An Original 1953
Les Paul Standard Gold Top

This totally original Les Paul Standard Gold Top weighs just 8.70 lbs. and has nice, fat nut width of 1 11/16 inches and a standard Gibson scale length of 24 3/4 inches. Solid mahogany body with a solid carved maple top, one-piece mahogany neck with a nice, thick profile, and Brazilian rosewood fretboard with 22 original thin frets and inlaid pearl trapezoid (crown) position markers. The top of the guitar has single cream binding and the fretboard has single cream binding. Headstock with inlaid pearl "Gibson" logo and with "Les Paul Model" silk-screened in gold. Two-layer (black on white) plastic truss-rod cover. Individual single-line "no-name" Kluson Deluxe tuners with single-ring tulip-shaped Keystone plastic buttons (stamped on the inside "2356766 PAT APPLD."). Serial number “3 3105” inked-on in black on the back of the headstock. Two beautifully balanced and very hot P-90 pickups with outputs of 7.90k and 7.89k. Cream plastic pickup covers (with no stamping on the underside). Single-layer cream-colored plastic pickguard. Four controls (two volume, two tone) on lower treble bout plus three-way pickup selector switch (with original Catalin switch-tip) on upper bass bout. Gold plastic (half-inch tall) barrel-shaped "Speed" knobs. The potentiometers are stamped "134 317" and "134 322" (Centralab April and May 1953) and the two original capacitors are the "Grey Tiger Type GT 452 .02 MFD 400 VDC." Combination "wrap-over" bar bridge/stud tailpiece. This guitar is 100% original with just one exception - the original 1953 half-inch stud anchors have been professionally replaced with 1954 one-inch stud anchors (the originals are included in the case). This is a very positive improvement - as the early Les Paul Gold Tops and Juniors were very prone to the stud anchor actually coming loose and weakening the holes in the top. Fortunately the changing of the stud anchors was carried out before any signs of weakness in the top became apparent. The back of the guitar is exceptionally clean with no belt-buckle rash. The gold top is has a couple of very small surface marks but there is none of the all too common 'greening' that so often affects these Les Pauls. There is virtually no fret wear and the back of the neck has just a few very small surface marks - but no real playing wear. There is some wear on the side of the body which only affects the treble waist edge, and the cream-plastic jack input cover has one corner broken away. There is some very minor finish checking on the edges of the top of the guitar. Overall this super 'blues machine' is in excellent plus (8.75) condition. Complete with the original brown leather guitar strap. Housed in the original Gibson "Bulb Headstock" five-latch Lifton brown hardshell case with pink plush lining (8.75).

Many guitarists consider this to be the ultimate "blues machine" -- the sustain on this guitar is quite unbelievable!

"The first Gibson Les Paul solidbody electric guitar, known simply as the Les Paul Model then but now better known by its descriptive nickname 'gold-top', first went on sale during 1952" (Tony Bacon, 50 Years of the Gibson Les Paul, p. 15).

"The new Les Paul guitar was launched by Gibson in 1952, in the summer, priced at $210, which was about $20 more than Fender' Telecaster sold for at the time…Today, a gold-finish Les Paul model is nearly always called a gold-top thanks to its gold body face…The new gold-top's solid body cleverly combined a carved maple top bonded to a mahogany base, a sandwich that united the darker tonality of mahogany with the brighter sonic 'edge' of maple. Paul said that the gold colour of the original Les Paul model was his idea. 'Gold means rich,' he said, 'expensive, the best, superb'" (Tony Bacon, 50 Years of the Gibson Les Paul, pp. 20-21).

"In 1955 the gold-top gained Gibson's new Tune-o-matic bridge. The unit had the facility to adjust individual string-length, improving intonation. Two years later humbucking pickups replaced P90s on the gold-top" (Tony Bacon and Paul Day, The Gibson Les Paul Book, p. 19). This guitar is one of the last Les Paul Standard Gold Tops with "wrap-over" bar bridge/stud tailpiece before the Tune-O-Matic bridge was introduced in late 1955.