I Bought the Cheapest Epiphone on Reverb! Epiphone Les Paul Special II review. 

Fact: today's Epiphones are most of the time better built than some vintage gems selling for thousands of dollars from the 50's and 60's. I know, I am going to shock so many gear snobs but when I look at a vintage guitar and pickups are not even routed straight, string ferrules on the back of Fenders are all uneven looking like they were drilled by a drunk, frets not all perfectly parallel, etc, etc ... say what you will, CNC really upped the quality and consistency of the instruments we get today, the difference between high end and lower end is the quality of the hardware and pickups and the attention to details and hand finishing, polishing fret levelling of the neck.

I bought an Epi Special II exactly like this one almost 20 years ago. I paid $99 for it used. It was my number one guitar for over a decade until I literally wore out the frets. It always played well but the really remarkable thing was the way it sounded, especially when recording. When it was no longer playable I had other guitars that were/are excellent instruments but I sometimes found myself wishing that the Epi was playable because of that sound. I talked to several repair people and they made it pretty clear that it would cost more than a new one to bring it back to life. I played others of the same model and some played fine but they didn't have "that sound". My brother, who is a luthier moved nearby and finally took pity on me (I had even considered buying an after-market neck since it's a bolt on design but he persuaded me to not do that. Instead he offered to check it out and see what all was needed. To both of our surprise the frets which were badly worn from years of hard use still had enough left for a levelling and dressing. So he did that for me, did a setup and has reunited me with a wonderful and expressive instrument. Believe me, I am as astonished as the next person that a $99 guitar would turn out to have such personal/functional value.

My $100 melody maker is amazing. Ended up upgrading electronics because it deserved it.

I bought this guitar while stationed in Afghanistan 15 years ago for $130 on Amazon just to have a noodler and maybe leave it for the next guy and I didn't expect much. I am not a guitar player I am a percussionist. When I got it, it sounded good to me, but there was one Bosnian guy who was a real guitar player and loved it. He set it up nicely. It's basically a Les Paul JR, with an extra pick up. He did mention although it played well, the hardware is cheap but very good. This guitar has been reviewed a 1,000 times on youtube. Well I had a new baby boy so I gave it a treatment, did corrections to the frets, leveled them out, rounded them nicely, bought Billy Gibbons Seymor Duncan pick ups, ordered vintage wiring from RS Guitar works who did a fantastic job. They gave me a prewired system that is exactly a PRS SE design which comes with the ability to have push pull capabilities including CTS 500 pots, drilled the peg heads out to 10mm and put Gotoh tuners and tune-o-matic bridge, and a Tusq nut. I spent $350 on this set up which is way more than the guitar cost. But put up next to the best Epi Les Paul or maybe even a Gibson this thing is a rock alcoholic. It is light so it sustains like crazy. It's a great guitar out of the box, but slowly do the add ons and you do have something special.

I bought one of these for my son 16 years ago. I was surprised how great it played and sounded. I still have it.

People don’t really need to fear guitars made overseas any longer. Every manufacturer are using CNC to make the necks and bodies so tolerances are the same as the us models. Where they scrimp is on the electronics and tuners which are easily upgraded. My opinion.

Last year I sold my heavy Epiphone LP Standard and bought 3 used LP Specials. I replaced the pickups in all 3; one with '59 PAF style pups, one with vintage Filtertron style pups and one with P90 style pups. I now have 3 light weight, great playing and great sounding guitars for the price of one LP Standard.

I bought one like this at Black Fridays store last year; unopened, perfect condition for $4. (Yep, four bucks). Have way too many guitars that I’ve paid way too much for; especially after finding how nice this plays and sounds.

Found a Epiphone Sg310 at a pawn shop for 80$ it even has a invader pickup! Just changed out the tuners for locking. My favorite guitar!!

Very Cool, Thankyou. Awesome guitar and playing. I have been seeing these available locally second hand, will be checking them out closer now. cheers

Les Paul Special II was my starter, quickly grew out of it but its cheap enough where its a perfect guitar to decide if you actually want to play or not

I bought my 2016 for $64! It was in great shape, just sat around an apartment as a second guitar that rarely was used. Mine is worn cherry with P90's in a mark 1. I have adapted a Gibson LP special pickgaurd and changed the knobs. Love it. Neck is nice like yours and and neck pickup is pretty hot too! I may end up changing the tuners out in the future but is holds a tuning pretty decent. I've been scratching away at the finish and giving it character marks and wear.

I bought a cherry Epi Les Paul Junior new for $125 in 2010. Replaced the crummy tuners (they were horrible) with after market $25 GFS tuners and replaced the okay pickup (really microphonic with high gain and volume) with a Duncan 59. Kept the "lightning bolt" bridge (I actually like those). Total investment $225 and it is a surprising good guitar. I still have it and play it regularly. Plays great and sounds good. They are fun little guitars that are definitely good enough to be daily drivers.

I bought the Limited Edition one of these..put some Grovers on it and it holds its own against my Gibson SG..definitely worth buying.

I just bought a used Epiphone Les Paul Special II, on OfferUp for $30 tonight. It was in need of some "Reassembly" as the prior owner removed the controls with the intent of repainting it. The Pickups, Bridge and tailpiece were still installed. it has the translucent grey finish with striped grain pattern in decent shape. I got it home and leveled/polished the frets due to evidence of a lot of playing. Also cleaned up the fretboard and oiled with woodwind instrument bore oil. I also reinstalled the pots and switch. I will need to replace the tuners included, because the originals I got in a bag with it no longer will work. The holes were drilled larger to accommodate different tuners, and the push-in ferrules no longer fit. That's fine by me, I plan on installing upgraded locking tuners anyway. This will be my first Les Paul style guitar, as every other guitar I have owned has been Stratocaster styles.. which I have owned many... I regret ever selling my favorite, a vintage Korean made Squire, with sunburst body. I fully copper lined the electronics and pickup cavities and channels between. I added Fender tortoise shell pickguard & rear cover with gold screws. all hardware was upgraded to gold including locking tuners, heavier tremolo bridge, input jack plate and jack, switch knob, and Fender American Standard gold string trees. I also installed gold pickup covers and strap locks. I made custom knobs by taking Gibson top hat style knobs, sanding the paint from the rear, and repainting black with the gold numbers showing. I sanded the tops flat and the backs of some identical diameter gold capped clothing buttons and epoxied them on. A friend of mine who was a luthier helped me do an excellent setup with very low action. I took a "cheap" pawn shop guitar and with all the upgrades I performed ended up with a gem.

Those bridge saddles may have to be reversed in order to correctly intonate the string, there is no right or wrong way just whatever is required to achieve intonation.

I've still got one of the sg specials from 2004.. when it comes to straight up indestructible simplicity,, they're up there with ak47's and Toyota pick up trucks!

Guy was having a yard sale around the corner from my house and had this self-same Epiphone for sale. It was an '05 and I bought it for $80. Needed a fret leveling ($60). I do my own setups. Total cost to me of $140. I have it set up like Keith Richards' Tele with 5 strings, tuned to open G. This guitar has a GREAT tone and playability. Incidentally, I checked my guitar after you mentioned the saddle slant direction on yours, and it was, indeed, as you illustrated it, the same.

Have the special 2 with 6 screw trem bridge. I added a vega trem system for tuning stability and locking tuners. Aside from the trem popping out from the back, it does well as a shredding piece. Epiphone does well even at the lower tier instruments.

Great review. I also don’t much care for the open humbucker look. And while I normally don’t like LP pick guards, on this guitar it looks excellent. Bravo!

I bought this guitar over 10 years ago when I was a young kiddo. Now im 25 years old. The Special II is still in my guitar collection and I still enjoy playing it! The more recent version "VE" doesnt have a Mahagoni body anymore only the neck is still Mahagoni. The Special II was fully Mahagoni on both the body and the neck which I definitly prefer for a Les Paul!

Also the covers actually seem to improve the sound of these particular pickups.

Hey man! Thanks for taking us along on this journey making the adjustments that so many of us should make on a newly acquired guitar! And, THANKS FOR BEING REAL AND NOT PRETENTIOUS! So many so called guitar channels are all about the host showing us how "cool" he is and how fast that they can play a riff that they spent hours and even weeks perfecting! New sub here my friend! Keep the faith and keep fighting the good Rock-N-Roll fight! God bless and take care...

I just got one of these a few months ago for $150 CAD, so around $100 USD, and I was surprised as well. Same finish as yours, just left handed, and when I looked up the serial number, it's from April 2003! It was scratched up, but the frets had no wear whatsoever, so it must have been knocked around a bit but not played very hard. I stripped the finish off the neck and gave it a walnut stain, Gotoh locking tuners, replaced the bridge with a better one I had lying around from another guitar, graphtech tusq nut, and new pots, switch, and output jack. Got rid of the tone and made both pots volumes. It's a KISS machine. I wanted to do what you did by adding the pickguard, I just haven't really found a decent deal for a left handed cream pickguard. Maybe I'll have to settle for white or something. 😂 But yeah, great guitar. One of the guys in my first band 15 years ago had a white one and I loved the look of it. It's nice to have my own now. 🥰

This was my first guitar It did me well while learning the basics

Your a Legend brother, making thus my next guitar as I just started playing. Thanks for the help and review, your a rock start

I bought a LP clone (not Epiphone) looked just like that. I opened up the pickups and rewired them to permanently make them single-coil (just disconnected one coil in each). then I rewired the controls to make two volume controls - one for each pickup, (and no tone control) so I could blend them. also added treble bleeds on each volume pot. the guitar sounds fantastic now.

No lemon here. You got yourself a gem. Tempting. Nice axe!!!!!!

I purchased a used one, including a hard shell case, for $100 Canadian. I replaced the nut, and I had to replace the tuners, but I just used inexpensive ones from China. After a set up, it is a surprisingly fun guitar to play!

I bought one here in canada for about $300 on amazon and I love it. It was just what I wanted for the price. Its one of my favorite guitars I have .

The Ebony one was my first guitar. Still have it. Nothing wrong with it at all.

Back in 96 I wanted a real Les Paul but didn't make a lot of money so I had to buy what I could afford. I purchased my Special II for a little over $200. It's still bone stock and plays great. The only thing I've done to it is level and polish the frets a little. These are really great guitars for the price point.

Great starter for the teenagers starting out in the fact that you can upgrade the tuners and pickups is just a long-term guitar in my mind. Just bought my 14-year-old daughter one today She loves it! Great review

I had an Epiphone SG Special II for awhile, found it at a local Goodwill. Ended up selling it to a father who's kid wanted to learn guitar, but it was a pretty good guitar, especially for the money. Woulda kept it, but I figured it should go to someone who's gonna get more use out of it, and I was already in the middle of working on my Epiphone Explorer Pro at the time. Would be cool to see Epiphone release a more affordable Explorer like this! Only reason I even managed to get an Explorer is because a friend gave it to me back in high school, insane that they seem to start around $650 new 😥 Apologies for rambling, but great vid! Glad I happened across your channel!

man that is a score. I remember back in the late 80's buying some korean Les Paul at the same price range and oh boy it was unplayable as hell.

I was just gifted one yesterday. It’s trans blue and signed by Joe Bonamassa as a PBS auction item. I have several guitars from a vintage Tele, a Jimmie Vaughan Strat, a 50 year old D-28 bought new, a few Ibanez and a ‘54 reissue Custom Shop Les Paul. I agree with everything you said about the Epi. Surprisingly well finished, sounds very good out of the box and today I’m setting it up to my liking. The only gripe is the Laurel fretboard which is almost Maple white. I’ll be staining that along with polishing the frets. I like what you did with the pickup covers but might convert to a P90 in the neck position, my favorite pickup. Tuners might get changed out, maybe. It’s a $230 guitar after all. The JB sig might rub off over time so I’m not worried about losing “collector value.” I work for PBS stations and it’s crazy, but one station was offering my same guitar with Joe’s sig for $2,500! Sure hope no one fell for that!

I have the same model but in black. Bought it as my first guitar on my birthday. Didn't really like it until i tried a lot of other cheap guitars lol Absolutely will keep it, even tackle with the electronics a bit maybe!

that guitar looks beautiful after the upgrades!

I can dig this, A few Epi's here and always liked the look of these LP's. Man, old enough to remember seeing Teisco's at Thrifty's for $39.00 and a bit more. They were mostly funky. Look at an exchange rate of today. Prob around the same value but 'cheap' guitars are so much better now. ha, i looked it up,,,, That $39.00 in '69 would be worth just under $318.00 now. wow.. Cats looking for cheap stuff got it made these days. My first electric guitar was an Audition/Teisco from the '60s in '72. Jag alike. Cool but nothing like todays bargain offerings.

i got this guitar way back in high school for christmas in 2009 ,i still have it and re-strung it last week and it's such a fantastic guitar!

I just did the same thing. Got an older one off of Ebay that had the wiring all shot for $75. The older one's have the head stock depicting Les Paul Special. Also on the nut cover. Put away the Ceramic 8 pickups and put in some GFS Alnico 2 pickups. Replaced the electronics with full size CTS pots. 500 for V, 250 for T. Also put in a Russian OIP Cap for snobbery. Was going to put HB size P90s but thought "Why??". P90s are not all they are made out to be for a long shot. You have turned my head with the LP pick guard. Looks good. Will pull one out and do the same. Case????? Only thing I can think of is a Fender case. LP Case will not stabilize the thin body. OH yeah..... How does it sound??? Like a Telecaster with some Balls !!! Buttt...I put on black pickup covers. Now I question that.

I have a couple of these... The oldest one is a '95 Korean-made and then two Chinese models... I have a vast collection ( 167 guitars so far ) and some of them are old and valuable, I even have a few custom shop models too... But for some reason I have as much fun with my Special-II as I do with my '75 Les Paul custom... Go figure 😄😄 And of course they're great mod platforms... Excellent video... Thanks

Looks fantastic, great work!

You got a very nice relic chair.

Some of my favorite guitars to play and mod are the cheap Epi LP Junior's. Cheapest purchase for one was $30.00 plus the $20.00 in fuel and $7.50 spent at Tim Hortons. They always all get TUSQ nuts, CTS pots/jack, Grover/Kuson/Gotoh tuners and new SDs or DiMarzio or GFS pick-ups.

Ahh, can't tell ya how many of those I saw leaning in the corner of a buddys room, all dusty and forgotten. Id always grab it and try to rescue it! Everyone in my eras "first" guitar lol!

I only buy cheap axes cause customization is a blast such as installing the Kill Switch twins Tap & Toggle. Ditching the Tone pot and there is an array of cheap yet awesome pups on the web.

Sweet man! If you change the pickups to something like a Seymour Duncan Custom you'll have a super guitar

You wasted your time and found a hidden gem! If the neck is straight and the basic bones are there I believe fresh strings and your particular setup gets the job done. Cleaned up nicely. 🤘🏼

I bought the exact same guitar at a Yard Sale about 10 years ago for $80.00 Canadian. I agree it's an awesome guitar. No regrets here!

Minnesota! Verrry Good!

I’ve not seen this particular model, but I have seen the Epiphone Les Paul Junior Special model with the single bridge humbucker in place of a p90. I’ve even played one, which I believe was made in Korea in 2005. It’s a single pickup, but a very versatile sound. I found myself constantly using it instead of a similar price point SG model made in either Indonesia or China in the same time period.

Normally, I don't like pick guards or chrome pickup covers. But those sure dressed up your guitar! Good call! I might pick one up today! Thanks for your review!

Thats a pretty impressive value, sounds and looks great!

Never seen that 3 + 3 saddles before?!? How? I saw that before I ever played the first note on a guitar. Most aftermarket bridges are like that. Most stock Gibson Les Pauls are like that.

I have a Special II that i was given over 10 years ago. I put Grover locking tuners, an ivory nut and a Wilkinson roller bridge on. I didn't know much about guitars and I still can't play well.... but my friend who plays keeps saying he loves the actuon and sustain my guitar has. He said i was some type of idiot savant for not being "musical" but able to do my own setup and intonation. I still have the Special II, and every so often, i get asked if I'm going to let go of it, or actually play it more. I've started to play a bit more, and it's a really reliable guitar.

I was given one of these and it plays great. I ended up converting it to a black and gold Les Paul Junior.

Excellent find…sounds fantastic….nice review 👍

Love mine...set up for slide in open e

Great video. I just bought the same guitar from Guitar Center and paid more. My first guitar at age 55 just learning. Appreciate the video it gave me some great insight and shows that it's me, not the guitar 😉

I got one as a customer tip with a crate amp and it accidentally became my favorite guitar. Nothing will replace my true favorite… 1972 Fender Mustang I will never see again 😢 heroin makes people steal to get their fix. I lived in the wrong place wrong time and got robbed of my strat, SG, and Mustang. The vibrochamp I had was original.

Great video! I subscribed cuz it was informative and not boring haha. That guitar turned out very pretty haha

I just got one for $100 on ebay. It gets here Friday. I'm going to add the pickup covers if I like the sound of the humbuckers. Based on your video, they appeared to change the tone a bit. I'll find out. As a cheap guitar, it was going to do the P90 conversion, but we'll see. Thx for the vids. Well done.

Sounds like a good purchase

Love the finished product

Great guitar, great review.

Leaving this comment because I noticed the 2112 intro solo. Loved the video. Glad to see another Rush fan in the wild. I have an LP special-1 I'm upgrading right now. Great guitar. I literally polished the frets and it was great. But the tuners leave something to be desired. Thanks for the video man.

After your adjustments it went from good to great. Nice tone.

What a terrific guitar

Guitar Center's website has an Epiphone Les Paul Special-I P90 on sale for $139 right now. I'm very tempted. I already have a Special that I installed humbucker sized P90s in when I painted it, but it's red and I want a worn black one with normal P90s too, so why shouldn't I? lol

Love what you did with this guitar.

I got a cream colored pickguard for mine after watching this video. Thanks for the great idea!

Not sure if it still does, but this guitar was available as a starter pack along with a 10w amp and a few accessories like a strap, etc. my friend had it and its not a bad playing guitar

As long as you like the neck there great. With today's technology there's great tones to be found there. There are budget guitars out there 200 and less that are incredibl. I know because I have many of them.

Paid 75 at a pawn shop. Put P90’s in it and dressed the frets and I play it live way more often that my les Paul.

my only guitar now is an epiphone LP Special II my dad bought exactly 20 years ago. he said it costs aroun $150 back then. and when he bought it he got a bonus which was a washburn BD12 Amp that i still use now... currently saving for an epiphone LP custom pro...

I had an all black version of this as one of my first guitars, bought at a pawn shop for $80. It was definitely a decent guitar. I recently traded it with some other things back to that same pawn shop for an LP Standard Pro. But there wasn't anything wrong with it, I just didn't need 2 LPs.

Hello! I thoroughly enjoyed watching your review. As an experimental physicist who enjoys getting hands-on, your review has inspired me to disassemble and enhance my old, rusty Epiphone guitar. If you don't mind, could you please share the modifications you made to your guitar? This could include adding new pickups, applying oils, etc. Thank you!

I'm more of a bass player but my brother has one of these and I've played it for an hour or two. It felt really nice. Don't have much to compare it to but it's a million times better than the basses at that price point. Holds tune at least. Only other thing I can compare it to is my dad's Harley Benton. I haven't played that because it is left handed, but he had to replace all the tuners on it because the ones that came with it were awful. The Epiphones are decent out of the box.

Found on in a dumpster in Sevierville Tennessee. Wine red and plays wonderful

I beat you all. How does FREE sound? I found an all-black Epi Special 2 someone just threw away! It had a few scratches from the kid who owned it, but otherwise nearly new. One tuner constantly goes out of tune so I'll get some Chinesium tuners for $15-$20. Will do a belly cutout and one on the top for my arm. Will sand +stain Neck. Convert the buckers to singles. Thinking of stripping to all bare wood or going the RELIC'ed look. Maybe change to a Tele Bridge. I felt like I won the lottery!

WOW,, Im Impressed.

Where did you get the pickup covers from? Were there any issues where retrofiting them was necessary to make them fit the pickups?

When working on this did you notice if the pickups were waxed or not? They sound really good. I was concerned about microphonic feedback without much high gain which I'm not hearing any. Mostly on cheap guitars it's an issue.

I had one of those Epi Special E1’s in the red SG model and I still think about it to this day

I bought a 100 dollar epiphone les paul with p90s and I love it

I bought an Epi Jr. in 03 and had Jason Lollar drop a P90 in it.Nice guitar.

I got the Special I specifically as a kick around guitar because my job often has me staying in hotel rooms out of town and the thought of my nice guitars sitting in a hot car until the end of the day when I can start driving back home was a bad thought. They're OK guitars. Very light and feels comfortable to play. Didnt get knocked out of tune anywhere near as often as other cheap guitars I have, which was surprising. I was bored and did an A/B comparison through the amp vs my Epiphone Prophecy and Gibson SG. Yea, those pickups are hot garbage compared to the better PUPs. Solid practice guitar for me. 100% would recommend if you just need a guitar around for some reason, but def not any good in a gig setting.

It's amazing what a pick guard will do.

Thanks. I subscribed and liked the video. Best Wishes.

Funny you didn't mention adding the pickguard or changing the pickups. Ooops, never mind. Just saw your other video. just covers on the pickups.

Hi, great guitar to play, did you just soldered the covers or wax them as well? Just for looks or maybe a sound difference that you can tell?

Opens the box, plugs it in, then plays “Spiderwebs”. Sold!

I got this for free from one of my customers 5yrs ago and decided last week to start learning how to play

Great for $99. I badly wish Epiphone would make an Inspired By Gibson Les Paul Special Faded like the long running slab LP’s of the 2000’s. They could do the work finish like they do on the LP Classics or cheapo SG Special VE. But covered humbuckers. I’d buy 5 of em in walnut stain! I’ve never bonded with the carved maple top of traditional LP’s but prefer two humbuckers rather than P-90s.

A professional setup on an Epiphone Les Paul will give you a world class guitar. Absolutely the equivalent of any Gibson.

Awesome video! I’m impressed too! Reminds me of a Les Paul Junior! I want one! Thank you for posting this!

Bolt on neck $100 guitar no case needed lol

Hell yea..i have a worn cherry..same guitar...and i love it dude!!

Mine looked exactly like that. No wear because it sounded like ass. I got it for less than $100, traded it for a pair of earrings for my wife's birthday. I think they were $45. Always wondered what it should have sounded like with a decent pair of pickups. NO WONDER they are the cheapest Epiphones out there. I still shudder when I think of it.