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Parafin, It´s hard to say if Martins are more expensive here in Europe. Just checked a standard D-28 price - found 2.999$ at an US store. Here in Germany you finda new D-28 for 3.400€ in dirfferent online shops, which is really much more than in the USA (1$ = 0.93€ at the moment). Calculation would give around 2.800€ - without transportation, taxes, customs fees. I have bought a D-28 in 2018 for 2.790€ in Germany but this is a long time ago. The number of offered Martins and escpecially Gibson acoustics is not big here at the moment. I have bought a new Martin D-18 two weeks ago in a store in Germany and I could talk to one of the store managers. The prices for Martins and Gibsons will rise in the next weeks due to the high inflation rate and new deliveries are rare. So you can´t do anything wrong if you buy a Gibson or Martin or both - you are saving your money from inflation and will have a lot of fun playing the new guitar. As described several times in this discussion, you should not give a damn about the opinion of so-called experts. My experience when buying the first Gibson (and Martin) acoustic guitars was that these experts have never owned such an instrument themselves in life and simply heard their "knowledge" somewhere. And still Gibsons should be bad according to the opinion of these "experts". Meanwhile I own 10 of them and all of them are very good, play well, sound fantastic and also look magnificent.

No, did not get any reply or information. I did not ask Gibson directly up to now. Anyhow - my new ES335 is a very good guitar and I like it. I´m just curious how things work. Doc

Murph, thank you for the information about the Peavey 1210 - I´m sure the sound was great - but they must be very heavy! But power amps had no power compared to today and speakers had to have a high efficiency. Sad to hear about the changes at Peavey. Peavey transitor amps and the small tube amps like the Bravo or the Classic 30 have been very popular here in Germany, a lot of bass amps and PA power amps have been sold her, too. They have been affordable and had a good quality. But to be honest, I stopped buying Peavey amps when the modern amps like the Vampyr series came on the market.

Murph, sorry for beeing unprecise - I mean the modern PAs as your Bose. I´m very intersted in the history of PA and speakers, will look in the internet for the "column" in the 60/70s and the 1210. My only Peavey amp is a Nashville 400 pedal steel amp which weighs a ton or so. Peavey PA equipment has disappeared in Germany but was on used quite often. My LD Systems MAUI is similar to the Bose you have show on your photo. The market is full of this type of small PAs. I like that they are less sensitive to feedback and sound quite good but there are limitations if the stage is too big or open air or the band too loud which could happen 🙂 - it´s only Rock´n´Roll.

My rig is quite simple. 2 pieces of LD Systems MAUI 11 G2, acoustic guitar in the case of mixed band with drums, e-guitars etc. per DI box (Palmer or Radial) via mixer to the PA. For acoustic "only" applications I try to put a AKG mic in front of the acoustic guitar - with all disadvantages. Sessions/open mics - i take whatever is available but bring my own DI box to the gig. For very small settings I have an Acus One-8 acoustic amp which is enough for a guitar and a mic or two guitars. As the Acus has now 48V phantom power I´m sometimes usind an external phantom power supply, a cheap box I have bought from thomann. I do not use the Acus in most of the band situations as I´m changing between electric and acoustic guitar and transport of my Fender amp is enough, although I have switched to Tonemaster Deluxe Reverbs. Anyhow the transportation capacity of my car is limited. Regarding PAs I prefer "column" PAs since some years as my acustic guitar sound is better than in the classic subwoofer/speaker setups we had before but this is depending on the quality of the PA.

Interesting information about Udo Roesner. I just new from the guitar magazines that another AER guy went to Hughes & Kettner.

Interesting discussion. I have bought a 335 Sixties Cherry from the "orignal" series, built in October, 2021 - with T-style pickups. The nitro finish of the ES335 is not thicker than on any other of my Gibson electrics (LP 50s, LP specialk, SG Special 1961, SG Standard 1961, all of them built between 2019 und 2021). A nice red color, no orange peel, drops of lacquer etc. The structure of the maple is nicely shining through the coating. I had no chance to compare this ES335 to an old one as I only have an 2004 Epiphone Dot but this is totally different. I like the "T" pickups. I´m playing Fender amps (Princeton, Deluxe Reverb, Tonemaster Deluxe Reverb) and it sounds great for me - very open, good clean tone, the "acoustic" component shimmers through the tone. Never had the impression to have "ice picks" on the guitar - but maybe this is the calibration of my ears as I´have played a lot on Telecasters. The "Rhythm" pickup even delivers a lot of bass tones. Chords sound with a good resolution, even with some overdrive. My Volume pickup is never full open, mostly between 4 and 6, Tone Control on 10. Amp setting mostly around 12 o´clock for bass and treble. That´s just my personal observation. As already mentioned I had no chance to play an older ES335. But the one I bought is fine for me. I´m glad not to have a thick "Jazz" tone.

I have one, built in September 2021, found it surprisingly in a local guitar store in Nuremberg. Could not resist, price was 1.400€. No I have a Pelham Blue SG 61 Special with P90s and the Standard with Humbuckers. It looks phantastic, varnishing is very good. The "unplugged" SG Standard rings which motivated me to ask for an amplifier. And it has the sound I have expected from a SG mit Humbuckers. Nice neck, luthier working at the guitar store made some optimiziation of the saddle notches and that´s it. Pickguard size - yes, the big one can be a matter of tast, but looking on photos of musicians know as SG users you see both pickguars types. So the "big" one is fine for me. I have made my piece with the softcase. It protects the SG quite good. Of course a tool storage compartmen inside is missing and the softcase is not really good stackable as normal cases. But it is very comfortble to carry and the quality impression is quite good.

Plain rectangle as on my J35 looks good., because it is so simple. There is another rare bridge on the SJ100 1941 reissue - or the dove, bought are quite thick. At the end of the day I do not really care about the bridge if I like the sound. Dave F´s post leads to some interesting physical background.

Have replaced th curling pickguard (which has already been re-fixed by a luthier) by a new pickguard bought at mv custom guitars, Greece. Quite comfortable for people living in the EU. 160€ - so not cheap, delivery time 6 weeks after order as I have ordered at the beginning of summer holidays, arrived carefully packed, very good quality, nice colors and engraving. For my feeling it is rather thick, but maybe this is "historically correct". Have fixed the new pickguard on my 2018 Hummingbird and everything is fine - and I hope it will stay fine. I have cleaned the original "flubby" pcikguard which opposed to all efforts to flatten it and will keep it with my guitar.

Could not find any information how the new ES335 modell is wired up, Gibson´s description just says "hand-wired with 500K potentiometers and orange drop capacitors". Is it "modern", "50s" or "60s" type wiring? My new ES335 shows a quite strong interaction between tone and volume control - it´s getting quieter when tone control is rolled of (and of course the tone is getting more mellow) which could be an indicator for 50s wiring? No idea, maybe there is an expert in the forum who can give me more information. It´s just for curiosity, it works fine for me and sounds good as it is.

Thank you! I was on the "waiting list" of this guitar store - wanted to buy an ES335 or ES345 in August and they had nothing, same situation as you are in. And they really informed me immediately after the ES-335 arrived on Wednesday last week. And now they have to wait for another ES-335. It´s my 60s birthday guitar - got it before I will be 61. Have an 2004 built Epiphone DOT (made in Korea) - a good guitar but nothing compared to the new Gibson. The Gibson is lighter, better wood, better optics, pickups are great for me, I like the more "open" sound of the new ES-335, hard to describe. I hope you will find one soon! Doc

Same situation here in Germany. The big retailers offer 20 to 50 different ES-versions in the webstores, but nearly nothing - maybe some with prices > 5.000€ - are available. But - last week a brandnew ES-335 60s Cherry (produced October, 28th in Nashville) found the way to a store in Nuremberg - and now it belongs to me. A beautiful instrument, great playability after the luthier of the store has optimized string height at bridge and the saddle notches. It sounds great, couldn´t stop playing on this guitar. So I am glad that one "hoarder" maybe has focussed on canned ravioli (not to find every brand and can size in the supermarkets at the moment) or AdBlue (additiv for diesel engines) - and not on ES-335s

Same opinion! Looking back 40 years an Ibanez acoustic was the only reasonable guitar I could buy - before internet - in our rural area and could afford as a student. Epiphone was not available in the late 1970s and 1980s. I have seen the first Epi acoustics in the 1990s a this have been quite cheap versions. I think the level Epihone has now in the higher price ranges (not talking about the new USA production as this is Gibson again) have made a good progress in quality. Maybe some of the older Korean Epis are quire good, too, but I just can speak for my 1995 Casino. Maybe sometimes a D28 or HD28 can be useful for certain musical constellations 🙂 - but most of my acoustic guitars are Gibsons.

I agree - strange times 🙂 You can continue the list - no cars as electronic components are missing - no guitar effect pedals (some have 12 weeks delivery time, no boutique stuff). Guns are no topic here as you can´t buy them anyhow. Toilet paper - same thing as you described, it´s available again since last summer. But - guitars are at least as important as toilet paper 🙂! The largest internet dealer here in Germany told me that they are expecting the next bigger deliveries in April, 2022. So I take one of my "old" Gibsons an practice Guitar Town and Hillbilly Highway. Have a nice weekend!

Ok, seems to be a longer lasting topic ... Boyd´s answer cites a thread from May. Sorry for writing more about electrics, situation is the same for acoustic Gibsons. Had the hope that the supply situation has recovered.

Maybe my question is a little "off topic" but I hope someone has more information. At the moment it is nearly impossible to buy new electric Gibson guitars in Germany and the offer of acoustic Gibsons is not very comprehensive. No Les Paul modells, ES-335 etc - only few Murphy Lab or Custom shop in price range > 5.000€, nearly nothing from the original series or ES-330 (the Slim Harpo model looks quite interesting). Do you have the same situation in the USA? Is it related to effect from Covid-19, the global transportation problem with container carriers or is Gibson just selling so many guitars that they cannor serve the market? I´m just wondering as for example the availabilty of Fender or Taylor guitars is much better at least here in the big music internet stores in Germany. I hope the Gibsons will come back again as my last "electric" aquisitions (LP Standard, Special and SG Special) have been fine with a reasonable price.

The "aftermarket" supplier I have mentioned above is MV - I have ordered a pickguard some weeks ago. Quite easy as in the EU. Got an order confirmation after short time, delivery date end of September as they have closed due to summer holidays at the moment. No problem if the new pickguard will fit, stick and look good. I can give an update as soon as I have fixed it on my Hummingbird. As Kelly Campbell writes - why do they not sell replacement pickguards? I would have tried to get an original one from Gibson. Fear of product piracy? On the other hand you can buy tuners with original "Gibson" logo - for example at Thomann. Needed replacement for my 61 SG Special as I wrecked one, no problem. I would look for a replacement pickguard for my J45 VS from 2016 - same problem but not so eye-catching as it has a simpler shape. Same kind of "flubby" pickguard on my Southern Jumbo makes no problem ... hard to understand.

Gabor, I have the same problem with a 2018 Hummingbird. Lifting started some weeks after I have bought the very nice guitar. I had been re-glued by an authorized Gibson service point which is not so easy to find in Germany. Same with the often mentioned, famous 3M adhesive sheets from StewMac - export to Europe is not so easy due to custom duties and taxes. I do not now which type of adhesive the service guy has used but it lifted again after 1 year. I have removed the pickguard carefully as described above, cleaned everthing with lighter fluid and have tried to convince the curling pickguard to be flatt. This did not work anyhow. I heated the pickguard up, pressed the warm pickguard between heavy books, re-heated etc. - there seems to be a memory effect in the material curling again when it is cooling down even if it was flatt at higher temperatures. So any adhesive tape or sheet will have to resist the "curling forces" for a long time. There is no chance to buy an original replacement pickguard from Gibson so I am waiting for an aftermarket replacement pickguard which hopefully will look good and be flatt. Of course I have kept the original pickguard for any cases the replacement part will not work. As mentioned in other threads. I love my Gibson acoustics and I always wanted to have an original Hummingbird as I started playing guitar in 1978 on an Ibanez HB clone. No as an old guy I had the money for the new guitar, but the quality of the pickguard is disappointing. Pickguards on my J35, J185 or Advanced Jumbo maple to not move a millimeter. Good luck with the repair work!

Had the same experience with Earnie Ball electric guitar strings - not as bad as we can she on Brucebub´s photos, but b- and high e-string could not be used. But this was only an random finding, maybe there have been some variations in the packaging process at the string manufacturers. I have some quite old strings only packed in paper bags - without corrosion ...

It depends .... I have very different experiences with older (about 3 years), new and very old guitar strings. All of them have been stored at room temperature (16 - 24°C, 40-60% rel.hum.) in the original packages. Had corroded high b- and e-strings in quite new sets of Earnie Ball and Fender electric guitar sets, completely good, clean Martin guitar strings in old paper bags and up to no problems with Gibson strings (phosphor bronze, (80/20s) in the original hermitcally sealed Gibson bags. So it is hard to say what will happed but in my case 98% of even very old unused strings made no problems. As the thread is drifting in direction "coated strings" - I like the coated Gibson strings, but I did never like other coated strings with the exception of Martin Lifespan strings.

Removing pickguards is easy if you have got the "flubby" version which has been discussed in this forum so many times. They come off the guitar by themself, just some lighter fluid needed for removing some glue ... I am still angry about the pickguard of my 2018 Hummingbird, all advices how to "flatten" the removed pickguard before fixing it again did not work in my case up to now.

This seems not to be Gibson-specific, had the same issue at the neck of my Martin D28 - on the side of the low E-string, around fret 1 after 1 year. I completely understand that this should not happen - the guitars cost enough money - but it seems to happen. My Gibsons do not show this kind of defect up to now. What did I do - not very much, just polishing the spot with Micro Mesh. I take it as normal traces of playing . Had worse flaking off lacquer on the lacquered maple neck of my 1994 Fender Strat - which is no Nitro coating.

Due to the Corona situation we have "extended" the open air rehearsals up to now - sunshine, not too dry, 7 to 12 degrees centigrade (location in Bavaria, Germany). My experience of the last two weekends is that the week point are the musicians, not the instruments. After about 2 hours the right hand gets so cold that holding the plectrum can be difficult and as written above you have to change to songs with a simple chord stucture. The other topic is the clothing - ski underwear can help 🙂. No problems with the guitars - we have no campfire or infrared heater, just the remaining sun which is not very powerful here in November. I have used a Gibson Dove and a Martin D28 - gave both some time for acclimatization in the case when I brought them out of the rehearsal room and back. One time some light rain started, that was the signal to pack the Gibson back and switch to a Harley Benton Acoustic. Tuning was never a problem after a first "basic" tuning when we started. As the situation with limitation of contacts exspecially in rooms seems to stay around winter time we have to work to improve our outdoor rehearsal "room" to extend the period at least until the first snow comes - playing some Christmas Blues songs 🙂 - or "Christmas Time´s A´Coming" ...

Servus Peter! I´m located in Germany, "Musikhaus Thomann" is my main supplier but even they have no Gibson acoustic strings. Sad situation as I just got used to the coated Phosphoe Bronze version and I liked it better than any other coated versions with exception of Martin LifeSpans. They kept the "fresh" sound even on Gibsons which are not played very often. I have made the observation that uncoated strings seem to change the surface on a longer timescale even in the guitar case. Are there any recommendations for a replacement of the relatively new coated Gibson strings? Greetings from Bavaria!