Obsession with LP weights

Jethro Rocker

Jethro Rocker

Ambassador of Live & Loud Action
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Some LP specific forums seem obsessed with the weights of the guitar.
So many factors influence sustain etc and tone of an electric guitar, who cares?
Placebo effect.
8.5 lbs vs 9.5 pounds won't suddenly make a guitar become a sustain hero. Use you amp, the bridge etc will affect it more than weight.
Cork sniffing.
The new old goldie has the lil mini humbuckers and of course they are anemic comoared to full size HB. The CS Modern Axcess has a thinner body, obviously lighter and is Gibby 490T equipped. Will electrically kill the old 76 with T Top HBs....

They sniff corks when they should be drinkin'.
 
Jethro Rocker said:
Some LP specific forums seem obsessed with the weights of the guitar.
So many factors influence sustain etc and tone of an electric guitar, who cares?
Placebo effect.
8.5 lbs vs 9.5 pounds won't suddenly make a guitar become a sustain hero. Use you amp, the bridge etc will affect it more than weight.
Cork sniffing.
The new old goldie has the lil mini humbuckers and of course they are anemic comoared to full size HB. The CS Modern Axcess has a thinner body, obviously lighter and is Gibby 490T equipped. Will electrically kill the old 76 with T Top HBs....

They sniff corks when they should be drinkin'.
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All are tools in the chest…ready for the appropriate task to be at hand. Some of s have favorites….that’s all.
:cool: :cheers: :cool:
 
Thatbastarddon said:
…as to the weight thing… I don’t know… Seems like more of a total package thing to me. I have one light LP, and another heavy LP-ish, and I like them both. With them, it’s BB Pros(in the light weight), VS 57 Classic/Classic+. They both have places in the toolbox.
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Exactly. But they obssess over weight regardless of other guitar appointments.
Why are the CS guitars lighter now even as solid wood blah blah blah.
Who cares?
Look at the whole thing and just play it.
 
These days anything over ten pounds is out for me.
It's not a tone thing, it's my physique - I'm old now.

My heaviest LP is 9.9 lbs, sounds great, and gets significantly less play time than the lighter ones.
My twelve pound beast of a Jazz Bass hardly ever gets played except sitting down for recording.

Whatever it is about the body wood that affects the individual voice of a guitar, it isn't the weight.

When I started out playing, I didn't care much about the individual character of guitars. Sounds dumb, right?
But I didn't know any better. I just thought, 'well, a Strat is a Strat and a Les Paul is a Les Paul.'

Eventually as I became more skilled, I was more attuned to tone and more sensitive to my interactions with each guitar.
I had one lightweight guitar that was very responsive, so I decided that light guitars were what suited me best.
And I spent years looking for lightweight guitars when what I really wanted was lively ones.
Eventually realized I was choosing based on the wrong standard, but it took me years to wise up.

Am still a firm believer that light bodies require less physical energy to make them vibrate. That's physics.
Yet while any semihollow or acoustic will sing against your chest, not all lightweight guitars lively in your hands.
I believe truly lively feel in a guitar is more about the neck than the body.

Every element matters, of course, along with the often-unpredictable ways they work together.
But IMO a bigger portion of the magic - for both feel and tone - resides in the necks than many players recognize.

I've got some heavy guitars whose necks are lively, and those will wake up when played at even modest volumes.
Yet heavy ones with rigid necks usually need pretty loud levels before they'll come alive and really sing.

As always, though - for any generalization about guitars, there probably are a few that defy it.
 
My Les Paul Custom is a boat anchor never play it the two Les Paul Standard Custom Shop's are 8.25LBS
they ring like a bell when picking a guitar it's how it sustains unplugged G note works for me
I have a 1961 Stratocaster that sounds like a 335 and a 1953 Esquire that sounds like a Les Paul explain that one to me
one lesson through the school of hard knocks is don't waste time on a tone turd guitar get rid of it
A friend got a made to measure Les Paul Standard Custom Shop dead sounding I felt sorry for him
looks stunning set up well dead donkey word to the wise don't buy a guitar until you play it or have a return policy
 
Jethro Rocker said:
Some LP specific forums seem obsessed with the weights of the guitar.
So many factors influence sustain etc and tone of an electric guitar, who cares?
Placebo effect.
8.5 lbs vs 9.5 pounds won't suddenly make a guitar become a sustain hero. Use you amp, the bridge etc will affect it more than weight.
Cork sniffing.
The new old goldie has the lil mini humbuckers and of course they are anemic comoared to full size HB. The CS Modern Axcess has a thinner body, obviously lighter and is Gibby 490T equipped. Will electrically kill the old 76 with T Top HBs....

They sniff corks when they should be drinkin'.
Click to expand...

My opinion?

The stiffness of the system has more to do with the sustain than the weight. It just so happens that a Les Paul is also a rather stiff guitar, given where the neck joint is and given that they usually have thicker necks.
 
Back in 09 I decided I wanted to buy my first electric guitar. Hit a couple GC’s. Some local shops. Then my youngest and I went to Chicago Music Exchange. Of course I was clueless what to look for. Had several different ones in my hands. At first blush I really liked the SG. Tried a PRS. Taylor had just started making solid bodies. Actually liked how they felt. Don’t remember picking up a LP or anything that said Fender on the headstock.

But with having some Swedish blood in my veins, had to try a Hagstrom Super Swede they had in the shop. To date (at least to my fading memory) that thing has been the heaviest guitar I’ve ever picked up. Did not bother plugging that one in. Maybe I should have???
 
Clockworkmike said:
The wines I drink don't have corks usually, just a twisty cap and a $3 sticker on them lmao
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Actually some higher end wines are starting to come with screw caps. Don’t have to worry about a bad cork spoiling the wine.

Now….. had you mentioned getting your wine in a box there’d be no option but like John Wick, you’d be declared Excommunicado.
 
It’s all BS, agreed. I have LPs with weights all over the place and its the heavier ones that sound better to me generally, in defiance of conventional wisdom. I’ve read that the older, denser wood is the heavier parts from the center of the trees - all this nonsense about the “golden age” guitars being “better” because of lighter “old growth” wood is pure BS mythmaking. In reality they were using older, denser wood in the ‘70s, and those guitars have always sounded better than ones from the ‘50s to me. If your back can handle them that is!
 
Don O said:
Nothing wrong with box wine. From an engineering perspective it’s far more efficient for transportation and storage.
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The concept is valid. There’s still the stigma associated with box wine. Like there used to be with screw caps. Once the big wineries get serious about offering wine in a box, I’m sure it will become a “thing.”
 
iblive said:
The concept is valid. There’s still the stigma associated with box wine. Like there used to be with screw caps. Once the big wineries get serious about offering wine in a box, I’m sure it will become a “thing.”
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Chateau Petrus getting a nice slice of cardboard, I like it! Meanwhile, I'll eagerly await the debut of MD 20/20 in a box, which is fitting: you can drink from your box and then use it as an extra piece of roofing for your "sidewalk chateau".

Everyone is talking downsizing to a tiny house and I already got mine fabricated with materials from the good folks behind Walmart
 
Clockworkmike said:
Chateau Petrus getting a nice slice of cardboard, I like it! Meanwhile, I'll eagerly await the debut of MD 20/20 in a box, which is fitting: you can drink from your box and then use it as an extra piece of roofing for your "sidewalk chateau".

Everyone is talking downsizing to a tiny house and I already got mine fabricated with materials from the good folks behind Walmart
Click to expand...
As a kid not old enough to legally purchase…. Did not do MD. In my corner of western Illinois Boones Farm was the crappy drink of choice. :pound-hand:
 
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