What is it?
Any guitarist that doesn’t know the Gibson ES-335 story must have been living on planet Zog for the past 67 years. Therefore we won’t insult you with a full-on history and description.
Let’s simply remind ourselves of how this legendary model’s semi-hollow – laminated thinline construction with solid centre section, two deep cutaways and a set of powerful humbucking pickups – made it one of the best-sounding, most versatile and nicest playing electric guitars of all time. It’s up there as one of the coolest lookers, too.
As we’ve seen for some time now, Epiphone loves to get in on the act. And some of the instruments we’ve plugged in and played in recent years, especially the Joe Bonamassa models and these ‘Inspired By Gibson Custom’ offerings, have been mightily impressive.
The fact that they consistently fit Gibson USA pickups, and use top-flight hardware and electrics gives them a great advantage over much of the competition in this hotly contested sector.
For this new 1962 Reissue, Epiphone offers the two most popular ES-335 colours: Sixties Cherry and Vintage Burst. And featuring as it does the Gibson-style ‘open book’ headstock shape it takes a second or two to realise it’s actually not the genuine article.
Timber-wise, it gets pretty close, too. A cream-bound, laminated maple and poplar semi-hollow body with solid maple centre section is mated to a one-piece mahogany neck with bound genuine rosewood fingerboard and mother-of-pearl small block inlays (original Gibsons only had pearloid).
Everything looks and feels solidly made and the Vintage Gloss finish, though not nitrocellulose, is convincing enough with its slightly matted-off look, not dissimilar to Gibson’s own VOS treatment.
The Vintage Gloss finish, though not nitrocellulose, is convincing enough with its slightly matted-off look, not dissimilar to Gibson’s own VOS treatment
Where Epiphone has the potential to trump the competition is, of course, in its use of parent company Gibson’s pickups. Here, they’re the most excellent Custombuckers, said to offer tones redolent of the Patent Applied For double-coils fitted to ES-335s from 1958 until ’62 and even sometimes beyond.
Electronics and hardware are the good stuff, too, with CTS pots, Black Beauty paper-in-oil capacitors, genuine Gibson ABR-1 tune-o-matic bridge, and Gibson lightweight aluminium Historic Reissue stud tailpiece.
Tuners are Epiphone Deluxe ‘Kluson’ type with keystone buttons, while the knobs are period-correct top-hat with silver reflectors. With 22 medium jumbo frets making up the final piece of the puzzle, our 1962 ES-335 Reissue looks ready to rock.
Specs
- PRICE: $1,149/£1,099/€1,1299 (inc hardcase)
- ORIGIN: China
- TYPE: Double-cutaway thinline electric semi
- BODY: 5-ply layered maple/poplar with solid maple centre section
- NECK: 1-piece mahogany
- SCALE LENGTH: 629mm (24.75”)
- NUT/WIDTH: GraphTech /42.87mm
- FINGERBOARD: Bound rosewood with small pearl block inlays
- FRETS: 22 medium jumbo
- HARDWARE: Gibson ABR-1 tune-o-matic bridge, Gibson Historic Reissue aluminium stop bar, Epiphone double-ring ‘keystone’ tuners, aluminium strap buttons, black top-hat knobs with silver reflectors
- STRING SPACING, BRIDGE: 51.5mm
- ELECTRICS: 2x Gibson USA Custombucker humbuckers, 3-way toggle pickup selector switch, individual pickup volume and tone controls
- WEIGHT (kg/lb): 3.75/8.2
- RANGE OPTIONS: There are many semis in the ‘Inspired By Gibson’ collection, including ES-335, ES-345, ES-355, Dave Grohl DG-335 and more, but in the ‘Inspired By Gibson Custom’ range as yet the only option is the same guitar in Vintage Burst
- LEFT-HANDERS: No
- FINISH: Sixties Cherry (as reviewed); Vintage Burst – Vintage Gloss
- CONTACT: Epiphone
Playability and sounds
Epiphone calls this neck the 1960s SlimTaper C-shape. Not to be confused with the scarily skinny necks found on ES-335s of the previous year (this reviewer owned one and it would give an Ibanez ‘dinky’ a run for its money), the SlimTaper boasts an elegant shallow C profile with a depth of around 20.5mm at the 1st fret and 22.5mm at the 12th. It’s a happy compromise between super slim and, say, the Les Paul’s ’59 profile that’s a generally chunkier affair.
Although the general setup is excellent, with a perfect action height for comfortable, buzz-free playing, the fret ends are a little sharp in places, especially further up the neck. It’s a minor annoyance but one that could be easily fixed at final setup with a few minutes’ more attention.
To play devil’s advocate, though, it could also be as a result of slight fingerboard shrinkage after leaving the factory in China. Some guitarists won’t want to tackle a job like this themselves, so if you try one and love it, but it suffers the same minor malaise, ask nicely and the store’s technician will do it for you.
Other than that we can’t fault the playing experience. At 3.75kg (8.2lbs) the guitar is not overly heavy, and ES-335s balance superbly on a strap or in your lap, so this one has all the model’s positives going for it.
That’s equally true when it comes to sounds. It’s pure ES-335 from the moment you plug in. The bridge pickup played clean puts us in mind of Robert White’s famous riff on The Temptations’ My Girl. Although White played it on his Gibson L-5 jazz box, both tones have the same characterful honk.
It’s a great tone, too, for clanging open chords, or George Harrison-style riffy rundowns. No wonder Gibson and Epiphone semis were the darlings of the British Invasion groups.
Flip across to the neck and we’re in ‘thick Strat’ or ‘light jazz guitar’ territory. Again, it’s a versatile set of sounds that benefits from the ES-335’s oft-touted ‘airiness’. It’s certainly distinct from a Les Paul. And then we have that quacky middle position. Is it a bit Tele? A bit Gretsch? Possibly both, but there’s a twang to it that you could easily hear on a Monkees’ record. And that’s only the clean tones!
Think of the legions of ES-335 players that have dug dirty, dark and graunchy tones from their semis. From Clapton to Warren Haynes, Eric Johnson to Gary Moore, Alvin Lee to JoBo, Chuck Berry to Larry Carlton, it’s a salubrious list and all those sounds live here.
The pots taper gradually, so balancing the pickup selections as well as riding the controls offers a wealth of totally believable rock, pop, jazz and blues voices. You won’t be disappointed.
Verdict
Verdict: ★★★★½
Well, Epiphone has done it again. In many ways the semi is ideal for the Epi treatment. Essentially, it’s a plywood box (although rather nicer than the stuff you use to shore up a broken window), so it’s not reliant on the pure vibrations of Brazilian rosewood and Adirondack spruce on a £10,000 acoustic.
But it still possesses that aforementioned airiness, which, combined with the solid maple centre block here, provides perhaps the ultimate mix of sonic subtlety and brutal brawn.
It still possesses that airiness, which, combined with the solid maple centre block here, provides perhaps the ultimate mix of sonic subtlety and brutal brawn
We must also reiterate the use of those superb Gibson USA Custombucker pickups, plus equally classy hardware and electrics. Sure, we encountered a slight issue with sharpish fret ends, but that could have arisen due to natural causes and a quick 30 minutes on a technician’s bench will have the guitar back in tip-top playing condition. In the final analysis it’s the authenticity of the tones we love most.
Guitar World verdict: Even plugging it into a humble little Yamaha THR10 amp begets a wondrous palette of sounds that makes you forget the fact that one of these will cost you a fifth of what you’d pay for something with the Gibson Murphy Lab moniker on it. Do go and try one. We think you, too, will be smitten.
