Stopped by GC today on my way to pick up Holly (that’s my wife) at the airport. I grabbed a new 2014 Gibson SG Junior (pardon me, SGJ) and plugged it into the new sweet Peavey Valveking II 50 tube amp. Set the amp for crunch and played me some AC/DC. So did it sound like Angus Young’s awesome crunchy tone? YES. Yes, it did. The SGJ has the SG tone, all of it. At a sale price of $429. We’re talking Gibson here, not Epiphone.
So what’s the catch? Well, this is a bare bones guitar. No poly finish. But while the lack of poly and binding looks hideous on the Les Paul Junior (pardon me, LPJ,) it’s OK on the SG. The regular SG doesn’t have binding anyway, but in person and up close the SGJ is not a bad looker. And the pickups sound awesome. So?
The dot fret markers look cheap to me – it’s what Epiphone and Gibson both do on their low end guitars. Personally, I’d rather see fake plastic mother of pearl imitations that are regular sized, but I guess that’s maybe taste. The tuners were horrific. Awful. Terrible. Stunningly bad. Replacing them would be mandatory. So if you don’t care about the lack of poly, the dot fret markers, and having to replace the tuners, you might be in good shape. But I didn’t get along with the fat neck – did not like it one tiny bit. Again, that’s just personal taste. And the biggest reason I don’t have an SG is my hand doesn’t naturally land anywhere comfortable on most of them. I have played a couple of Epiphones that felt good, but mostly it’s weird – I put my hand where it naturally wants to be and it’s a weird spot. Again, personal taste.
But in all, I think Gibson accomplished what they wanted to with the SGJ. SG fans should try it out.
