Following the runaway success of his 1955 Copper Iridescent Les Paul Standard, Epiphone and Joe Bonamassa have put their heads together to come up with another signature guitar fashioned after one of the über-rare pieces in the blues guitar superstar’s collection, a dual-pickup 1959 Les Paul Custom.
As Bonamassa explains, a ’59 Les Paul Custom – all dressed up in its tux – with only two electric guitar pickups is a rare thing indeed. Speaking to the Gibson Gear Guide’s Dinesh Lekhraj, he tells us we are much more likely to see the three-pickup configuration, such as Eric Clapton’s 1958 Custom that Gibson recently made a Murphy Lab replica of.
“For those out there that don’t know, they made a lot of two-pickup Customs. Starting in 1968, they made thousands and thousands and thousands of them. They just never made ‘em in the ‘50s,” says Bonamassa. ‘There’s probably less than 20 original 1950s two-pickup Les Paul Customs. They are almost always three pickups. And for the exception of a short run in, I believe, ’59.”
Under 20? That’s rare. Of course, Bonamassa has one squirrelled away. But he’s not the only one in the Gibson/Epiphone extended universe to own one. Gibson brand president and CEO Cesar Gueikian has one, too.
“I believe our CEO has a two-pickup Custom I saw at his house,” says Bonamassa. “His guitar and my guitar are pretty close in serial numbers, 20 off, so there was a batch of them.”
The difference is that Bonamassa’s has a Bigsby B70, and that gives it a little secret sauce – a voice all of its own. Fender 2-point synchronized tremolos, Floyd Rose double-locking vibratos, all great and good; but each and individual Bigsby has a certain something…
A twang? Lekhraj makes the suggestion, and you can hear that here, too, a certain resonance atop the usual cream you get from the Epiphone Probucker Custom humbuckers.
“Given the fact that this is all-mahogany with an ebony fingerboard, and a Bigsby it’s a little more hi-fi, but it will rock, it will roll,” Bonamassa assures us.
As for the specs, Bonamassa has revealed some of the highlights here but what most excites us – besides the fact the 7-ply binding on the top of the body has been yellowed to age it – is the long neck tenon construction. Great to see at on an Epiphone guitar with a £949/$999 price tag.
The neck is mahogany, shaped into a 1960 rounded medium C profile. And those dimensions are as you would want, 12” fingerboard radius, 24.75” scale, medium jumbo frets. It’s a Custom so you have the pearloid block inlays, the split diamond inlays and 5-ply binding on the headstock. The Grover Imperial tuners are a touch of old-school class.
The hard-shell guitar case is included in the price, stencilled “BONAMASSA, NERDVILLE, CA” and “FRAGILE,” and it’s lined in yellow fur, that looks gold in a certain light. All the better to go with the hardware.
The Joe Bonamassa 1959 Les Paul Custom is available now – see Epiphone for more details. In other Bonamassa signature swag news, only last week Seymour Duncan expanded its signature collection with the Bolin Burst humbucker set – the aftermarket mod you need to make your Les Paul sound like the 1960 original.
