"The Ultimate Blues Machine".

1955 Gibson Les Paul Standard Gold Top.

This totally original Les Paul Standard Gold Top weighs 9.10 lbs. and has nice, fat nut width of just over 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 wonderful thick profile. 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) bell-shaped plastic truss-rod cover with two screws. 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 “5 8589” inked-on in black on the back of the headstock. Two nicely balanced P-90 pickups with outputs of 7.74k and 7.57k. Cream plastic pickup covers stamped on the underside "UC-452 - F" and "UC-452 - B / 2". 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 "134 448" (Centralab November 1954) 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 all original with the exception of the nut which has been replaced. The back of the guitar has some considerable belt-buckle wear through the wood. The gold top  has a few small surface marks but there is none of the all too common 'greening' that so often affects these Les Pauls. There is some light fret wear and the back of the neck shows some playing wear. There is no finish checking to the body - just a small amount on the headstock face. Overall this super 'blues machine' is in excellent plus (8.75) condition. Housed in the original Gibson four latch, shaped brown hardshell case with pink plush lining (8.50).

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.