Gibson Solid Formed Archtops - any good?

WillEdmunds

I'm looking for a good archtop for swing/blues/gypsy jazz. I'd love a Gibson one but the prices are insane. The Solid Formed archtops seem to be the only one I could actually afford. I need a good 'acoustic' tone so looking at ones with floating pickups, especially the Solid Formed 17" Venetian Cutaway. I only need a neck pickup, so not really looking at the ES-175 etc.

I know there are a lot of alternatives like Eastman, Peerless, D'Angelico etc, but none of them quite have the mojo/style of the Gibson ones (bit superficial perhaps, but style/design is important to me!)

There is a bit of hype by Gibson about how these Solid Formed ones have better tone/stability than carved tops, but a lot of people online just saying it is a cost-cutting measure and the hype is BS. They also seem to have discontinued this model now. Has anyone tried one or know anything about them and why they have been discontinued?? Thanks!

Winny_Pooh

You should look at the Loar guitars

Danielsguitars

What price range have you got

I know a hand made benedetto style arch top that will be for sale soon 
It's a work of art and I can get pics 

It's near Sutton Surrey and available to view/play etc

There was a gibson in guitarguitar in Epson that was lifeless compared to the sound and tone of it

It was on our stand at the Kempton park guitar show

I've got to do the finish on it as it's only had a few wash coats

Jerry_k

#WillEdmunds,
I had a similar problem. Since about nearly 50years I`m playing an old archtop guitar, probably a german Klira,. I have been looking a long time for a new archtop with following features:

- zero fret (a real one)

- no pickups and no potentiometers mounted in the top

- the fretboard area above the corpus should be floating and not fix glued
All those conditions in summary could not be found at all the knowed Archtop manufactures. There are some master guitar builders who can do all those features according to customer requests, but the price range is between about 8000 to 20000 Euros. For me it has been to riskiy ordering such a taylor-made guitar, because if at the end it would not fit for me I could not escape.

Now to the Gibson archtop 17" solid formed: I have read of it, it came my imaginations near, not all my conditions have been met. I hat the oppurtunity to play such a guitar in the "custom shop" area of a big music store in Cologne and compare it directly with a famous Gibson L5 The acustical sound of solid formed guitar has been classes better than those of the L5 of nearly double the price. I bought the Gibson solid formed because my preference has been the acusticl properties and now I am totally happy with this! I the meantime you can get the solid formed archtop for about 4000 €. I think that is an acceptable price espacialyif some US music house are asking still 6299 US$ for it.

Best regards,

Jerry

octatonic

Feedback can be a serious issue with these instruments, so be clear you are getting something you can use.
I fear most of them end up sitting in a case whilst people end up playing their ES175's or ES335's most of the time.