But who makes the best non-Gibson Les Paul copy? Well, how long is a rope anyway? I suppose a rope is twice as long as half its length. I'd venture to say Gibson makes the best Les Paul guitar. Designed by Rich Lasner of Ibanez RG fame, the Yamaha Weddington has traditional LP specs and Weddington flash. Nevertherless, these are beautiful guitars. If you're looking for a cheap guitar, then the Yamaha Weddington is probably not for you. The SE 245 from Paul Reed Smith guitars has a shorter scale length, at 24 ½” with a relatively wide neck, making it comfortable for traditional guitarists. This is a great guitar for the money.Īre you a Les Paul traditionalist but can’t afford a vintage Gibson? This guitar is great price.
This guitar is similar to the LPs made in 1957, when PAF humbuckers were introduced to the design. There are a few even rarer models that can be worth more than $3,000.
The "Custom Agent" set-neck models are worth from $1,000-$1,500 (or more for rarer versions/colors) and a set-neck Professional with a vine neck (the "Randy Scruggs" model) will run you $1,500 to $2,500, or even more. These are great clone guitars, even the bolt-neck ones. Set neck models run anywhere from $800 and up.
at the time) and demanded they stop producing copies of their instruments, specifically their headstocks.Īn Ibanez Les Paul copy with bolt neck in excellent condition will run you about $500 these days (prices are up, as their reputation is growing). In 1977, Gibson sued the Elger Company (the distributor of Ibanez instruments in the U.S. By the mid-‘70s, these Japanese guitars consisted of mostly blatant copies of popular American designs and the quality was much better than people wanted to admit. In the early 1970s, American guitar manufacturers (particularly Gibson, Fender, and Martin) were experiencing a steady decline in production quality while more Japanese- built guitars were showing up in the American market. But this is only some of the Burny guitars. When were Burny Les Paul guitars built by Tokai? The information I've been able to locate indicates this happened in 1978-1979. Burny high-end Les Paul guitars are not as sought after, so you could get a real deal on one, especially if you happen to land one that was actually built in the Tokai factory. Some of the high-end Grecos and Edwards guitars are also heating up on the market. People have really caught on to the quality offered by Tokai. The best Tokai guitars are being bought up every day. As with all other makes of Les Paul copies listed on this page, the ones which say "Made In Japan " are going to be vastly superior guitars to ones made in either China or Korea. Some Fernandez or Burny guitars were built by Tokai. What I mean by this is that the Fernandez and/or Burny guitar company has no factories of its own. One painful thing which must be said here is that some of these Burny Les Paul guitars are really Tokai Les Paul guitars. If there is binding between the fretboard and the neck on a Burny Les Paul, then the guitar is higher quality. So there are some very qualified endorsements.Īgain, as with all other makes previously discussed here, Burny makes less expensive copies of the Les Paul, but they are still high-end and high-quality copies. We're talking about the kinds of persons who could afford any guitar on the planet, but they use a Burny. There are quite a lot of rock, metal, and punk guitarist who use Burny guitars. Burny and Fernandez are essentially the same company, but Burny makes Gibson copies while Fernandez makes the Fender copies. The Tokai copy has become so successful that I'm seeing some of the most decked out Tokai Les Paul copies selling for over a $1000.īurny guitars are another Japanese make. The higher the model #, the higher the quality. Once again, the model # tells you a lot about the guitar's build. The older Japanese models sell for a lot more. The Korean-made guitars are fairly inexpensive. What do these guitars cost? Well, there are loads of factors involved. That being said, it can be widely verified that Billy Gibbons plays this guitar. The guitars are built to be exactly like the Gibson, and so you'd have to be able to read the head-stock of the thing or have Billy Gibbons actually mention it. It can be incredibly hard to spot such a thing. However, he also plays a Tokai Les Paul copy on a regular basis.
So if these Tokai Love Rock Les Paul copies are so damned good, who's a famous player who plays one? Billy Gibbons, the big bearded Texas guitarist and singer for ZZ Top, is famous for playing an actual Gibson Les Paul he refers to as his "pearly gates" guitar.