Here’s a fairly rare guitar, a Gibson ES-325 TDW, where the ‘TDW’ stands for Two Pickup, Double Cutaway, Walnut finish. The TDW does not appear anywhere on the guitar or its label, bur does appear on marketing materials, to distinguish it from the ES-325 TDC with Cherry finish or the TD in Tobacco Sunburst. This guitar was built between 1972 and 1978 and is an original example of Gibson’s Norlin era production – Gibson’s corporate parent between 1969 and 1986.
Gibson
Seen here is a Gibson L-4C cutaway archtop acoustic guitar with an original DeArmond Rhythm Chief 1100 pickup with its ‘Monkey on a Stick’ mount. This fine vintage guitar very much looks the part, and it plays well. The 16-inch wide Gibson L-4C was introduced in 1949 and came to replace the non-cutaway L-4. That model first appeared in 1912 as an oval-hole archtop, with F-holes becoming available in 1935 and finally discontinued in 1956.
Introduced in 1954 as the top of the line, the Gibson Les Paul Custom featured a gloss black finish on a Mahogany body with carved Mahogany cap, an Alnico-V ‘Staple Top’ pickup in the neck position and a P-90 at the bridge.
The Gibson Les Paul Pro Deluxe was built from 1978 to 1982 and blended features of several previous Les Paul models. Based on the Les Paul Deluxe, the Pro Deluxe had P-90’s in place of mini-humbuckers, a Maple neck and Ebony fingerboard with trapezoidal position markers.
Introduced in 2003 and built at the Nashville Tennessee shop, the Gibson Les Paul Supreme is a high-end take on the classic design and features carved, highly figured Maple top and back. The construction of the Gibson Les Paul Supreme differs from the standard Les Paul though it uses the same basic materials as the Les Paul Custom. The carved top and back set are bookmatched, highly flamed Maple, on either side of a chambered Mahogany core
Coming from the now shuttered Memphis plant in 2014, the Gibson ES Les Paul combined classic Les Paul aesthetics with the immensely successful thinline ES concept. Along with the plant, this model has, as such, been discontinued by Gibson’s new management. The new ES-235 is perhaps its replacement in this class. Here we’re looking at a very, clean Gibson ES Les Paul sporting a Light Burst finish. There is very little wear of any type, to the frets, fingerboard, finish or plating.