Gibson Guitars - What's the Deal?

it had the robots yep he was so proud of it he's showing off sick man check this out it Tunes itself yeah we get three songs into the show and it literally malfunctioned where he hits this big open a chord and it thinks that it's trying to he's trying to knit and it goes somehow it tuned itself to like dad gap in the middle literally return into Guitar Center the next day hey everybody I'm Rick Beato on today's everything music we're gonna be talking about what happened to Gibson guitars that just apparently are filing for bankruptcy they're in a whole heap of trouble and I've got two experts with me that are both Gibson owners and and phenomenal guitar players Rhett Shull and Dave Onorato now Dave I've talked about on my channel many times Dave knows more about guitars amps any kind of musical gear than anyone that I know so I called him up and I said Dave when you're coming over to grab my guitar to fix it can you also can you also sit in our discussion okay so let's talk about this wrap what do you what do you want you start out basically what's happening is at the end of July they have a whole bunch of debt that's coming up and if they don't refinance or take care of that debt it's going to default and they are headed towards bankruptcy so it's something to the tune of over 500 million dollars I believe it is but it's not good okay so why Dave is Gibson in this position tell us a little history on Gibson well um my take on it would be I mean there's plenty of information you can go through the whole history of Gibson easily but I'll spare you that but the I think we're it kind of started going wrong for Gibson was probably realistically about ten years ago there would supplies started getting cheaper they couldn't get as good wood as they used to get they've always had in different periods of wood problems like mid 80s they got some really stuff and then like early 90s they had some stuff that was good by the end of the 90s it was starting to get a little suspect they started using weird fingerboards stuff brazilian they started using Indian rosewood and now we're up to baking maple and paining maple and and you know in the closet composite cardboard you know rich white things that stuff like that you know so so Les Paul's been around since 1952 and you know the woods that they started making those guitars originally with you know they were pulling from woods that were already at that point probably 100 hundred fifty years old so you know those trees got depleted by probably the 70s 80 80s so by the early 80s when Henry bought the company you know Norlin Norlin was sandwiching everything they could 5-ply tops and you know 13-point necks and all stuff you know they were really just banging him out you know get him and that was that's where everybody's starting one about 50 skits are 66 ours because they started realizing all these players were like oh man the new ones are junk I mean you pick them up they're like in any way of time they don't sound right they don't play and then wait a ton because the wood was yeah because the wood was not the same wood and for some reason the premise was in the 70s like heavier the better right so that that monkey er kind of got stuck to like oh if it's heavy it actually sustains better which is the complete opposite right but that was sold as a you know a selling point you know and so everybody started putting like brass hardware in their guitar oh yeah yeah 13 pound Les Paul's and all this stuff and then by the early eighties everybody was like well y-you know we did all this and it still doesn't sound right so that's not like 50 cigars so all those gets our early guitars went back way up because everybody guys who knew the difference were like man you know you can tell right off the bat you know now your normal average players whatever they couldn't afford some of that stuff so they were kinda they were buying new stuff I was going and so and the cycle of vintage guitars is usually 20 years so you know it's the hey I had this when I was a kid so I don't care if it's good or not I want one you know and then it becomes good because you identify with it sure so my first guitar was like a 66 Fender Mustang which you know by the time I was 20 I could a complete piece of crap and then you know now I'm like no they have their purpose they have their have 2-tone and so it's a thing but a lot of people grew up on Mustangs later than me who you know those were amazing guitars so it's all point of reference but but back to the wood definitely by the early 90s in my opinion Gibson's would supply was really starting to get you know low as far as their good quality stuff you know they kept some high-end stuff for their 59-58 Les Paul's some of the upper end jazz box guitars and 175 super for honor it's that kind of stuff and of course the the acoustics you know J to hundreds that kind of stuff you know they would keep the better stuff for those but your you know your realistic guitars that really keep the company going starting to really get cheap you know and you can feel it and you started especially in mahogany you know the Hobby was really heavy so they started chambering them to lighten them up and so they used that as a selling point as like oh it's chamber but really what they were doing was just trying to make the mahogany lighter because right all complaining they were so heavy they had no other way by doing except drilling holes in the top and making channels bigger and then they cover it with a maple with them and they put a maple top on it so anyway yes you know and grated you know your average Les Paul Studio is is basically a eight to twelve hundred guitar right and until they came out with the Epiphone stuff that was in competition with him you know that was basically the entry level okay well why why would they even come out with the Epiphone model I don't understand what what the purpose of that was that made no sense to um well I think basically they were they were still getting beat by Japanese companies and Korean companies at that 500 $600 price point right and people were like well you know I can still go buy an Ibanez for 600 bucks that's better than the Les Paul Studio for $1,000 so they needed something to compete in that you know in that category as far as of you know three to five hundred dollar guitar that still had a Gibson name on it you know and was licensed by Gibson right you know and the other fact is if you you know if you know anything about Les Paul copies you know you go outside the US there's a Les Paul car there's thousands of them right answers like Tokai greco all these companies that make great Les Paul copies and they were all you know same five six hundred bucks sure people were like whoa I can buy one of those so Gibson had to be like okay well let's let's just join the race well I know that I had a band come in I don't know five six years ago that had a Chinese website yeah that was buying guitars Les Paul's that were $250 and having him shipped over here they have big styrofoam boxes oh yeah they came over they were made at the same factory where they're making the Epiphone and in China and I mean they had some cheap Hardware on them but for the most part they looked exactly like Les Paul's eight serial numbers in it and everything else yeah hmm Rhett what else is Gibson been doing that's been killing them so I think where a lot of their financial troubles are coming from today is this idea that their leadership has had to sort of try and turn Gibson from an instrument manufacturer into a a household audio brand you know if their CEO I read a quote earlier where he was quoted as saying that they want to be the next Nike and so what they've done in the past probably ten years or so started acquiring companies like Phillips and Onkyo and the the DA cakewalk and sonar and all this stuff which has gone that which they which is they just recently killed yeah they killed off to the chagrin of a lot of users so they've started they've spent hundreds of millions of dollars acquiring these companies either for I don't know I guess rights to their products or intellectual property or whatever it is and they're not seeing the return on those investments at all and they're doing things like you know I've seen Gibson is building studio monitors now that look like you know Les Paul tops that you know it's a pair of studio monitors it has a carved maple top with with sunburst on which is like I don't know if you're into that kind of thing that's great but to me that's see it's right it's a niche market that's what maybe 20 guys in the whole probably a tree that would buy yeah and if those guys nearby they would get somebody to custom-make of anyways because would you get Gibson to custom tune monitors no right okay all right so so one of the problems with Gibson over the past 10-15 years is that they're just overpriced for people the only people that can buy Gibson our doctors and lawyers and that's been the problem essentially exactly it's it's not only that but then they came out with these ridiculous things the robot tuners the Firebird X yes I mean yeah this was wanting there was no portion of the market of guitar players it was like you know what I need a guitar that Tunes itself because I'm too tired and lazy to do it on my own well I think honestly that that was you know that's the head of the company and the PR department really not knowing their their niche and really not knowing their core customers I mean even though he's been Henry jesuits has been there for yeah he's been there since like 82 right now how could he not know what the company does science yes Tamizh because he did turn that coming around from Norland I mean no they were they were bankrupt when he bought them based lightly and he saved that company I'll give it to him the first ten years where he was there they weren't the greatest models but they were vast improvement of what was being made by Norland and you could tell the people that were making I'm Dave a crap you know and in the quality you know I work on a tie guitars now and I see a lot of eighties model Gibson's come through and I work on them all the time and for the most part most of them are put together right so what would those be those you're talking about standards yes customs ideas studios 335 juniors June right any of the standard model stuff you know Firebirds flying babies that kind of stuff and for the most part if they were treated right they they're still great guitars and and so that's just proof that actually those guitars were built right okay now there is the the the elephant in the room is the fact that not a lot of people play guitar anymore because of EDM music and the availability of da w's where people can just pull out a MIDI keyboard and record anything anything the as I say the barrier to entry to playing something and putting it out on your on your soundcloud or Facebook page is you need a little MIDI keyboard in the USB cable essentially yeah you put on some loops you sing a vocal you rap on it whatever you got a pan all of a sudden you're AB and then you get on the radio so in order to play guitar you got to go through a few years where you can actually play well another well enough to play a song right but what's interesting about that is even though the guitar market as a whole has has seen a decline in last few years Gibson as a an instrument manufacturer has still been profitable I mean they did over a billion dollars in revenue last year there's still one of the most profitable names in the guitar manufacturing industry and that portion all the other you know financial stuff aside that portion of the business of gives in USA is still profitable and is still a viable company so I think what we'll see is if they end up going bankrupt the brand is not gonna go away Gibson is not just gonna sub by somebody somebody might not pick me out good boy yeah cuz it's too big not to and it's too much of a legend in this industry not to okay how much of this profit this billion dollars is from the custom shop is that is that factored in here um I'm sure it does you know I think and that is something we should talk about too that the gibson USA gibson memphis Gibson Custom Shop and the Bozeman Montana plan are actually almost separate companies companies yeah they're run differently by different people and so that's been most of my personal experience you know we're all Gibson owners here and we that's why we have the Gibson's behind us here yeah yeah so you know my 335 back there that's my you know baby if the house is on fire and I could grab one thing you know and my wife was okay I would grab 3:35 there and that's a Memphis guitar and so most of my experience with Gibson modern Gibson has been with playing custom shock stuff which was to my experience unbelievably good and that Gibson Memphis stuff which is also incredibly well made and also but as we were talking about earlier it's just insanely expensive it's especially the the Custom Shop stuff you know for for a 59 reissue Les Paul I mean you're talking anywhere from 7 to 10 grand from the custom shop no I think the point there is you're kind of getting into the law of diminishing returns right where it's like okay if I really want the 59 sound you know the Custom Shop has gone to extreme links to recreate what a real 59 was so it's like I could spend $10,000 on one that I feel comfortable with actually taking on playing touring or I could spend three four five hundred thousand on a real burst that I'm gonna lock away in a vault and sit on for ten years yeah ten years well - maybe I make my money out of it so yeah I mean I think I think there's still a viable instrument manufacturer it's just the leadership is not making great decisions on all everything else even in the the modern you know Gibson USA they keep releasing models like the Boogie van Les Paul's if they just ridiculous yeah they're again to me that that goes back to you don't know your market your drug there to me for the last easily five years it to me it's like desperation though they're just grabbing at straws trying to be like okay well what what's the hip thing of the month we can do with something to me that company has been around so long that it's like just make 10 really great models in and then have a separate Custom Shop if you want to take that model and have something done okay then it didn't have a 10-grand guitar and it's your own thing and it's but but have the set price point be you know a thousand two thousand dollars across the board for a Firebird you know Les Paul SG all the stuff and have it at that you know just really make great guitarists in that price range don't get crazy with all this custom stuff make what guys want and use I mean because you go to any bar if there is anyone using anymore nine times out of ten the Gibson's you're gonna see are the stuff that's like Studio Les Paul's basic model SGS juniors specials everything it's eight hundred to a thousand dollars that a real musician can afford yeah that's that's the market they need to focus on because that ultimately that's what's saving there but I mean an Epiphone I'll tell you right now to me Epiphone is what's really saved up yeah because as far as what I work on daily in my repair shop I mean I get I'll get twelve episodes a month you know and I might get a half a dozen Gibson's but so Epiphone by four or outselling everything else and that's where they're making their money I think rich is a good exam you know to look to yeah what Gibson should be doing Gretch offender you don't scratch appeal no and they are I think they are doing exactly what you were just talking about we just like they have their models if you want a Chet Atkins or you know a double-cut Black Falcon or whatever it is they have their models that they are known for but then they also have the Elektra Matic yes you would your excellent guitar yeah excellent for the 800 to a thousand dollar price I would have no problem Technol it starts with gig no employing hello there because they're great and that's and so you know as with the Epiphone so they upper phones I put I know once they're set up and tweaked out man they're totally a really giggle guitar so this whole idea of price range is really important I personally you have won your special right if you made one of your many there are the guitars you play the most this guitar here I bought for about six hundred dollars probably ten years ago something like that I went to Guitar Center on the wall they had a bunch of these okay I picked up the best playing one and bought it I don't even know if it was 600 I thought want to say was 550 I think originally those were like in the 5 to 7 this is a great playing guitar do they even make this anymore not this particular model no they make a special and they do yes you can get this but this particular one with the thin finish and the thinner body this they just this is an amazing guitar I don't know why they're not making this guitar I don't know why either to me that's that's a nope ring that's a no-brainer this is the right price point here that one is if you look is not relict that's real yeah that's right that's real Rick Rick real looking here the neck everything so don't get me started on relegating so anyways so that's uh that to me is the is the price range that they need to be looking at if they're gonna you know I mean solve their problems there's not enough doctors and lawyers out there to buy these things really they're not there's not in in I can tell you from experience the whole thing of like well you know the Custom Shop is an investment you know they're one of the worst investments ever I I can I don't know I mean I've seen guys sell guitars for a little more money but this whole thing well if I keep a custom shop for five years I'm gonna make it's ridiculous you lose my you lose money instant instantly just like it's like boys a new car and driving off the lot you know you're instantly sixty percent you just lost right so at that point if you really knew your market you would be like okay well that's a speciality thing and we'll do we'll do that like you said like Gretch has their they make a small amount of high-end you know white Falcons and stuff they're all handmade and it's and that's cool and they need that that's the flagship you know but your bread and butter stuff the electromagnet it's kind of things the Les Paul studios that kind of stuff that's what really sells that's what really the market is okay so here's the problem I have when I look at a Gibson Les Paul Custom and it doesn't have an ebony fingerboard on it it's not a Gibson Les Paul Custom I mean right I what did they do about that Dave they can't get that wood anymore no and they've gotten to the point where unfortunately the EPA laws have gotten you know so tight and so strict and the wood supplies you know or if he of course they Gibson had a problem with their whole wood supply a couple years ago that whole debacle so basically yeah the Les Paul Custom has to have an ebony fingerboard on okay that's just sort of in the psyche of all guitar play right think so so you know now they're trying to bake maple and paint maple and do all this other stuff and they're still trying to justify getting real money for guitars you know which I can sort of real money being anything over you know two three thousand dollars yeah it's you know your money and and so that I don't that I think that there's a there's a price point that you can't go beyond which is probably about twenty five twenty seven hundred dollars yeah for normal normal musician for gigging musician that that is that is pretty much the top I'm not gonna pay that much I'm not gonna pay over that for an amplifier I'm not gonna play that that much for guitar honestly I don't have any guitars that cost that much money I mean I I went I went to I was at Guitar Center I talked about on one of my live streams that I was a guitar Center yeah last week and they had an es 175 I don't know what year was but it was a it was a Metheny reissue 59 59 59 blonde okay and um played terribly now I don't know what the deal is with it I don't know if it was a custom shop or what the deal is well ok part I will say partly I I won't blame Gibson for that kind of okay because most guitar centers Technic guitar throw it on the wall and it sits there and it goes through extremes and and so I've had people bring me guitars like hey I just bought this from Guitar Center and I'm like the neck it's like a ski slope and I'm like well they just threw it on a wall and set under hot lights and you know under tension so you can't blend Gibson for that you know that's you know but but as far as structural things you know like some of the the historic that I've seen have come through without bone nuts on them they're using composite nuts which is to me is ridiculous it's like you're paying this kind of money I don't think you could think they could spend well they two dollars for a bone now they wanted to know thirty-six hundred dollars for this guitar used used that guitar new if it's if it's the fifty nine Metheny looking one bit typically those guitars new were like five to six grand that's that's just ridiculously rich and you start talking to me in my opinion if you start talking that kind of money by the real thing I mean you can buy a real 50s right one for seventy five hundred bucks right you know if you're gonna spend five grand if I'm gonna spend five right and I'll save up and spy the real thing and you're gonna you're gonna get your money out yes because again they're not making any more real 59 right exactly so I think you're right it's if you're if you're past that threshold of for $5,000 you're really shooting yourself in the foot by buying a brand new guitar unless it's something that you know like like you were talking about you have like some of the really high-end well-made replica stuff yes like sure real wood yeah yeah there's a lot of small boutique builders that have good supplies of real wood still left old growth wood and as far as I'm concerned if I was gonna spend real money that's what I'm gonna spend money on because you can't get that anymore yeah and that does make they have the original wood right then that makes that a huge debts and and so it's it's one of those things where you know Gibson doesn't have that anymore if they do have a supply of it it's so small that they probably only keep it for artists models that go to you know Richie Sambora or whoever's in the you know Joe Perry or whoever's in the custom shops sure they have probably some select boards of that stuff but overall you know they're still baking their woods now you know they're these this new fad of well we try killing woods that's fine and I've played along guitars that weren't done that way and they're fine but it also tells me that the wood is still so green and so heavy and water content and they're running out of woods they're trying to figure out how they can replicate still the old woods and that's how they're doing it okay so speaking of old Woods ret my old Gibson here is my 1957 country-western so Dave why does this sound so good well there's this guitar that I've had for since 1999 what is the deal with with having a guitar that's 60 years old well especially on an acoustic the biggest thing is this wood the spruce and of course this guitars the mahogany back and sides solid these these have dried out you know and they and the more you play an acoustic and and the more dry it is the bigger it sounds the more you know louder it is so that's why the older Martins Gibson's Epiphone all that kind of stuff is so coveted and not thing that they're all great because they weren't play but a majority of them sound incredibly better than most of new guitars and it's strictly because that wood has dried out the molecules in the wood but from playing it over years and years chair it's cured that wood a certain way and it's dried out a certain way and it just rings and you can just hear it even with dead strings on a guitar like that you can usually tell oh yeah and it still sounds great yeah I mean it's a mate for recording it's yeah it's amazingly good and and typically you know there are like the new Bozeman model Gibson's I will give it to those guys if I was going to pick of all of the companies that Gibson it has going for them quality wise the Bozeman is still the best made stuff okay and here again why because that company is very tiny yeah there's not that many guys working I said quality control quality controls is excellent I've worked on a lot of the new gifts and Bozeman stuff and I've yet to see one that had really any any kind of inherent problems and that didn't play in sound right you know it did it sound like an old one not necessarily but they have their own merits - and those guitars will aged just like these ways you know there is one slight difference that this is Nitro lacquer where the newer guitars they can't use a complete natural lacquer now they're using kind of a composite lacquer what does that do to the sound it affects it nitro straight nitrocellulose lacquer has a thing where it just breathes and it's you can it just has this inherent thing to it it's organic and is it's and it sounds ridiculous like the band yeah mystery thing but there is something about it whereas the new finishes course polyurethane kills a lot of stuff because you basically just pouring plastic sure guitar yeah so that's why you know the lower end stuff sounds so dead because it has plastic all over and that wood is not the same wood so that's the biggest difference on the acoustics what kind of rosewood with this because Brazilian that's Brazilian okay and even what's really funny is I even on this guitar new was actually not considered that - ma sure it was kind of low in mid range yeah but all of the original gives 50 sixties Gibson's all had Brazilian rosewood so even their cheapest model already one that was like 99 bucks right still had a presume because they could get it yeah you know um you know I was wondered if that was a conscious decision on them like they really knew what they were doing with the wood or whether it was just a happy accident different they probably just had so much of it I think that I think that's probably yes so I the modern Gibson's even the higher-end you know the Custom Shop the Memphis stuff you know I know you said this about the postman but do you think that you know like a modern like this is 335 here yeah yeah you know this is the 2011 Memphis is this gonna age the same way a six this is a 61 yeah yeah so is this gonna the same way you know if I give this thing 50 years um you know it's hard to say I personally I don't think so for a few reasons the finish being that is a nitro finish but it's not completely nitro it's a little different than what the 50s and 60s and 70s guitars had the other thing with that guitar you know it's those that would in that guitar I would I'm gonna guess them it you know because I'll probably get crap for this but you know it'll be some guy like you know bitching about but it was I would venture to say probably the wooden a guitar is probably 30 to 4 years old you know maybe what they're drawn from or less but I would say maybe probably in that range you know that gets or will it sound like an like a 59 61 Ridge '''l one know for a lot of reasons but sonically you know if it's it'll be close it won't be exact but it'll be close you know but anytime you know it all depends on how much you play it and the kind of care you give it to yes so but I do know that finish definitely definitely changes that tell me that's our because I've had the dead on 59 historic reissue Paul's you know that they are they're great guitars you know I'm not gonna sit around bashing because they do a great job on now we're or $10,000 I don't think so right but they as far as aesthetically in the way they're put together there yeah they're built right you know and they're doing the best they can to make every kind of year a little better maybe than the last I you know but when it still come down it comes down to it you still have Greenwood and you still have that finish and so it's not gonna age the same yeah you know and now that's not saying that they're not gonna be very good tars another not ours but to say the difference between those two the old ones are still gonna be the old ones because of the wood and the finish I think it's cool I think it's important to talk about to like you know if if somebody has a guitar that we've maybe not been speaking so highly of that it's if it's something that you have that you find inspiring to play and that you love and that you makes you want to pick it up and play it and get better on it then that's as far as I'm concerned I mean that's ultimately yeah that's ultimately there's a perfect example usually the guy always always comes to mind when I think of this you know you got Jimmy Page yeah played 5859 burst and then I played a Danelectro right and he's still sounded like Jimmy Page you sure can pass on both of them yeah you know $50 guitar they basically put a new bridge on and you know did did amazing stuff on anything he had to real burst you know so yeah ultimately it comes down to the guy playing it too but as far as where Gibson's going wrong I think you know it's that's a big part of it you've got too expensive wood that's gone and a guy who's running the heavy that just really has out he's out of touch with who he's selling guitars to and they should they shouldn't be this conglomerate big thing because we all know anytime a company goes from this to this it's very ever good yeah you know so in if the company is making money which they are making money you know unfortunately I think they have to obviously they've the shareholders that's that's the biggest thing they're trying to grow you know they're doing that whole well they bad all these other all these failures and all these other businesses right they've tried to and I don't bandy with a company for trying to expand and trying to maybe go in another market but to me it's like I've gotten that feeling from that company it's just like well the guys at the top they don't really care about it well Dave when I went into Guitar Center two years ago three years ago and I saw those ridiculous tuners Oh Abdi - Abdi robotic about 10 of those who - I mean I thought to myself what what is this man I was on a gig one time with a guy he had just buys a friend of mine had just bought a brand new it was basically the modern version of the the special yeah yeah yeah it had the robot - yeah he was so proud of it and he's showing off sick man check this out it Tunes itself yeah we get three songs into the show and it literally malfunctioned where he hits this big open a chord and it thinks that it's trying to he's trying to knit and it goes somehow it tuned itself to like dad gap in the middle literally returned to Guitar Center the next day he's got his money back no I've actually had Pro players actually Chris green we both know he brought me a robot Les Paul a couple weeks ago and he said you know is there anything we could do with this I was I can't get rid of all this junk and you actually have an OK Les Paul and so we did I took the gears off gutted all the electronics out of it put the standard good stuff back and it said locking Grover's turned out to be very tart you know so you know I know don't blame them from trying to you know because Gibson's do have inherent problems thus another they do have and that's another gripe I would like to I'd like to acknowledge you know in this day and age the scale length on a Gibson show in everybody everybody knows that they don't tune because the scale like GB or constantly out of tune right and you have to temper tune them and tune them sharp to get them to play somewhat in tune right you know to me like if you're if I was the head of Gibson the first thing I would do okay well we're having we do have a problem with this tuning issue okay how do we solve this which I probably should have done about 25 years ago right right and even leave it it's funny cuz even later on I've talked to some guys who worked for Gibson and heritage and some other companies and they there was all kinds of stuff in house where guys were like can we just make the skin like a little bit longer right or even just half half acid where it's not okay it's not twenty five and a half like a shirt under but just a little bit longer just to get it a little bit closer sure and it always fell on deaf ears because I think of two reasons they would have to reach everything and ya asked a lot of money to retool yeah and their whole thing was it's that traditional like we've always done it this yeah which all of these companies like Gibson fender Rickenbacker all of these American companies but Martin all of them have this well its traditional and that's how we've always done it that's great but it doesn't mean that it always worked okay and and so and especially like I said I work on these guitars all day long and it's one of those things where if they just would make the scale like just a slight longer it would solve quite a bit you know and there the other gripe with a lot of people well you know the neck always snaps here why do they make this like this you know this one this one's had a break yeah and I mean I've got one here that you know this one's got a break too you know it's got the nice little smiley face you know it happens but it's mine doesn't yeah and it better not yeah just wait I don't know man it's no I don't think it's a real Gibson until it's Berg Yeah right well that's the other thing you know I was tell people you know it's funny because I get a lot of guys they have a pair of guitars and they bring it in I'm like no it's the next big right leg and I said sometimes it actually helps because actually you know if you put splines in it or you know do it right it actually can be stronger sure then a piece like I mean I've looked for a guitars oh yeah yeah I but I'm never gonna find any right right you know um so first of all you know like to me okay you know then I will give it to Gibson they tried to make a long scale Les Paul what they did in a really stupid way they didn't just like make it look normal they put like 3:45 slide inlays in it and they changed the binding and they tried to do a sudden the heels with and it was like no just or have an option of yeah what I want a long skill sure just have a long skill one if you want a traditional call to Gibson the modern les ball yeah longer small scale you know oil tap the pickups there we go Henry you know it's it's it's not it really isn't rocket science because most people you know if you got the traditional so oh no I want the original okay fine buy that we offer that if you want this it's an it's a slight up charge maybe if you really are it's all about dollars and cents well okay then up charge 50 bucks for a long scale you know whatever you know but fix the problems that are inherent in the guitars that are actually good and that people wanna buy instead of coming with robot tuners yes Margaret X's and you know like in the 70s and 80s it was the so next guitars that were made out of MDF right and one you know the Corvis guitars that were basically leftover bodies that they cut in and it looks like a like a like a can opener right you know I mean you know Gibson's always been a little weird on there you know I don't know what it is which I mean that's kind of a Dearing right yes well at least our trata side is they're trying but it's again no but you know these guitars you know a 335 or Les Paul are great they're all great guitars but they all have inherent problems why not work on those problems and fix that and just make a really good model of that for a modern guitar now you know if you got the guys that are traditional I want the old stuff they might make that to make that best phone make that but you know as far as our concern mean if you're making a Les Paul Studio and you're selling for a thousand bucks and a gigging musician is playing it you know why not you don't need robot tuners make the scale with a little longer and right put some really good gears on it and build it right and it's gonna stay in tune and yeah art get it that way right I mean that's the thing and like with so much of what you're talking about come out with a Les Paul Studio modern player well yeah long scale unless you know and market it to real players guys here our bargain perfect example in your annual is because you don't want to bands like guys who come in that guys that they're tuned way down yeah yeah I'm to see they learn and you try to take a Les Paul Studio or any Les Paul with a 24 inch scale and tuned it down to those two even with the heaviest strings on it you still have massive tuning bro oh yeah and I mean you I mean how I deal with that all right right so you know you won't honestly they stop playing Gibson's right that's the thing is though the bands I work with the tune tune way down instantly there's your more there's a market right there yeah I mean all these are not playing Gibson's because of that here's a company out of touch with guys who are using them well I mean they honestly miss that boat back yeah the nineties in the early 2000 and I gotta tell you there's no the rig I'll say right off the bat the reason PRS started dominating in a lot of metal feel right was because he dry longer scale yeah and it's stayed in tune better and he better gears you know I'll give it to him and he knew the market that's what that doesn't I start seeing this guitar as soon as Creed's started playing those concerns and that whole wave of bands came in and they were all detuned and then it got even lower yeah man all you saw was Paris guitars and that was a big part of it and I worked on those guitars for guys and they would go they would say well I want to get my Les Paul adieu I'm like you're not going to you need to use your PRS and they go you're right man after we did that the PRS stays in 10th grade the scale length ya know that's a big part of it so and that's a huge mark this is how stupid is Gibson actually they almost hit the mark they came out with a gothic Les Paul I'm not gonna explore but they didn't they didn't put the scale length any different they just all he did was repackage the same thing that they had and they missed the mark and it was like if he would have just put a little more time into it instead of just trying to make donuts and get 50,000 out the door actually improved the guitar they would have they would have gained a market sure and we they would still be getting they would still be selling the crap out of those guitars right and again I get him back to the boutique thing I think that's why the boutique world has exploded in the last 10 years it's because players people sense that that's what these large manufacturers Gibson and Fender are doing is they're just trying to crank out well all they need to do is go into your local guitar shop and they see the things that Gibson's putting out and they look ridiculous and they don't people don't want to buy guitars that look ridiculous and especially the last I would say two years we were looking at this before these multicolored top striped Les Paul's or $6,000 they've came up this Chinese year of the dog won this month you know it's like it's almost like they're trying to put the cubby out of business right it's almost been my take on it this is this is my the best way that I think I could describe it was last year round now there was a it was a satirical ad that got put around like the gear page and everything of the new Gibson Les Paul and it was it was ridiculous it was bright pink and all this crazy light memory and yes if this this shows you where Gibson is that I thought it was serious right and in you know this time I've got a pretty good nose for something now that kind of stuff and also I said so firm I was like dude look at this yeah this is what they're doing there right right because it's it's supposed to be ridiculous but it's not that far off not what they've actually been doing it's not the Firebird X & Y a robot tuners and all this crap yeah yeah so this this thing with Gibson really started people started talking about this in the past few months it did not go to nab yeah the CES yeah and that was a really big thing people in the you know in the music industry we're talking about it constantly what's going on with Gibson what's going on with Gibson I saw heard the rumors of them going bankrupt months ago and if they'd like to consult with us they can contact me here at this channel yeah and we'd be happy to come in and talk with with Henry or whoever you'd like at the company what's our 15% yeah well let's get Henry's lawyers involved yeah yeah all right so that's all for now I'm gonna bring these guys back in again and we're gonna talk about what's going on with fender next time thank you all for watching I'm Rick piatto Dave Onorato red shell

Channel: undefined

Views: 558,892

Rating: 4.813098 out of 5

Keywords: Rick Beato, Everything Music, Gibson Guitars, Bankrupt, Henry Juszkiewicz, PJT Partners Inc, creditors, epiphone, bankruptcy, debt, decline of gibson, gibsons suck, gibson custom shop, decline, guitar center, les paul custom, gibson bankruptcy, Gibson chapter 11, gibson files for bankruptcy, Gibson, guitar center bankruptcy

Id: 9_Xi9GQ48iY

Length: 39min 55sec (2395 seconds)

Published: Thu Feb 22 2018

Reddit Comments

[u/Massive-Gas]

Gibson has made me annoyed and depressed for the last 20 years so I am sticking to Rickenbackers. Great sound and affordable

[u/Tiny_Pay]

Never heard anything ever about something inherent in the 24 3/4" scale being out of tune? Wasnt it just the head angle plus a bit of the friction at the bridge? I always figured a tempered earvana type nut would solve any problem. No?