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Gibson Ron Wood L-5S

Gibson and the Rolling Stones guitarist team up to create the Ron Wood L-5S, based on the original release from the ’70s.

Gibson Ron Wood L-5S

This guitar is built to match the preferred specs of the artist, inspired by one of his favorite instruments, which incidentally was originally released around the same time he joined the Rolling Stones.

The original L-5S is simply a solid body version of the hollowbody Gibson L-5, carrying with it the same features and cosmetics. Unfortunately, it did not become as popular as the hollowbody version, even with the L-5S being part of the company’s top-tier line up. Still there are some guitarists that took a liking to it, and this includes the Rolling Stones guitarist Ron Wood.

The official description adds, “Although we think of all the great Gibson electrics as being made in the ‘golden age’ of the ’50s and early ’60s, a few genuine classics slipped in during the years between the end of that era and the rebirth of Gibson standards a little over two decades ago. The L-5S is one such guitar: Gibson’s top-tier solidbody at the time of its introduction in 1973, it has long been the favorite of Rolling Stones and Faces guitarist Ron Wood–an artist who knows a “rock star guitar” when he finds one.

Now Gibson and Ron Wood collaborated on a signature L-5S that combines classic Gibson design, Ron’s experience and preference, and modern building techniques. The result is a new top-tier signature guitar with upmarket looks and price tag.

Instead of using the usual solid mahogany body, this guitar features a body crafted from three layers of maple, with a top, middle and back section all glued together into a solid piece. To alleviate the usual weight issues, the company applied their modern “chambered” body design into this signature guitar, a method that they are now using to many of their solid body electric guitars.

The guitar’s body shape follows that of the L-5, carrying over the same wide lower and upper bout, but with a thinner profile because of its solid body design. Both the back and top feature white multiply binding that contrasts the black finish, giving the guitar the classic “Tuxedo” as seen in the popular Les Paul Custom guitar.

Ron Wood had his way with this guitar’s neck, which is crafted from maple and walnut. It has a thin neck profile and topped by a 22-fret ebony fretboard. His preferred fingerboard radius of 12″ was used while the nut width is 1.687″. Instead of the usual shorter scale length design found on many Gibson guitars, the Ron Wood L-5S has a 25.5″ scale length. All these features were planned and selected for to make the guitar as playable as possible to Ron Wood himself.

For plugging in, Gibson equipped this guitar with a pair of marched Burstbucker pickups, described as having a depth and growl that meets Ron’s rock and roll music requirements. The pickups are wired to a traditional 3-way pickup, selector and a stripped down control section that has only two knobs.

Metal hardware on the guitar are finished in gold, including the Grover Kidney tuners, adjustomatic bridge, stop tailpiece, the output jack and the strap buttons. Rounding off the guitar’s features are the pearl block inlays and the multi-ply custom headstock with pearl split-diamond inlay.

The MSRP for the new Ron Wood L-5S guitar is $5,499, and the first 50 guitars to come out of their production were signed by Ron Wood himself. For more information and other details, visit Gibson.

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