The Gibson brand was build upon its reputation for archtop guitars, but it might just have released one of its finest builds yet. Mat Koehler, Gibson’s senior vice president of product, says the new 1957 L-5 CES VOS Reissue is right up there. The pictures, and the spec, back up his assertion.
This is the Gibson Custom Shop pulling out all the stops, offering the classic hollow-bodied jazz guitar in Antique Natural and Vintage Sunburst, both finishes showing off all the details in the AAA figured maple on the guitar’s back and sides.
“No corners were cut in bringing it back to life, even going as far as utiliing a dovetail neck joint for the first time at our Custom Shop,” says Koehler. “It is as fine an instrument as we’ve ever made and we are all very proud for it to join our legendary Historic Reissue range.”
There is a stateliness to the 1957 L-5 CES design that is hard to beat, with gold hardware, multi-ply binding, the tortoiseshell pickguard and the MOP ‘flower pot’ headstock inlay.
You might want to put your suit into the dry cleaners before taking it out of its case to play it.
Gibson has given these a pair of Alnico III Custombuckers, which are left unpotted and served by their own individual volume and tone pots, with the three-way pickup selector toggle mounted on the guitar’s lower horn as opposed to the more typical Gibson positioning on the shoulder.
The Custom Shops took ‘advanced 3D scans’ of the original ’57 models before reverse-engineering these majestic electric guitars back into life.
The L-5 is a real piece of Gibson history, a design that dates back to the 1920s when Lloyd Lloar was hard at it in the Gibson R&D department, designing mandolins and pioneering guitars like this.
Early adopters of the L-5 typically played country or jazz but there’s something about a big-bodied electric like this that can be used in any number of musical contexts, just as long as you’re careful about volume, gain and the feedback that might ensue. This thing will sound magnificent through a tube combo with a slash of spring reverb and slapback delay.
“Orville Gibson invented the carved top guitar, but it took decades to perfect it,” says Koehler. “We chose to reissue the 1957 L-5 CES for the first time because of its incredible versatility and influence across jazz, country, blues, rockabilly, and beyond.”
The details are exquisite. Just look at the back of the headstock, where you’ll find a set of Kluson Steadfast tuners and a stinger – the neck comprises two pieces of maple with a walnut centre strip.
Also, the L-5 tailpiece remains a work of art. The ABR-1 Tune-O-Matic bridge is mounted on rosewood, though the fingerboard is ebony, with MOP blocks. The nut is Corian. The scale length is 25.5”.
The price is reflective of all this high-end lutherie and is definitely one for the collectors.
We're talking $11,999/£9,699 for the Antique Natural model, £8,799/$10,999 for the Vintage Sunburst, but then these are serious guitars, and you can check both of them out at Gibson.
