I literally get hammered on here to review this or that DIY Guitar kit… “Can you do a review on the BYO ’59 LP Kit?”… ” I see you did a solid top, but how good Are the Bulldog LP-S Kits?” … “When are you going to do an SG or an LP Junior?” and “How about one of those Precision Guitar LP Kits”… And honestly… I’m a little tired of building Les Paul Guitars and indeed, it makes my wife crazy…

So… I do what I want… However,

’59 Les Paul Guitar Kit Review

 This kit is reported to have been made from plans drawn from an original 1959 Gibson Les Paul AKA “The Holy Grail” of electric guitars that was disassembled by the builder of these kits and it utilizes all the traditional materials and methods from the real deal.

“Historically Accurate ‘58, ’59 1960  top carve, one piece mahogany body, one piece quarter sawn mahogany neck, Rosewood fretboard, original style celluloid inlays, correct 14 degrees headstock angle, correct truss rod end cavity, correct 10/32″ truss rod thread, fret nibs, 12″ fretboard radius, correct long tenon, solid Canadian maple top, .”

  This DIY Guitar review may actually be a second look at a product that was available a couple of years ago that caused quite a stir on a guitar forum I am a member of… Someone with a gripe sent me one and basically wanted me to expose the kits as junk … However, because it was only one kit of very many I did not do a write up on it because it was possible that the kit I was sent was just one bad example of the product.  Now… I’m not at all sure about any of this… It’s only a hunch…  There may also be some other shenanigans involved in this example of the unfinished Les Paul kit as well and I will disclose everything that makes me think this during the course of this review.

 The ’59 “Gibson Les Paul” Guitar Kit as it Arrived:

 

 

 

 

 

 ’59 LP Replica Kit Quality:

Um, well… Wow:

 

 

The wood is very “clean” and has a decent  “ring” to it. The maple cap is hard as good maple should be and the overall workmanship is very, very good.

The total weight of this kit as you see it is 7.2 lbs.; the headstock matches pretty much precisely within the range of all the examples and plans I have at my disposal.. The only thing I can identify as out of vintage correctness is the lack of “wings” that make up the headstock of the originals.

 

My only two gripes are these:

 

 

 

 Building this ’59 LP Kit

Just a few shots of how it all comes together:

 

 

 

  If you are looking closely you will notice that this kit has an ebony board and the inlays are white mother of pearl rather than rosewood and celluloid… It is an option for this kit and I bought it this way because that’s what I wanted.  However I did see highly detailed images of the rosewood boards and inlays and those were just as impressive as any I have seen.

 

 

 

 

  This Guitar kit is going together so well it kind of scares me. I sat and ploinked on it for a while after I set the bridge and did a pre-finish set up…  The damn thing plays like butter… I don’t think I’m even going to have to touch the frets. And man it “sings”  the raw tone of this instrument is most excellent. The quality and selection of woods, binding, inlays and overall fitment is excellent… I  give this LP  Kit a Double A+ with a bullet for quality and reported list price.

…

The Weirdness Behind this Guitar Kit

The reasons I think there may be something a little not right about this review:

I was contacted by someone claiming to want this kit built and “honestly reviewed” and they were willing to pay me to do it… I was basically given the money to purchase this kit and a little extra money in order to complete it.

The way this purchase was set up would have made it difficult to “cherry pick” the item shipped to me for inspection but not impossible to do so… I have no way of knowing for sure.

Also: the person that footed the bill for this may or may not be who he said he is, and may have some other agenda here, because after I purchased the kit with their money, I had some talks with the vendor I received it from… And the stories don’t match…

Basically I was told by the guy that footed the bill that the kit I had in my hands here was from a limited run… The vendor I got it from said he could get me all I wanted.

So… This review for what it’s worth:

These ’59 Les Paul Replica kits are not available just yet… I’m told they will be available soon at the price of about $700… I’m told I will be contacted when they (you know… that they… also known as Them) are ready to go to market with this kit… And as soon as that happens I’ll publish that info right here: (—Link to Somewhere in the Near Future… I Guess—)

My thinking on why this all came about is:  I’m being used as market research because my crazy blog here does currently get about 12,000 hits a month for things like this.

… Then again they (Those THEM) could just be trying to drive me crazy.

 

UPDATE:

The Finished Guitar:

 

 

 

June, 10, 2012:   Unfortunately there is still no word on when (or if) this kit will be available on the market.