"Gibson reintroducing the '70s Les Paul Custom"

[Dave Scepter]

 "Gibson reintroducing the '70s Les Paul Custom" and not a bad price either 

Those specs include a headstock volute, throwback finishes, and, under those, the preferred tonewood recipe of the period: a mahogany body with a three-piece maple top, ’70s profile maple neck with a ’70s profile, and an ebony fingerboard with mother-of-pearl block inlays... After Gibson’s move, the Les Paul went through a series of refinements before it landed on that combination, and ’70s Custom builds have since become drool-worthy vintage guitars. Randy Rhoads’ infamous Custom was a mid-’70s build. The Edge is another famous advocate for what they can do.

These new Customs have five-ply top binding and three on the back, while there are 22 medium jumbo frets, a GraphTech nut, and, of course, a 24.75” scale.

Tradition is maintained with an Aluminum Nashville Tune-O-Matic bridge and Stop Bar combo, Grover Rotomatic tuners with Keystone buttons, and Calibrated T-Type humbuckers hand-wired to Orange Drop capacitors.

Finer details include Witch Hat knobs and a black washer with gold text for its three-way pickup selector 'poker chip'. They also come complete with diamond-shaped Posi-Lok strap locks, which are handy.

For ’70s-chic looks, its bound headstock gets a mother-of-pearl Custom Split Diamond headstock inlay, and there are four gloss nitrocellulose lacquer finishes to admire. Choose from Ebony, Tobacco Burst, Wine Red, and a version with a beautiful Buttercream Top that’s sure to whip up (ahem) excitement from vintage enthusiasts.

At $3,999 apiece, these nostalgic riff machines don't come cheap, but that's cheaper than their vintage and Custom Shop counterparts.

“Some of the first Gibson models to come out of the new craftory were Les Paul Customs, which quickly made their way to the heavy metal pioneers and hard-rock icons of the era,” the firm says. “Gibson is proud to reintroduce the legendary Les Paul Custom 70s, making its long-awaited return to the Gibson lineup after two decades.”

https://www.guitarworld.com/gear/electric-guitars/gibson-les-paul-custom-70s-2025

Edited September 23, 2025 by Dave Scepter

[G Man]

I wonder if they all come in at at least 10 lbs as well.

[bruce919]

1 hour ago, G Man said:

I wonder if they all come in at at least 10 lbs as well.

 

[stobro]

How can a '70s LP Custom be considered authentic when it has "medium jumbo" frets?

[RobB]

19 minutes ago, stobro said:

How can a '70s LP Custom be considered authentic when it has "medium jumbo" frets?

Because they won’t sell as fretless wonders.

Edited September 23, 2025 by RobB

[RobB]

I checked out one at my local GC today. It was the white on black model. It was very nicely made. I only played a few chords and checked out the construction. I did not plug it in. It was heavy like a 70s Les Paul should be.

Edited September 24, 2025 by RobB

[hamerhead]

They're re-issuing those Norlin pancake boat anchor pieces of crap??

Still #1, all 10.2 lbs of it. Pretty sure it came with medium jumbos, although that was 46 years - and 2 fret jobs - ago.

 

[Hbom]

4 hours ago, Dave Scepter said:

 "Gibson reintroducing the '70s Les Paul Custom" and not a bad price either 

The guitar that made the Stratocaster famous.

[Travis]

🤔🤔🤔

[Hackubus]

The 5 layer binding on the top bothers me.  The 3 layer binding on the back REALLY bothers me.  

[crunchee]

I remember back in the late '70's/early'80's, practically everybody who was familiar with those LPs in transparent colors (Standards, Customs, etc.) with maple tops wished that Gibson would use two- piece maple tops (like '50's models) instead of those three-piece tops, me included.  Hell, it didn't even have to be figured wood, plain two-piece maple tops woulda worked just fine. it didn't make sense to me or anybody I knew why Gibson didn't do that from an aesthetic viewpoint, I always thought a three-piece maple top looked mismatched; also, maple was probably the cheapest of any of the woods that Gibson used on LPs, too!  Nowadays, Gibson probably charges a premium for 'vintage accuracy', for using three piece maple tops.  

Edited September 24, 2025 by crunchee

[hamerhead]

10 hours ago, Travis said:

🤔🤔🤔

I had mine waaaay before anybody heard of this guy. What's his name again? 

[velorush]

A couple of the neighbor boys got Les Pauls in the 70's (I, of course, kept my $49.99 Sears guitar because I was eventually going to quit guitar like everything else...). One opted for a tobacco sunburst (Like Ace) and the other, a white Custom. Don't know what ever happened to the tobacco burst, but the other guy still has his (now quite yellow) Custom (and some 50 years later I finally bought my own Standard!) 

Edited September 24, 2025 by velorush

[santellavision]

Here's my '73 Gibson Les Paul Custom. I got it as a gift  from my dad in 1973. I still have it!


Yeah, It's definitely not the same now - haha. Been through a million changes. Here's the story...
 
It went through some crazy mods. First, I swapped out the pickups for 2 DiMarzio Super Distortion pickups. My dad drove me to Staten Island, NY and I went to Larry Dimarzio's house where he was selling them out of his basement!! I later added a middle PU a'la Peter Frampton. I then added an MXR Phase 90 inside the control cavity (Yeah, it actually fit) Added Grovers too (still on there)

 
I stripped it down to natural like Mick Ronson and filled in the maple top and took out the middle PU.

Kept it like that for a long time. It was a pretty nice sounding guitar! Under 10lbs too.
I then decided to fix her up. I sent it to a luthier to completely grind off the maple top and 're-top' it with a Spalted Maple top.
Recently, I added some custom-wound Gravelin pickups and 3rd refret by RS Guitarworks to Medium Jumbos. The only part still original is the tailpiece. Weird, but it's Super lightweight and actually makes a big difference in tone. I tried two other gold tailpieces and they didn't sound nearly as good, lightweight really made a difference. Here's a current pic I used for my CD insert on my album.

Lastly, I made a nice truss cover to remind me of my dad.

 

 

Edited September 24, 2025 by santellavision

[The Shark]

24 minutes ago, santellavision said:

Here's my '73 Gibson Les Paul Custom. I got it as a gift  from my dad in 1973. I still have it!


Yeah, It's definitely not the same now - haha. Been through a million changes. Here's the story...
 
It went through some crazy mods. First, I swapped out the pickups for 2 DiMarzio Super Distortion pickups. My dad drove me to Staten Island, NY and I went to Larry Dimarzio's house where he was selling them out of his basement!! I later added a middle PU a'la Peter Frampton. I then added an MXR Phase 90 inside the control cavity (Yeah, it actually fit) Added Grovers too (still on there)

 
I stripped it down to natural like Mick Ronson and filled in the maple top and took out the middle PU.

Kept it like that for a long time. It was a pretty nice sounding guitar! Under 10lbs too.
I then decided to fix her up. I sent it to a luthier to completely grind off the maple top and 're-top' it with a Spalted Maple top.
Recently, I added some custom wound sounding Gravelin pickups and 3rd refret by RS Guitarworks to Medium Jumbos. The only part still original is the tailpiece. Weird, but it's Super lightweight and actually makes a big difference in tone. I tried two other gold tailpieces and they didn't sound nearly as good, lightweight really made a difference. Here's a current pic I used for my CD insert on my album.

Lastly, I made a nice truss cover to remind me of my dad.

 

 

Very cool.  

[hamerhead]

Great story and the connection to your Dad, Ernie.  Love the spalted top, too!

[kizanski]

My 1970 3 pickup LPC

ALL original except for frets and replaced toggle switch.

Original owner gave it to an old friend of mine, who sold it to me many years later.

I bought it to flip it but I fell in love with it and kept it.

Until I sold it, that is.

Frets over the binding (of course).

[Willie G. Moseley]

Had a pawn shop prize '77 Custom in Silverburst that was, not surprisingly, turning that greenish tint that made the silver part turn into the color of a hardboiled egg yoke. Flipped it sooner than I thunk I would to finance the purchase of a (new) bass.

As for the new re-issue, that buttercream finish is off-putting on accounta it still looks it's starting to yellow (verb) because of use in a club environment, and I'd want Alpine White, which is a pure white color (YMMV) Fender and early G & L have also put out instruments with an original "light beige" finish (for lack of a better term). 

[Vintage Hamer-Lover]

3 hours ago, kizanski said:

My 1970 3 pickup LPC

ALL original except for frets and replaced toggle switch.

Original owner gave it to an old friend of mine, who sold it to me many years later.

I bought it to flip it but I fell in love with it and kept it.

Until I sold it, that is.

Frets over the binding (of course).

Asked myself many times, why some headstocks of that period yellowed so much. Too much smoke/weed?

[kizanski]

1 minute ago, Vintage Hamer-Lover said:

Asked myself many times, why some headstocks of that period yellowed so much. Too much smoke/weed?

In the case of the former owner, this was definitely a factor.   

[Vintage Hamer-Lover]

Even Hamers yellowed

[Vintage Hamer-Lover]

same year, another Special. Or too much sunbur(st)n?

[ZR]

45 minutes ago, Vintage Hamer-Lover said:

Even Hamers yellowed

Was that decal installed at the factory...on a Friday about 4:45pm? 😃 It looks so crooked to me. 

[Vintage Hamer-Lover]

29 minutes ago, ZR said:

Was that decal installed at the factory...on a Friday about 4:45pm? 😃 It looks so crooked to me. 

😄 I suppose, it's just the picture's angle.

But honestly, strange that varying yellowing...

[Dave Scepter]

15 hours ago, Vintage Hamer-Lover said:

😄 strange that varying yellowing...

It's just the difference between the brand of lacquer, thickness, temperature and the amount of exposure to UV light of the clear lacquer applied 

Edited September 25, 2025 by Dave Scepter