Gibson ES135 - anyone got one ?

DrCornelius

A mate of a mate is thinking of selling one for a reasonable price (c £1k), it’s a newer one - I’ve seen it in person a while back and it looked nice (sounded nice too but that may have been the player).

Should I give it a whirl ?  I do like messing around with the odd maj 7 chord or are they cheap for a reason ?

Cheers

stickyfiddle

Nice looking & sounding things. Not far off a single-cut ES-335 really. I’ve often fancied one but never looked seriously

Is it a P90 or humbucker version?

DrCornelius

Cheers Sticky and it’s a P90 one which would probably be my preference as I’ve recently had yet another whirl on a les paul with PAF alikes in it 

Jason

Had one, wish I'd never sold it, really nice guitars

DB1

Yes, I had one for a short while - nice enough, and very much a cross between an ES-225 and ES-175. My only gripe with it was that my particular example felt like a 'cheap' Gibson, whereas with a new Eastman of a similar new price, the quality would have felt higher. The price sounds decent though. 

DrCornelius

Cheers fellas and funny enough @DB1 if I heard the story correctly it’s a new Eastman that has made him think about selling the 135

DB1

Oh, lucky guess then! I wouldn't decry the ES-135 at all, apart from noting the cheaper 'feel' to it, primarily the unbound, slightly uneven neck - I've been through between 40-50 Gibsons in the past four years, just wanting to try as many as I can really - and I don't think that it was any dissatisfaction that caused me to sell. I got my money back, even though I bought it at a retailer (Sound Affects) and sold it through eBay, and that was about £1150, so it's not a purchase that you'll regret financially. 

guitars4you

Ik is a decent price for such a guitar - Just my preference, but I favour the P90 version over the humbucker

p90fool

I like the guitar well enough, but I'm really not a fan of P100 pickups and would change them immediately for proper P90s, given that I'd be unlikely to use that style of guitar with huge amounts of gain anyway. 

DrCornelius

Ok I need to now oh so gently encourage him to sell in a disinterested sort of way rather than my usual ‘TAKE MY MONEY !’ approach as this may make him rethink it......

ICBM

Do you like 'long' guitars - like ES-335s and Firebirds? If not you may find it awkward - for some unknown reason they made the neck joint at the 16th fret, not the 14th which is standard for a Gibson single-cut semi-acoustic. The result is that the neck is about an inch too far to the left compared to something like an ES-225 - I find them ungainly and awkward to play.

Funkfingers

p90fool said:

I'm really not a fan of P100 pickups and would change them immediately for proper P90s, given that I'd be unlikely to use that style of guitar with huge amounts of gain anyway. 

My then work supervisor had a -135. Even after upgrading to BKP Mississippi Queen pickups, he still did not gel with it. 

ICBM said:

'long' guitars … awkward … neck is about an inch too far to the left … ungainly and awkward to play.

My supervisor was (and still is) a shorthouse. This might be why he only kept the -135 for a matter of months.