Bought an inspired by Gibson Les Paul Modern a while back. An sound every bit as good as LP Standards I’ve Played. Tell me how you like the Fishman’s after you play them for a while, I’m interested in what you think
Beautiful guitar bud, used to have a red Gibson Classic and sold it.... Regret that.
I managed to play for around 3 hours switching between a Gibson Classic with Burstbuckers and an ESP LTD EC-1001TCTM with EMG 57 & 66 active pickups.
I switched between all guitars to make a comparison. The playability of the Epiphone is spectacular, its strange how the 24 frets make a 22 fret guitar feel really short when switching! I would say it's worth the money for the playability alone but it's a big step replacing the electronics.
Switching between the Gibson and the Epiphone PAF setting there is good and bad. The Fishman removes some of the low end the Gibson adds to the sound when playing rhythm which is actually quite nice, just tightens it up and adds some clarity. But, and I don't know if you feel this, there is something about the bounce of the strings under your finger with a Gibson, almost a bassy burst of muted distortion when you bounce your hand off the strings, and I love that feel. With the Fishman, it just sounda a bit scratchy than bassy.
The PAF sound is really good on Rhythm and I would say it's quite a nice sound. If you wanted an alterative PAF rhythm sound I would say it's great, if however it was to replace a Gibson PAF sound, then I'd stick with the Gibson.
The lead PAF sound isn't bad too, but it isn't good. It loses that aggressive mid range in favour of a more rounded and muted sound with a sharp element. This is probably the ceramics having there effect. The lower lead notes are quite clear and sound good, but the further up the neck I went the more brittle it sounded.
With the more modern sound, I really like the rhythm setting, really bright and just overall modern but not too clinical. Compared to the EMG in the LTD, the LTD was both modern but warm sounding. Both I would say sounded great, but I actually preferred the clarity of the Fishman.
The Lead sound with the EMGs is very clear, aggressive and makes you want to play, like the Burstbuckers, once you break into some lead it's hard to stop. Polarised sound from the Fishman, the lead sound is brittle, horrible to listen too and very sharp sounding. The further up the neck I played the more uncomfortable on the ear it became and playing lead then barring two notes made the pickups lose a lot of clarity.
On the Axe I could dial in quite easily a lovely amp sound, the Fishman Rhytbm played really well with a very pushed JCM800, but I just couldn't get the lead sound to sound inspiring.
To make sure it wasnt the Axe, I plugged in my Silver Jubilee, and it was pretty much the same result.
All in all, the guitar is fantastic, the pickups are not.
Saying that, I am not giving up yet, the guitar itself it's so nice I want to make sure I rule out all options.
If I could buy a Gibson with an asymmetrical fretboard with 24 jumbo frets I'd take it in a heart beat as I love the scale, the neck, the look and literally eveything about it.
I hope that helps, I will put some more info up tomorrow.
