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I traded for this guitar this morning and I couldn't put it down for the last 4 1/2 hours. I'm not the type of guy is has difficulty finding words, but I must admit, I feel almost speechless after taking this Ferrari out for a test drive. Just as the key to enjoying a ride around anything but an Indi race track is controlling the throttle, the key to enjoying the ride with this Firebird Studio is the volume controls. Rolling off the volume warms up the ear piercing punch this guitar is capable, and after a few times around the track I found there really nothing it can't do well, from ripping distortion, 80's hair band, SRV, Hendrix, mellow jazz, finger picking folk, and twangy country. I understand why it's rightly called a "Studio", because there's nothing it can't cover; but the key to all those tones isn't in all the push/pull, phase shifting, coil splitting knobs, but simply in the volume control of which pickup or pickup combination I chose. I'll never likely use all those clever options, some which are as silly as the out of phase options on my Baja Tele, but I take all three pickup combinations along with their coil splitting options, all made useful through simply rolling back on the volume knobs. Like another reviewer stated, I too will get most of my use from the neck pickup and the neck/middle, though the bridge and bridge/middle combinations are useful too WITH control of those volume knobs. I'm a Strat and Tele guy normally, but this Firebird was like a Strat on steroids, no, more than that even. I've never played anything so powerful, like a Ferrari, nor as potentially versatile as this Fire-breather Studio. I didn't find the neck to be especially thin, at not compared to Fenders and Music Man long scale types. And being wider and flatter than those others, a bit less thickness made is one of the easiest guitars I've ever played. That baked maple board has a great feel, a bit like ebony, and can sound painfully bright if throttled down. Again, the whole key for me was easing up on the guitar volume, which warmed it all up, but still had that bright snap of the B and plain E, great for rhythm accents, ala Hendrix. Warm with the mud; who can ask for more? Not I. It considerably heavier than the Fenders and such I've been used to, but it's worth it weight in tone and playability. My neighbor said he'd buy it off of me if I was willing to sell it, sight unseen, but that ain't gonna happen, at least not until this honeymoon is over. Have to get some heavier strings now, given the short scale neck. On the rating points, how do I rate Features, when it has way more than I need or will ever use? I guess the same way I'd rate a Ferrari that I'd never drive 217 mph. If I had more money in the bank than I could spend, I wouldn't complain about it.

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I'll be honest, I really bought this guitar because I fell in love with the body style and matched with the Pelham blue color. I'll never get tired of admiring the shape, one of the best designs of all time, in my opinion. Okay, let's get in to the sounds, or which there are many, possibly too many. A quick word about the pickups, I've read they are p100s and I've read they are split coil p90s. Well they can't be both but I know they aren't p90s because this sounds tame compared to a double-cut LP Jr. I had owned, which was fitted with a Gibson p90 pickup. That LP Jr had balls and a major bite that this guitar just lacks. If I throw this into the bridge pickup with the tone all the way up it can get close but there's something in it's personality that is missing. The push/pull options are pretty useless to me. It takes everything I love about the p90 sounds and craps all over it, giving the guitar a sound that is thinner than Kate Moss, makes a Tele sound like a Les Paul. I may be tarred for this but I've already got p90 pickups on order, I'm going to change the 5-way toggle to a 3-way switch, ditch the push/pull nonsense and streamline the Firebird into a rock & roll machine. The finish is fantastic, except for the symbol on the pickguard, a couple red splotches here and there but it's just a pickguard so I don't care. Much better job by Gibson on this guitar than on my LP Jr., which looked like it had a disease in some places because the yellow was so thin. The truss covers on these guitars is pretty ridiculous, essentially it's like a piece of cellophane. The tuners seem okay but tuning slips more than I'd like but I'm confident I can work that out without dropping more money on higher end tuning machines. I'll say it holds tune better than past Gibson guitars I've owned. All in all everything seems very high quality and all changes will be made because I want my stripped down rock & roll player, not because I feel hardware or electronics will break down. 2 p90s, 3-way toggle, 2 vol / 2 tone speed knobs and this will be a dream to play. Case is tough and huge, like the old Fender cases. No combo lock, you'll have to throw a little pad lock on there if you worry about your shady friends.

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The fretboard is actually that "baked maple" stuff Gibson seems to be using a lot of, I'm sure it's cheaper, and the pickups are Tapped P90s, as per the gibson website...The finish on the my blue firebird is awesome; way better in person than any pic I saw. Massive sustain, and so damn many tonal options, really close to having too much, if that's a thing. I pushed my bridge pickup away from the strings cuz it was so hot, and as stock, I personally use the neck pickup and just push/pull for most of my tonal changes within the guitar. Love the neck, love the headstock, love how massive it is compared with my strat. Not many people play a firebird, and i get a lot of comments on how sweet it looks. That's cuz it *is* sweet!

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