Gibson Modern Collection Les Paul Studio Session

The Studio, Refined

Wildwoodians, the Les Paul Studio has been a staff favorite for decades, so we were delighted to hear that our friends at Gibson decided to make it even cooler by introducing the Les Paul Studio Session. With a host of refined new features and upgrades, the Les Paul Studio Session is sure to impress the discerning modern player with its combination of style, comfort, and classic Gibson tone. Let's dive deeper and see how the fine folks at Gibson have taken the Studio to the next level!

What's New?

Fans of the Studio model will be glad to know that many of the features that made it a classic are still here: a back-friendly Ultra-Modern weight-relieved body, a delightfully past SlimTaper neck profile with a modern contoured heel for easy access to the upper frets, push/pull knobs to tweak your tone for maximum versatility, and Grover Rotomatic tuners with Keystone buttons. But, the Studio Session has several awesome upgrades: '57 Classic pickups, a bound fretboard, and an eye-catching AA figured maple top. As a result, the Studio Session sounds positively fearsome and looks good doing it!

Powerful Pickups

Now, we don't have to explain why bound fingerboards and figured maple look cool, because that's an inarguable law of nature proven many times by dozens of totally-real scientists. But, we'll never pass up the opportunity to nerd out about pickups, and these '57 Classics are some of our favorites. Based on vintage Patent Applied For Humbuckers, they capture the sweet sound and spirit of fifties Gibsons thanks to their meticulous vintage specs. They have very similar specs to the originals, including Alnico 2 magnets, nickel slugs, nickel-plated pole pieces, maple spacers, and two-conductor braided wiring.

In direct terms, that translates to a rich yet articulate tone with muscular midrange, warm lows, and highs that can sizzle or sing sweetly depending on your mood. They also nail that vintage-style sag on the attack, which makes for lovely note bloom after the initial clear, percussive strike. The neck and bridge also complement one another beautifully.

The neck is a straight-ahead PAF recreation with rich, warm bass and midrange response and sunny highs. By contrast, the '57 Classic+ in the bridge is a little hotter--a nod to some vintage pickups where the pickup winder had too much coffee and got overzealous with the winds. As a result, it's a little more focused and has more presence, with punch, snarling mids, tight but forceful lows, and sparkling highs. Both pickups have outstanding touch sensitivity, too. Overall, they have a tone that fits beautifully in every genre from metal to rock to blues to country and all points in between!

The Height of Versatility

If the only tones available in the Les Paul Studio Session were the humbuckers straight, it would still be an awesome guitar. But, it has four push/pull knobs that allow you to dial in just about any tone your heart desires. The volume knobs are both coil-taps, so you can get single-coil sounds in either the neck or bridge position, or mix in a single-coil for brightness with a humbucker in the middle position if you really want to get crazy.

The tone knobs select either a out-of-phase switch or a pure bypass switch, which both sound awesome. The phase switch puts the two pickups out-of-phase with one another in the middle position, bringing both funk and classic blues/Peter Green vibes. The pure bypass sends the signal directly to the output jack with no extraneous wiring in the way, which gives it a raw, aggressive, slightly hotter tone.

With these tone-shaping tools at your disposal, it feels like you can get infinity tones, but it never feels overwhelming because the controls are so intuitive. Whether you're a set-it-and-forget-it kind of player or a habitual tone tweaker, you'll find lots to love in the Studio Session's versatile electronics.

Step Into the Studio

As you can see, we are deeply in love with the Les Paul Studio Session. With its AA figured top and bound fretboard, it cuts an elegant yet imposing figure, and its '57 Classic pickups give it Valhalla-worthy tone that can be shaped in a thousand ways with the versatile electronics. We invite you to step into the Studio Session and see what musical adventures it takes you on!