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Gibson j45 all mahogany?


MorrisrownSal

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Not a J-45 but this LG2 definitely has a different sound. To me it sounds more mellow like a spruce top and maple sides. Doesn't have that bass thump I associate with a spruce/hog Gibson.

 

Ignore the large pick, I've already heard all the comments.

 

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Just played one today at the Thousand Oaks Instrumental Music at the Gibson demo today. Cool looking but I personally didn't like the sound compared to a mahogany J-45 with a spruce top. Not that this means anything but neither did the other 4 players in the acoustic area either. True it may be "crowd influence" but it was definitely my impression. Less defined notes, a bit muddy for my taste.

But then again, beauty is in the eyes and all that.

 

 

I loved the Maple AJ, however.. [scared]

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I love 'em. Along the lines of what Dave was saying about the LG; no, they're not the super-articulate metrosexual thingy music guitar that Matt from Eddie's Guitars, StL might be skillfully demo'ing some fingerstyle playing on, but they are some serious chord chunkers that can deliver a rumble when the top loads up as it's pushed to the limit. Would be a trusty singer-songwriter guitar. John Thomas (JT) might weigh in on this, as he too is a fan of hog topped J-45's.

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Thank you guys...

Didn't Gibson do a few JT guitars, one of them being Dave's hog LG2 reissue?

I am intrigued with the all hog J45. I love my all hog D15, and Musicians Friend has an all hog J45 with a burst on it... My wife is asking me what I want for my soon to be AARP membership celebration... I am not sure I can take the chance and buy one without playing it...

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Thank you guys...

Didn't Gibson do a few JT guitars, one of them being Dave's hog LG2 reissue?

I am intrigued with the all hog J45. I love my all hog D15, and Musicians Friend has an all hog J45 with a burst on it... My wife is asking me what I want for my soon to be AARP membership celebration... I am not sure I can take the chance and buy one without playing it...

 

Sal, Musiciansfriend has the 45 day return policy if you don't like it send it back.

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I heard one live - but as we know wood can't be judged through a PA-system. Neither in a good sounding bar.

 

However this variation looks good - very folksy and authentic. It's not a guitar you clown around with.

 

Worth noticing about the above is of course that it's a 19-fretter.

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I am intrigued with the all hog J45. I love my all hog D15, and Musicians Friend has an all hog J45 with a burst on it...

Thanks for the reminder that you already have the D-15 with some fairly sentimental fretboard inlay. Emin7 recently dusted off the old chestnut of "play your Martin and get to know your Gibson and vice versa " in the What's the Story behind your Favorite Guitar thread, and in this way, the hog J-45 would be a good way to contrast the short scale and round shoulders of the Gibson with the more boxy, "kettle" sound of the long scale and square shoulders of the Martin. This is the sort of comparo that has led me away from rosewood Martin squares, yet still deep into the rosewood, Gibson-style.

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I don't know if I could justify a J-45 for myself since I have a J-15, but an all-mahogany J-45, well... That is another story!

 

Secretly hoping I can live vicariously through you.

 

There are some demos on YouTube of all-mahogany J-45s, I believe, not that that is the best way to just a guitar, but it is helpful and better than nothing.

 

Also, Tman and his friends all got their ears blasted by a maple/spruce Advanced Jumbo prior to playing the mahogany J-45, so they were still too busy regaining their senses to formulate opinions. ;)

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Don't have an all hog J45, but a few months back I bought this used Alvarez AFM66ce. It's all mahogany and auditorium size. Not a Gibby, but still a nice and on-the-quiet-side tone. It's not the warmth of a J45, but still a friendly and warm sound. Of course, it doesn't have the size and power of a dreadnaught. I don't find it an inferior sound to other tone woods, just really different from say rosewood/spruce, hog/spruce, walnut, koa, etc./ First time I've knowingly owned a guitar that's the same wood for back/sides/top.

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My hearing is not that great anymore (too many loud amps in my teens and twenties) and it has to be a big difference before I notice.

 

I enjoyed it when JT released the CD with the different guitars and asked us to pick our favorite. It was a very nice comparison and I did hear a difference. I chose the laminated maple.

 

I have two all hog's and one all koa. The rest are a combination of some kind of spruce and either rosewood, hog, maple, walnut, laminate, or koa.

 

The big thing that I notice is that I like rosewood when listening live and maple when recorded.

 

 

 

 

 

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Don't have an all hog J45, but a few months back I bought this used Alvarez AFM66ce. It's all mahogany and auditorium size. Not a Gibby, but still a nice and on-the-quiet-side tone. It's not the warmth of a J45, but still a friendly and warm sound. Of course, it doesn't have the size and power of a dreadnaught. I don't find it an inferior sound to other tone woods, just really different from say rosewood/spruce, hog/spruce, walnut, koa, etc./ First time I've knowingly owned a guitar that's the same wood for back/sides/top.

The first for me was an all-hog solid wood ladder braced inexpensive Harmony back in the 1960's. To my ear, it sounded just like every hog-top I've played since then. The one exception is the wartime hog-top J-45, which I consider to be an excellent guitar.

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Thank you guys...

Didn't Gibson do a few JT guitars, one of them being Dave's hog LG2 reissue?

I am intrigued with the all hog J45. I love my all hog D15, and Musicians Friend has an all hog J45 with a burst on it... My wife is asking me what I want for my soon to be AARP membership celebration... I am not sure I can take the chance and buy one without playing it...

 

 

I thought the guitar Gibson copied from one that JT loaned them was actually a rare as heck 1942 LG-1 which at the time had X bracing and a mahogany top. But it would seem proper to call it a mahogany LG-2.

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I wish I could remember how to embed videos, but I can't. YouTube has a few demos of the mahogany-top J-45. Would be pretty hard for me to justify another Gibson at this point, but if these were affordable and around... or a mahogany-topped square-shoulder........ or all-mahogany 165.......

 

 

Anyway, I think you should go for it. You can always send it back, right? Listening to a video won't tell you what it's like to play it and what it sounds like to the player, but at least listening, through a mic, they sure sound nice to me. Sweet and dark sound, very different, but still with that thump and that kind of weird oomph that only the J-45 body/bracing (and J-15) have.

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Dave's guitar is one of the 50 copies of my LG-1. Gibson chose to call it an LG-2, probably because most think of the LG-1 as a ladder braced guitar (the 139 wartime LG-1s we're X-braced with fancy purflings front and back).

 

I love all mahogany guitars. To my ears, they have a crisp, clear tone. One of my few guitar regrets is selling an all mahogany Banner J-45.

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