It was not until 1952 that Gibson had the legendary jazz guitarist and music innovator, Les Paul, endorse the solid body electric guitar with his own name. (Paul was also an innovator and early adopter of multitrack recordings.) The solid body guitar solved two predominant problems of the day that Paul was dealing with. One was with feedback, which hollow bodied guitars were extremely prone to.
The other was increasing the sustain of a note played, as the solid body supports a longer resonance of the strings.
In 1961 the Gibson SG was launched. The SG has a thinner body with 2 sharper cutaway horns. The SG was short for “solid guitar”.
The list of guitarists who use Gibson guitars is impressive. Even many who are more known to use the Fender brand, have been seen to have used a Gibson at some stage of their career.
A sample of guitarists include;
Jeff Beck, Chuck Berry, Marc Boland (T.Rex), Eric Clapton, Bob Dylan, John Fogerty, Ace Frehley, David Gilmour (on his solo work), George Harrison, Jimi Hendrix (SG Custom, Flying V & Les Paul), John Lennon, Bob Marley, Paul McCartney, Mike Oldfield, Roy Orbison, Jimmy Page (with signature edition Les Paul), Keith Richards, Carlos Santana, Slash, Pete Townsend, Joe Walsh, Angus Young and Frank Zappa.
