Midtown Standard Problems

[wordsworth_jlg]

I thought I would give an update after 2 years of using this 3rd Midtown Standard.

 

I have played it quite a bit and have been very pleased. I was quite concerned at first with several details of the finished guitar but 2 years of use (dings, scratches, etc.) have taken the sting out of my initial unhappiness. I believe someone even predicted this would happen earlier in this thread.

 

I did remove the back plate which revealed a big glob of color coat was preventing the plate from lying flat. Easy fix. I removed the knobs and reinstalled them so that they were all the correct distance from the body. Also an easy fix. The scuffs on the headstock don’t bother me anymore since now the rest of the guitar its own scuffs and battle scars.

 

The only thing left that still bothers me is the binding on the neck which is not level in several places. This is something that I think Gibson should not allow past their quality control. I think someone mentioned in this thread that Gibson probably just unloaded these to an online dealer so that they wouldn’t lose money on them. This makes sense to me however these were not advertised as B-stock or anything and I don’t even think Gibson sells B-stock. In the end I got a good $1,300 guitar for under a grand.

 

It sounds like to me the sunburst (and black?) version of this guitar tends to have fewer issues with the finish. This probably has someting to do with the pelham blue metallic paint being difficult to work with. I still prefer the striking pelham blue finish over the other options.

 

To sum up this whole thing I think there has been an obvious trend in which Gibson has lowered their standards of quality. To what ends? Who really knows but the Gibson brass but in myy opinion is they are coasting on a reputation that has brought them this far and hubris allows them to let certain guitars reach the consumer that never should.