How to love a Les Paul

Unlike others in the thread, I haven't ever gotten along with a PRS, after 4 tries. I do have 5 LPs. 2 are top end Epiphones, because you can get them Light, 2 are Gibsons, but chambered models, and one is a Gibson LP Special (also light but thinner and with a belly cut).

Tuning can be a problem because of Gibson's headstock angle and string break angle. SO easily fixed with just a little work on the nut. widen the peg side of the string groove, so the string doesn't bind, et voila.

Ca't help with the neck profile. Either you like it or you don't. Though Epiphones have more thinner neck profiles than Gibson LPs. Same thing for upper fret access. You just have to learn to work with what it provides.

Know exactly how you feel!

I've tried to love a LP a couple of time, but as you say tuning and overall feel just wasn't for me. Love the tone, especially that brilliant contrast between the neck and bridge pu.

I ended up getting a MusicMan reflex, in hardtail, as a kind of substitute LP. That's a great guitar, got none of the problems mentioned with the LPs... and it sounds pretty close as well.
But it's not the same, and it doesn't sound exactly like a LP

Once in a while I'm tempted to give the LP another try...

My perfect guitar would be a Les Paul body with an EBMM Van Halen neck.
Wish the made a mahogany Axis with a maple top and maple neck.
The closest I have is my EVH Wolfgang Custom setneck. With a mahogany body, maple cap, mahogany neck, ebony fretboard. If only it had a maple neck...sigh!

Quote from Redspecial

If I get it wright the thred is all about guitar ergonomy and the effects it produces! It is very difficult to pair an industrial,standardised
good whith an unique gift that mother nature granted to us !Your hand (an unique piece of art).In theory every human guitarist hand
(left or right ) has an unique guitar neck paired but this is not the way industrial goods are made.You can turn to a luthier but grosso modo they use the same plans ! I never saw a study in guitar ergonomics (maybe it exist) ,a study which analises the correlation
between the guitarist hand properties (dimensions,anatomical constitution,motility etc) and a neck properties.I dont think there is any data base about it but i am sure that the conclusions might be an other guitar revolution (after Kemper).One hand one guitar neck!
Two years ago I had the idea to ask this community (the largest I know) to create a database about that but the lack of time and laziness
made me to give up! Maybe is time to do it!I can use the initial ideas (i did not forget them) and create this database ! All we need is standardised data!

you kinda described parts of the Human Base concept
http://www.humanbase.de/content/framesE.htm

Quote from MonkeyPeanutButter

The still don't like about it are it's weight, the neck

whenever I get asked to help someone pick a guitar, I pretty much sum it up like this:
1) find a guitar with a comfortable neck
2) forget any advice and 'knowledge' about brands, tonal characteristc of wood etc.
3) find a guitar with a comfortable neck
nobody can tell you which ones are right for you, but when you pick one you like - you will know it

My PRS SC245 is very LP-like. Outstanding tone and playability, and without the string-bend issue at the nut. However, getting a strat sound out of an LP is unlikely, IMO.

Quote from Nikos

There is a Stratocaster world and LesPaul world...if not to say universe..

You cant have them both "in one guitar".It is simple like this.Both kinds of sounds have written legend songs on their own,created legend riffs on their own..

In the late 80s I took some thousand deutsch marks(I played literally "every night" back then and I still went to school ..) and wanted to buy my a LesPaul.I tried literally "thousands" in many,many shops all around germany (where I lived by that time) I looked also outside of germany and at some point I did a journey to london to find "my LesPaul"..and was heavily dissapointed.Dead wood.I heard peopple who said that "outside of the US you will not find a good LesPaul"..I started to believe exactly this and that was it.

Two years later I finally found a luthier who worked at Heritage (and Gibson prior to Heritage) and just opened his guitar customshop in my neighbourhood..he had personally selected wood to build his "personal guitars",his own "dream-axes"..if I remember correctly he had a Tele with a walnut-body,some Strats and...a LesPaul made by one-pieces for the mahagony-body and the neck (both same wood..honduras) with a two-piece of wonderfull maple top..since he came from Heritage he just used schaller-hardware(including golden 50s)..he allowed me to play this guitar and this was it..this was the sound you hear on these albums..like some famous guitar legend said once (Gibbons:I dont remember) "the real lespaul sound is like to step on a ripe plum..it makes first pfffltschhh....and then the tone develops in something wonderfull"..

To bad he did not want to sell any of these very personal guitars but just a little bit later his daughter got ill(she died later) and he needed every single penny..he wanted 2000 deutsch marks from me for the LesPaul and I gave him 2200.Only the wood must have been worth double as much if not much more.And this LesPaul was mine.At some point years later I asked if he wanted his guitar back because I felt so bad that I bought this guitar under these circumstances,seeing this guy comming to my gigs,looking at the LesPaul with tears in his eyes.He still rejects to this day...saying that he is happy that I play it..the finest compliment I ever recieved.

Anyway..I heard a lot of stories (from "people who know" in most cases) that many,many famous guitar players have a LesPaul made by some unknown luthier while they just put the Gibson-Logo on it..

Just one year later I went one day to the ESP-customshop in Duesseldorf where they started to sell "vintage-guitars" for a while before they closed down completely in the mid-90s..and there I found my ´77 Stratocaster.She has the legend-twang but also an unbelieveable sustain..

I owned and played many,many guitars(including late 80s ESP custom shops) but I sold,lost or lent them all to everyone I knew and who asked.Both these two axes,the LesPaul and the Stratocaster mean the guitar world to me.

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Thanks for the story, Nikos.

Thanks Michael_dk.. I got sentimental it seems..

But since the thread is about "how to love a LesPaul" I dont have regrets..

Btw..

Once I tried changing the golden50s and the (brass) nut with SDs (still have a Pearly Gates for the bridge & AlnicoII for the neckI bought as replacement some 25 years ago) but this changed the sound of my LesPaul to much.Specially the brass nut seems to ad silky highs and "openess"..for those who think that "small things" dont count.

Quote from DonPetersen

nobody can tell you which ones are right for you, but when you pick one you like - you will know it

this

I had a les Paul classic 1960 for about 10 years and loved the sound but couldn't get on with its ergonomics. Sold it and got a PRS about 4 years ago and though I sometimes miss her, that les Paul never loved me.

Quote from cybermgk

Unlike others in the thread, I haven't ever gotten along with a PRS, after 4 tries.

I find the PRS's more ergonomic, but I just can't get along with their sounds. I've always found them to be very generic sounding, like a universal compromise. I like guitars that really have their own strong personality, and a good Les Paul has this. I'd prefer a Teisco or a Jolana that had a strong personality over the PRS's I've played.

I see a bunch of people here swapping their PRS pickups, so perhaps that might be a way for me to find one that works for me. I'm still a sucker for classic designs though, so it might have to be one of their newer models with pickguards. I also hate flame-tops too. Hello Starla!

Quote from Klappy

I find the PRS's more ergonomic, but I just can't get along with their sounds. I've always found them to be very generic sounding, like a universal compromise. I like guitars that really have their own strong personality, and a good Les Paul has this. I'd prefer a Teisco or a Jolana that had a strong personality over the PRS's I've played.
I see a bunch of people here swapping their PRS pickups, so perhaps that might be a way for me to find one that works for me. I'm still a sucker for classic designs though, so it might have to be one of their newer models with pickguards. I also hate flame-tops too. Hello Starla!

My 2007 PRS SC245 has PRS's PAF style pickups, which is different from the newer models. This guitar has amazing tone.

Quote from Klappy

I find the PRS's more ergonomic, but I just can't get along with their sounds. I've always found them to be very generic sounding, like a universal compromise. I like guitars that really have their own strong personality, and a good Les Paul has this. I'd prefer a Teisco or a Jolana that had a strong personality over the PRS's I've played.
I see a bunch of people here swapping their PRS pickups, so perhaps that might be a way for me to find one that works for me. I'm still a sucker for classic designs though, so it might have to be one of their newer models with pickguards. I also hate flame-tops too. Hello Starla!

It's funny, many people describe PRS tone as "generic", while it's really just it's own beast. I think it's because people plug in a PRS and expect it to sound like either a strat or an LP (or whatever).

In some ways, I'd say a LP or strat tone is MORE generic, since those are so widely used

@Michael_dk gotta agree there - I was thinking exactly the same thing. Oh and btw me thinking stats or les pauls 'more generic' doesn't mean I don't love the sound;)

Quote from Netheravon

@Michael_dk gotta agree there - I was thinking exactly the same thing. Oh and btw me thinking stats or les pauls 'more generic' doesn't mean I don't love the sound;)

Agreed!!

I was kind of exaggerating to make a point - I myself don't think of those tones in terms of being "generic". I do think they are iconic (if a tone can be called that). I really, really like those tones (the ones I'm thinking about, anyway ;-)).

I also really, really like the PRS tones for what they are - I don't listen for "what they are not".

Quote from Klappy

I find the PRS's more ergonomic, but I just can't get along with their sounds. I've always found them to be very generic sounding, like a universal compromise. I like guitars that really have their own strong personality, and a good Les Paul has this. I'd prefer a Teisco or a Jolana that had a strong personality over the PRS's I've played.
I see a bunch of people here swapping their PRS pickups, so perhaps that might be a way for me to find one that works for me. I'm still a sucker for classic designs though, so it might have to be one of their newer models with pickguards. I also hate flame-tops too. Hello Starla!

I think that is a major part of it for me as well.

Buy the correct Les Paul.

The thing about Les Pauls is it is so hard to find a great one. They are definitely out there, but are few and far between. Most LPs IME are not that great. I have been searching for "the one" since I started playing in 1979, and have only played 3 exceptional ones. The first was a mid 80s goldtop, some sort of reissue that belonged to the Gibson rep in the area. That one was amazing, but I didn't buy it as it was $900, and I had previously bought 5 Norlin LP's for $400 or so each, and thought it was too much. Those were the days...

The second was a R9 Standard VOS in the Gibson booth at a guitar show about a decade ago. It was so staggeringly good even without an amp I had my Gibson hating friend play it, and he agreed with me that it was maybe the best guitar he had ever played.

The third is the one I own now, a 2010 LP Trad Plus given to me as a gift by my day job due to a big sale we made. This one is so good in every way I have no desire to play any other LP. The only thing I've done to it other than play the heck out of it was adjust the action, 1/4 turn on the truss rod, set intonation, and change strings. Everything else is bone stock adjusted from the factory. I have no idea why it is so good but it is. Maybe they ran short on wood on the Trad Plus line that day and used something from the custom shop. In any case I got stupid lucky on this one.

If you are looking for a good LP, along with the standard weight/looks/playability/feel/resonance stuff, a critical aspect is to make sure it sounds good into a clean amp. If a LP has an interesting tone when played clean, with lots of harmonic movement and doesn't sound dead, you really have a good one. Most any LP sounds great into a distorted amp, but few sound great clean.

Another thing to take into consideration; it is entirely possible that the LP is not the guitar that moves you. Maybe you should have a PRS or Fender or ESP or SG or whatever, the LP just isn't your animal. Perhaps one should consider that if no LP makes them swoon, drop the LP from consideration. There are SO many other great guitars out there.

The aforementioned PRS and a 2013 R9 VOS. Two amazing guitars. Per the OP, I do have a Strat for Strat tones.

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For me it comes down to the feel of the neck. There are other LP's that sound great , but may have a neck profile that won't fight you. But as mentioned above, you have to play a bunch until one jumps out at you