: I currently have a Mexican Tele which to be honest has given me no joy and was a bad buy….the other day I tried a new Epiphone Les Paul and it sounded great…i’m looking for a more leady meaty sound, but i’ve heard quite a few horror stories about Epiphone. : Somebody recomended Ibanez. I can only afford around 450 pounds…..600dollars…….can anyone help? The modern Epiphones are quite nice. Most are extremely well made. The newly Gibson designed pickups in my Epiphone Alleykat are very good and will not require changing. The neck is as good as any Fender/Gibson neck I have ever played. The Gotoh tuners stay in tune just as good as the Shallers on my Ovation 1867 Legend. The only drawback to Epiphone electrics is their crummy tone and volumn pots. These are easy and inexpensive enough to change out. For the buck I would say Epiphone is a very smart choice for a guitar. I have a high dollar strat, but the Alleykat has quickly become my main axe. Anybody want to buy my Iron Maiden sinature strat cheap?

I’ve played some Epiphones they were great and some that were terrible. Generally, the electonics aren’t as good as what they put in Gibsons. The quality of the wood that Epiphone uses isn’t anywhere near as good either. If you compare a Gibson Les Paul to an Epiphone, you’ll see major differences in how Epiphone puts their guitars together. Generally, Epiphone will uses a lot of glue to manufacture their instruments, where Gibson tends to use solid peices of wood. Generally, for the money and the quality you get, Ibanez is the way to go. Since quality can vary greatly, my advice is play an instrument before you buy it.

The quality control of Epiphone has improved over the last 18 months. They can be quite a good guitar. However I went shopping for a new guitar recently and heard nasty things about Epi pickups. I tryed a 2002 Epi Les Paul custom and it sounded great until we cranked the volume on the amp and it howled like a love sick wolf gazing at the moon. Not nice. The guitar itself was great but the pickups made me spend my money on something else.

: I currently have a Mexican Tele which to be honest has given me no joy and was a bad buy….the other day I tried a new Epiphone Les Paul and it sounded great…i’m looking for a more leady meaty sound, but i’ve heard quite a few horror stories about Epiphone. : Somebody recomended Ibanez. I can only afford around 450 pounds…..600dollars…….can anyone help? have you tried working on the tone of the guitar through changing the electronic parts? i have learned how to work on my guitar electronicly to adjust it’s tone characterists and have it set-up to what i want to hear. it was fun & educationl to work on my guitar! try checking out……guitar electronics.com hope this gives you some help……

They are generally ok, just check out the guitar thourghly… if you like the sound/feel and it’s in good shape then it should be fine. I’ve seen alot of them new that had poor ‘workmanship’ (quality), so if I bought a new one I would defintely have to see/try it first as I wouldn’t take the chance of just having one ‘off the rack’ sent to me. I have a 2000 epi LP signature US which sounds great, very good ‘workmanship’ and has held up very well (but I looked at several before choosing that one), and for the price I don’t have to worry much about knocking it around… thats my .02, for $600 you should have a lot of options, so just try as many as you can and have fun doing it. : I currently have a Mexican Tele which to be honest has given me no joy and was a bad buy….the other day I tried a new Epiphone Les Paul and it sounded great…i’m looking for a more leady meaty sound, but i’ve heard quite a few horror stories about Epiphone. : Somebody recomended Ibanez. I can only afford around 450 pounds…..600dollars…….can anyone help?