Epiphone - 1962 ES-335 Reissue Sixties Cherry + Etui

At Epiphone, they haven't just tried to copy a cult model: with this 1962 ES-335 Reissue Sixties Cherry, they've deliberately targeted a year that Gibson isn't revisiting. The result? A half-body electric guitar that resurrects the late 60s neck profile, the mother-of-pearl block markers and the rounded cut-outs... without lapsing into dusty nostalgia.

As soon as you put your hands on it, the comfort of the mahogany neck with its SlimTaper C-profile jumps out at you. The rosewood fingerboard, with its rounded edges, glides under your fingertips as if the instrument already knew you. With the softness of the medium jumbo frets and the 1962-style fret markers, it's almost like a one-way trip back to another era... except that everything has been designed with today's players in mind. And whether you're lining up bluesy bends or knitting jazz arpeggios, the 1962 ES-335 remains surprisingly docile, without ever losing its bite.

The body may be open, but the sound is not. The solid maple centre block limits feedback, maximises sustain and the overall rigidity of the instrument, and the two Gibson Custombuckers, hand-wired with CTS components and Black Beauty capacitors, give you a wide range of sounds to explore. From mellow roundness to dry snap, every nuance seems to want to tell its own story. A simple flick of the toggle switch and you can change the scene without losing your bearings.

And then there's the look. Because yes, even if you're playing in a dark corner, the Sixties Cherry finish always attracts a little more light than you'd expect. The black pickguard and nickel hardware are a reminder that this guitar was designed at a time when style never came second to sound. An added bonus: it comes in a hard case embossed with the words 'Inspired by Gibson Custom'.