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View Full Version : Les Paul would have been 96 today...



Noilly Pratt
06-09-2011, 06:17 PM
...and I saw the interactive "Doodle" Google has on their website today and it reminded me how much we owe that man for modern music. Maybe some of you might not know how much...

He helped perfect the solid body guitar. Previous electric attempts were hollow bodied and yes, they played the note, but he desired a way to change and sustain the tone of the note as well. Flanging? Les Paul invented that, too.

He invented the multi-track recording process, first using acetate (wax) discs to accomplish this. Then, after the Germans invented tape recording he modified a tape machine to record sound-on-sound for Bing Crosby.

Les Paul approached Gibson with an idea for a guitar but they didn't take him up on it until Leo Fender had come out with his version of a solid body guitar (what would become the Telecaster)...he then helped develop and style the Gibson Les Paul, a guitar you can still get today.

Also, if you listen to Les Paul and Mary Ford recordings, they were among the first to use "close miking" - standing less than 6" away from the mic and using what's called a cardioid mike - a mic with a specific pattern that cancels out background noise. This emphasized the bass notes and created a more intimate sounding recording, as opposed to the many other recordings of the 40's that sounded like an omnidirectional mic was put into the middle of the room and everybody played into it.

On top of that, the guy could play guitar wonderfully and did so until his death in 1989 of Pneumonia

24 multitracks in the 50's (The Beatles in the 60's only had 4)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e0ffdwBUL78

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=foXSXOAfB4U

Hal-9000
06-10-2011, 01:39 AM
My friend had a Les Paul sunburst...a 1960 version if I recall correctly and man could he play.We were around 17 when I got to play it and he showed me my first chords (attempts).
In my limited guitar touching experience, that solid body had the best sound regardless of your level of talent.

Didn't see him for over 20 years, we caught up and I asked him if he still had it.Sadly he got into a heavy drug habit and sold it somewhere along the way. :(

deebakes
06-10-2011, 02:46 AM
man i wish i had a drug habit to spend my les paul on :(

Goofy
06-10-2011, 12:27 PM
I had a Les Paul special in cherry red a few years back, thing weighed a tonne though! :lol: Swapped it for a Strat......... sold the Strat and bought an SG standard.......... and now i wish i still had my Strat :wha: The SG sounds great but doesnt play anywhere near as well as the Strat did

Noilly Pratt
06-11-2011, 05:56 AM
Never had the dough for decent guitars.

I had a Mann guitar which was a copy of a Les Paul. I now have an Ibanez copy called a Samick (colour -- Deep Purple), a nylon acoustic and an electric acoustic by Kramer.

SGs are small guitars, aren't they?

Goofy
06-11-2011, 08:10 AM
SGs are small guitars, aren't they?

Yeah, a bit smaller and a lot lighter than the Les Paul........ Angus Young plays one :tup:

http://img34.imageshack.us/img34/7974/happybirthdayangusyoung.jpg (http://img34.imageshack.us/i/happybirthdayangusyoung.jpg/)

deebakes
06-12-2011, 01:38 AM
Tom Morello plays google for les paul:


http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=W5P3FcKpz8k