Gibson get raided

[AndyR]

I felt a little uncomfortable reading some of the comments in this thread yesterday.

Gibson have now published their response and the full text of the agreement and statement of facts received from their government.

http://www2.gibson.com/News-Lifestyle/Features/en-us/Gibson-Comments-on-Department-of-Justice-Settlemen.aspx

[Burtog]

Gibson was a great guitar company in the sixties and seventies when they were priced in the same ballpark as Fender and Rickenbacker. But then they started jacking up their prices to ridiculous amounts that only collectors and rich rock stars can afford, abandoning the average player. Gibson no longer makes guitars for guitarists, they make guitars for the wealthy.

I've owned a few Gibsons. I still have two; one from the sixties and one from the seventies. They're great guitars and I'll never part with them, but I'd never buy another Gibson because of the price. There are many other guitar companies making guitars as good as Gibsons, if not better, for reasonable prices. So I'd be foolish to waste money on a Gibson.

What a shame that a once-great company has come to this. Greedy businessmen always ruin everything they touch.

Unfortunately I tend to agree. I'd always wanted a Les Paul and in 2003 whilst window shopping in a music shop my missues said why dont you get one, a credit card was in my wallet and for £1250 I got a brand new standard. I tried a number in the shop until I picked the right one. A while later I compared it to a friends Epiphone Black Beauty which he had purchased for around a quarter of the price, I was a little gutted to realise there was no real difference, certainly not to the difference in cost.

I sold it on a number of years later as the weight used to hurt my back while playing - I replaced it with a telecaster!!

[peterp]

No one expects the Spanish Inquisition!
Time to stack all the evil Gibbies in a big pile and burn them!

I have an epiphone closest I could afford next to the real thing, works quite well.