This guitar weighs just 8.80 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 wonderful thick profile, and Brazilian rosewood fretboard with 22 original thin frets and inlaid pearl trapezoid (crown) position markers. Headstock with inlaid pearl "Gibson" logo and "Les Paul Model" silkscreened in gold. Two-layer (black on white) plastic truss-rod cover. The serial number "7 7685" is inked-on in black on the back of the headstock. The top of the guitar has single-ply cream binding and the fretboard has single-ply cream binding. Individual single-line Kluson Deluxe tuners with single-ring tulip-shaped Keystone plastic buttons (the three 'treble-side' tuners stamped on the underside "2356766 / PATENT APPLD." and the three 'bass-side' tuners "D-169400 PATENT NO."). Two PAF humbucker pickups (double-black) with outputs of 7.36k and 7.32k. The neck pickup has the small rectangular black label on the underside with "Patent / Applied For" in gold lettering. The bridge pickup - as if often the case with '57's does not have the label. The cream neck pickup mounting ring is stamped on the inside "MR491" and "M-69 7" and the cream bridge pickup mounting ring is stamped on the inside "MR490" and "M-69 8." Single-layer cream plastic pickguard. Four controls (two volume, two tone) on lower treble bout plus three-way pickup selector switch on upper bass bout. Gold plastic bell-shaped "Bell" knobs. The potentiometers are stamped "134 649" (Centralab December 1956). Two original "Bumble-Bee" capacitors. With the original brown plastic control cavity plates. ABR-1 non-retainer Tune-O-Matic bridge with metal saddles and separate stud tailpiece. There is some finish checking on the top but there is no loss of finish and the gold top shows no sign of 'greening'. There are a few small and insignificant indentations on the back and sides and a tiny bit of wear to the top treble side of the headstock face. The original thin frets show some wear but this is mainly confined to the first seven frets - and the guitar certainly does not need a re-fret. This guitar plays, sounds, and looks phenomenal, and is in exceptionally fine (9.00) condition. Housed in the original Gibson brown four-latch "California girl" hardshell case with pink plush lining (9.00).


"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).

"Humbucking PAF pickups replace P-90 pickups around serial number '7 2000' to '7 3800' range (latest 1957 goldtop documented with P-90s is serial number '7 38xx', and the earliest is a leftie PAF goldtop '7 13xx'). During this period there was definately overlaps of Goldtops with either P90 or PAF pickups. First few months of humbucker pickup production used brushed stainless steel pickup covers (instead of nickel plated covers) with no PAF stickers. Resistance of the new pickups ranged from 7.0k ohms to 8.9k ohms. The first month of humbucker Les Paul goldtop production used black plastic parts (pickguard, pickup rings, switch surround), with black parts ending by about serial number '7 32xx'. All black plastic 1957 Les Paul Goldtops should have a dark back (if it doesn't, chances are someone stole the cream parts and replaced them with black parts). Within a month or two, PAF goldtops changed to cream plastic parts (cream part PAF goldtops not seen before serial number '7 3000'). Generally speaking black plastic part 1957 Les Paul goldtops are worth less than cream part 1957 goldtops though. The black and cream plastic humbucker pickup mounting rings had 'M-69' as part of the molding, on the bottom side between the height adjustment screw and mounting screw. Also the plastic humbucker rings had four 'screw tunnels' for each mounting screw (but not for the two pickup height adjustment screws). Though the M-69 pickup surrounds were used until about 1970 (in black, when they were replaced by the M-8 pickup rings with no screw tunnels), Gibson did not use cream colored M-69 pickup rings any later than 1960. That's why there's such a big deal about original cream-colored 1950s Les Paul pickup rings, because original M-69s in cream were unavailable after 1960. Though these seems like minor details, original plastic parts are important to these guitars" (http://www.provide.net/~cfh/gibson5.html#lpstd).

In 1958, the "model name changed from 'Les Paul Model' to 'Les Paul Standard'. Sunburst finish replaces Goldtop finish in the fall of 1958, around serial numbers in the '8 5300' range (though the first known Sunburst Les Paul has serial number '8 3322'). The maple top on a 1958 to 1960 Sunburst Les Paul is always two pieces and 'center seamed' (there is NO exception to this rule, except for one of the first 1958 sunburst Les Pauls with serial number '8 3322'; if a Sunburst Les Paul does not have a two piece center seamed maple top, it is a refinished Goldtop!) Most 1958 Sunburst Les Pauls came with a brown 'california girl' case with a pink lining and four case latches. But by the end of 1958 the cases changed slightly to have five latches, and this 5-latch brown case is known as the defacto-standard Sunburst Les Paul case" (http://www.provide.net/~cfh/gibson5.html#lpstd).