choose this because of the price and the sound plus with the 45 days return policy if it was not a keeper I would have returned it.
I mainly wanted to confirm how great I like the quitar

2001 Model, Solid Mahogany, 2 Pick-ups, Selector switch, 2 volume, 2 tone pots.490 and 498 Alnico pick-ups.Pretty basic,but perfection in simplicity! Came with Deluxe gig-bag.

Classic rock, country, folk, blues. Solid, warm sound. Easily switched to any genre of music. Very quiet, days of sustain(wouldn't expect nothing less from Gibson!).

Flat-top mahogany, natural finish. Worth the price for the looks! Action a bit high, but can be adjusted easily with no buzz. I added a creme pick-guard flush on the top instead of up off the top like the arch-tops. Protects the finish and its not in the way.

It's a Gibson! I will play live anytime without a back-up with this guitar. Take care of it and it will take care of you! This applies to any guitar.

Haven't needed to contact support. Gibson on the headstock says it all.

This is one fantastic guitar! Not as heavy as the arch-tops. All you need. It lets you see and wonder where the added expense is on the Standards and Classic models! One other electric and three acoustics. This is my main one!

all you need to know about this is already posted. I just have to add my review to express my satisfaction towards this guitar.

it's a Gibson. I love the 490R and 498T combination.

my ebony finish looks really good. true, very easy to get dirty, but looks beatiful when clean. I really miss the bindings, I like the look they give to the guitar. no flaws whatsoever. the action is a *bit* higher than what I'm used to, but that's ok. no buzz at all.

seems like a solid guitar. haven't submitted it to intense conditions yet.. but I think it will last a lifetime.

I didn't have to deal with gibson and I expect not to. the guitar looks and feels 100% since day 1.

Fantastic Value. great guitar, great price.

This is a 2000, US-made Gibson Les Paul Special SL. It has the same fetures as a Special, but throws in some 490 and 498 humbucking pickups. You know the drill: 2 tones, 2 volumes, a three-way selector switch, slim-taper set mahogany neck, rosewood fingerboard w/ mini crown inlays, Les Paul Special decal on the neck, Gibson Deluxe (vintage style) tuners and all Gibson hardware. My model has a transparent natural finish (which I must say shows off the wood very nicely and gives the guitar a cool vintage vibe) Cme with a nicely padded Gibson gig-bag.

Well, first off, I play just about anything. I like to play alternative/pop/punk/classic rock. I play some metal, but none of the nu-metal (complete shit). I found that this guitar has a much warmer sound than my other (maple-topped) Pauls. It has a really nice jazz tone when you throw the neck pickup on. My rig consists of a Vox AC30 amp, a Marshall JMC900 halfstack, and Fender Princeton Chourus. I throw a Ibanez Tubescreamer, Boss DS-1 Distortion or a HM-3 Hyper metal in front of them to get some differant sounds. I also use some assorted Boss and Electro-Harmonix petals for the wierder sounds. I think that this guitar fits very nicely with my other guitars, because it delivers a slight differant tone than any of them. I play in a both an alternative rock group and a 15-piece jazz group, and I can say that this is the ONLY guitar that I would prefer using for both. It can handle smooth jazz or raw rock easily. Some people look at this guitar and think it is a poor-mans Les Paul. I own three Pauls (two Standards and a Deluxe) and this is my favorate. I would have paid 3-4 times as much for this guitar if I had too, and one day, I know that it will be worht that much.

The factory set-up was pretty good. The action was a bit high, but nothing a little adjusting couldn't fix. I looked over the guitar pretty well, and everything looked fine to me (I'm really not that perticular) Once I lowered the action, it played fine.

This thing is like a tank

They have always been kind and helpful, whatever the concern or problem.

If it was stolen, I would cry like a baby, then go grab another one. I think they are a special edition model and they won't be around for long, so I suggest you grab one while you can. I might throw a coil tap in and I might change the Bridge HB to a Seymour Duncan JB (not that is bad, I just love JB's) This is a keeper, and to me, it spells "Collectors Guitar". Good luck. Lata.

Your basic stripped down Les Paul. No maple cap on the mahogany body, no binding, mini-trapezoid inlays rather than larger trapezoids. Big deal. Set mahogany neck. ABR bridge, stop tailpiece. $90R and 498T humbucker pickups (they also make a version of this with P-90s). Natural finish. Non-locking tuners. Gig bag included. Not many features - no coil tap, 3 position pickup switch. This is the SL (sans lacquer) model. Lighter weight than a normal Les Paul with a body contour in the back. Made in US.

I am using it with a Laney LC15 tube amp, a variety of small solid state aops. I also play through a Johnson J-Station, Korg AX100G, and a few overdrive pedals. This guitar has a rich, full sound, and handles high gain better than any other guitar I own. It sounds great through the Rectified setting on the J-Station, which is not an amp simulation I use much with other guitars. I expected that. I did not expect it to sound as good clean as it does. I may have gotten lucky here, but I don't have any grounding issues at all - this guitar is dead quiet, unlike what some of the other posters have mentioned.

The guitar came with a long checklist of setup items done at the factory. The setup was perfect (it even came in tune, although downtuned half a step). Action was medium with no fret buzzing. For a guitar which is designed to skimp on cosmetics, this is a very pretty guitar. I like the natural finish a lot. It either is a one piece body or the best job of bookmatching I have ever seen. The knobs look a little cheap, but would be quite inexpensive to replace if necessary.

I'd never use anything without a backup, but I'd have no reservation about using this live. Marked down a bit here because set necks are inherently more fragile than bolt-ons.

I haven't dealt with the company. The Web site is pretty good. Lifetime warranty, but it excludes just about anything that could go wrong. Your call as to whether it's worth the stamp to send it in. I bought it from Musician's Friend, who were great. Got it here in three days.

I've been playing about 30 years, but with a 20-some odd year break in the middle. I own about a dozen electrics - the ones I use the most are Fender Strat Plus Deluxe, Route 101 Solimar, Parker P-38, and Fender Nashville Tele Deluxe. I have liked the sound of Les Pauls, but have avoided them because of the price (not a problem here) and the weight (this is not nearly as heavy as most Les Pauls). The pickups are the same as the Les Paul Standard. This is one great sounding guitar, and the lighter weight, which is a minus for Les Paul purists, is a big plus for me. I wish it had a whammy bar, a coil tap or single coil option. Right now, this makes all of my other humbucker guitars obsolete, with the exception of my Steinberger GT-Pro, which is a small travel guitar. For a US-made Gibson, it's a very good value.

You've read it in previous reviews.

Love everything until I get up past the XV position, then gets a little whiny. Still, a very versatile guitar considering its humbuckers.

Can't find a problem

Definitely a top notch instrument to use in a gig. Only complaint is that the pickup selector sometimes has to be switched back and forth 2 or 3 times for it to "click in."

No problems.

I've been playing for 6 years and this guitar makes me want to play for years more. A Gibson for under $400??!! Can't go wrong. I sure love it.