Gibson has brought back a stone-cold cult classic electric guitar design from its archives, resurrecting the RD shape – most recently popularised by Ghost – in a stunning new Ebony model from the Custom Shop.
The RD Custom is a little piece of history for the Gibson Custom Shop. This is its first 25.5” scale solidbody electric to join its core lineup, and Gibson CEO and president Cesar Gueikian has a real sweet spot.
Having teased its release over a series of Instagram posts – again, it is worth noting that Gueikian’s Instagram account is where the biggest Gibson stories break – he has declared the RD Custom as “one of my favourite forgotten Gibson designs of all time”. The question is: will it be forgotten again?
It shouldn’t. There is a lot to recommend the RD. The shape is instantly recognisable. That body is a nice big slab of mahogany. There’s a simplicity to its design. It’s all mahogany, with a medium C profile glued to the body and attached with a long neck tenon.
This, of course, comes bearing all the usual Custom Shop livery. The Ebony finish is complemented in house style by gold hardware, MOP block inlays on the ebony fingerboard, plus Custom split diamond inlays on the headstock. It wears the Gibson tuxedo well, with multi-ply binding on the body’s top and headstock tying the look together.
There are a pair of 490R and 498T humbucking electric guitar pickups at the bridge and neck position. The three-way selector switch is mounted close at hand to the dual volume, dual tone controls. Here we have black Gibson Speed Knobs – we are very much on-brand with the Custom look. The ebony fingerboard has 22 medium-jumbo frets.
The RD Custom’s regal headstock seats a set of Grover Rotomatic tuners with ‘kidney bean’ buttons. It has a black multi-ply pickguard, a Tune-O-Matic bridge and an aluminium stop-bar tailpiece.
Under the hood you have the good stuff; a hand-wired harness and 500K CTS pots that give you that nice taper when rolling back the volume or tone. Elsewhere you have Switchcraft jacks and toggle switch. The jack plate cover is gold-plated brass.
It will be interesting to see if Gibson reissues a Standard variant of the RD. Maybe this is a good way to test the water, to gauge its appeal. Maybe now the RD Custom will gain this cult body shape a mainstream acceptance.
For Gibson players looking for a guitar to tune down, the RD Custom with its 25.5” scale makes a credible choice. Anyone swithering over one of Adam Jones’ heavyweight Les Paul Customs now has a design to make. The RD Custom, with no weight relief, might just be the hunk of timber with the timbre to make their drop tuned riffs really sing.
The Custom RD ships in a Custom Shop hard-shell guitar case, with a COA inside, and it is priced $4,999/$5,799. See Gibson for more details.
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