Because of its excellent craftsmanship, and the superstar guitars associated with the instrument, the 1800 or so Les Pauls built from 1960 are literally the most desired electric guitars on the planet, with collectors asking, and getting, figures in the six figures — and higher — for these beautiful instruments.
While most of us will never pull that particular sword from the stone, Robb Lawrence's The Early Years of the Les Paul Legacy: 1915-1963 is the next best thing, a hardcover book chockablock full with beautiful color photos of the instrument, and the surprising number of variations in its design, including its transition from the classic single cutaway design of the 1950s to its twin cutaway SG successor in 1961, until, for legal reasons apparently involving his divorce from Mary Ford, Les Paul asked Gibson to remove his name from the instruments in 1963.
Fortunately, Gibson and Les Paul reached an agreement to reissue Les's classic singlebody design in 1968 and its been a bestseller since; that will be the subject of the eagerly anticipated second volume of Lawrence's book.
A Tribute To The Minimoog
If the Les Paul was the signature instrument of the 1950s, then the Moog was the breakthrough instrument of the 1970s. While the solidbody electric guitar of the 1950s was a breakthrough in both portability and flexibility, synthesizers at the time filled whole rooms and could do little but electronic beeps and blurps (see: Planet, Forbidden). During the 1960s, their size continually shrunk until the arrival of Robert Moog's Minimoog synthesizer in 1970.
Of course, these days, size isn't that critical an issue, as synthesizers are increasingly software propositions, such as Cakewalk's popular Dimension Pro and Rapture software synths. But four decades of exposure to the vintage sounds from those early instruments keeps the desire for warm analog sounds alive.
Hence, Craig Anderton's MiniMoog Tribute Expansion Pack for Cakewalk's Rapture software synthesizer.
Listed alphabetically, the first of the 100 patches is called Bass_BigSawtooth, which instantly recalls the first half-dozen notes of "Chameleon", the first track on Herbie Hancock's iconic Headhunters album from 1973. Other patches such as Brass_Analog display a remarkable sensitivity to the player's touch; played lightly, the instrument sounds like a muted horn; hit with full velocity and it can really screech.
Anderton's MiniMoog Expansion Pack for Rapture also has a wide variety of sequencer sounds; while I'm no expert on Minimoog programming, it seems safe to say that to generate these sounds in the 1970s, you'd need to run a Minimoog through a battery of outboard gear; here they're a press of a button.
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