A classic icon with the right balance of modern tech.
A classic icon with the right balance of modern tech.
The debut of Gibson’s Robot Guitar in 2007 was a watershed moment, featuring their first attempt at a self-tuning guitar: the Robot Tuner. It wasn’t the first of its kind—Transperformance (now known as AxCent) preceded it—but what’s amazing was that it did not require extensive modification to the instrument.
Nearly a decade later, the system has been refined significantly. Now christened G Force, Gibson has of late, made a habit of including it on their guitars, much to the chagrin of traditionalists. The backlash was enough for Gibson to make concessions, so for their 2016 line-up, they’ve given customers an option: a Traditional (T) variant of each model, which as the name suggests, sticks to its roots, and a High Performance (HP) variant imbued with modern appointments, including G Force.
To put it in context, the Les Paul isn’t known to be a versatile guitar. Subjectively speaking, its tonal palette is strongly associated with traditional blues, rock and metal. If you could only bring one guitar for a performance where your set spans a variety of music genres, chances are it won’t be at the top of your list.
But with the newfangled electronics, Gibson has turned its flagship guitar into a veritable swiss army knife. How they’ve accomplished it is admirable, given that they did not radically change its look—a rather important requirement lest the puritans get their knickers in a twist.
Given this aesthetically-driven paradigm—or limitation—Gibson designed a bespoke circuit board that controls all volume and tone knobs. These knobs use push-pull pots (potentiometers), to help you shape and fine-tune your sound. To extend its versatility further, Gibson added a five-position DIP (dual in-line package) switch for additional options. It can only be accessed from the rear cavity, which isn’t the most convenient place to flick switches—you’ll need a screwdriver to remove the control cavity cover first. The cavity itself is a little cramped, but you can reach in with your finger to toggle the tiny switches if needed. Though not a typical use case, it’s helpful if you need to make some adjustments on the fly.
With these in place, you have a variety of sounds that an “old-school” Les Paul can’t do—single coil or P90-ish tones, out-of-phase modes, and pickup coil selection. You can even add a high pass filter (treble bleed) and transient suppression (to reduce spikes for digital recording). Sound-wise, they do enough to approximate the sound of other guitars like a Stratocaster, and gives the Les Paul Standard HP an additional palette of tones that it can instantly call upon.
Similarly, what G Force brings to the table is not its self-tuning ability, but rather, it offers multiple tuning options that can be evoked almost instantaneously.
But first, a quick primer: with the G Force unit switched on, strum the strings once, and the unit swiftly tunes the instrument to within a few cents of a semitone of the intended pitch. It is accurate enough for live performances, and more importantly, it’s quick. Although tuning the strings individually gives more accurate results, it nullifies the benefits G Force brings. Like all tuners, string buzz will slow the tuning process, and you may have to tune the affected strings individually.
The current version of G Force allows you to tune your guitar manually provided the unit is switched off. While we can’t determine the robustness of the unit over time, you’re not entirely in trouble if the G Force gives up the ghost; it can be easily removed and replaced with conventional tuning pegs if required.
As mentioned, what makes G Force really useful is the ability to store user-determined preset tunings. You can use all preset memory banks as custom banks, and even save offset tunings (slightly sharp or flat tuning). Constantly changing tunings between songs is now viable, as changes can be made in a manner of seconds, and will not disrupt the flow of your performance. However, learning to navigate the system takes time, and you definitely need a cheat sheet to remember the preset locations, no thanks to the relatively primitive interface. Also, for maximum tuning speed, you will need to keep the battery level above 60 per cent.
With these latest updates, the Gibson Les Paul Standard 2016 HP is now a viable option for a musician who needs a versatile guitar.
