It's funny, all the people who love Epi's don't own Gibsons. I would not buy another Epi. They play awful. I know they don't dry the woods in the same way. I am not sure what it is, but the strings always feel way tighter. Epi custom shop are now asking 1500 for a Chinese built Epi. I avoid guitars with the code on the headstock of 14/15. Sire make a better Les Paul copy than Epi does. Sire Larry Carlton L7 is far better!
A couple of years ago I bought the first Epiphone Guitar that I have ever owned it was a Les Paul Classic. I bought it because I have never been able to fall in love any Gibson guitar. It surprised me in a good way. It stays in tune. The stock pickups sound better than expected. I actually bought a set Seymour Duncan Hot rodded humbuckers to go in it. The quality of the guitar was much better than I expected. I don't know about now, but the quality with Chinese made used to be hit and miss. I have a Squier strat that was made in China that I will never sell. I got rid of my Mexican strat and kept it.
Apart from the QC issues you mentioned though some of them don't add up (fretting issues on a guitar with a high nut for example) or are not really QC issues (loose knob), you can't really compare this with any Gibson because there's no guitar Gibson offers which matches it, not even the Modern ones. For starters, Gibson doesn't offer any LP with 24 frets. Secondly, the Prophecy has a shorter scale (24.742" vs 24.75" on the standard Les Paul). Also, 6:08 is not a rumor and you can find plenty of videos of pretty much every single model Gibson makes with some case of either snapped headstock or snapped neck joint and that happens because of how they manufacture their necks. All it takes is the guitar falling once and either hitting the headstock or the neck joint a bit harder.
I think the thing is the ratio... of course every brand has bad units on their batches (even Gibson and Fender) but what really surprises me is the hight ratio of bad ones that Epiphone has.
No, It was new, but I really liked the specs of the guitar as I sayd, the point is that I actually like Epi's but I would love them to have better QC. Obviuly I'm not gonna buy more from that brand until they solve those problems.
Thanks for the inside info with an actual inspired by Gibson. I only tried Les paul's, so if you found problems in a ES model, it proves my point of their inconsistent QC in the China factory.
@@joe_mox i mean being an Epiphone it's actually surprising for me, I had an Ibanez artcore AS73 I'm the past, all those details were polished out, edge binding, paint details, just the electronics and hardware were the weak point of that guitar, nothing that a new wire harness and new hardware cant change, but I think the Epiphone saves itself by being a copy of the es335 just it has better electronics and hardware than the Ibanez, but details like binding and finish, those aren't paid attention enough....
I have an Epiphone LP Custom Pro, the knobs were loose, strap screws fell off, needed to change electronics very quickly and the plastic Jack input cover shattered.. But guess what. Fixed it and now its my favorite guitar. The neck Sooo comfortable (its different, 60s SlimTaper D), the looks, the black ebony fingerboard, everything is amazing. Now I want to upgrade pickups and locking tuners/nut because this guitar will stay with me forever :D
Disclaimer 1: I forgot to mention that the height of the strings was huge when I got it out of the box, I had to adjust the height, a little turn on the truss rod, and intonation as well. Disclaimer 2: The nut is bone material, so far haven't had any problem with it, but probably will put a Graph Tech NuBone in the future when I change the pickups.
Man, dont wanna be negative, but 20 minutes of you talking before we hear the guitar? Maybe splice in some footage of you playing while you review next time.
