All about Hollow Body Electric Guitars

First a little history The first electric guitars Gibson made were completely hollow like an acoustic guitar. The ES design consisted of such hollow models like the ES-175, ES-125, etc…(Gretsch made them this way too)

Fender was the first to introduce the solid body guitar–Telecaster and Gibson followed them with the Les-Paul design. Later on Gibson introduced models that were semi-hollow, meaning that they added a center block to the ES line and created the ES-335 classic model. Gibson and the some of the other companies still continued to produce completely hollow guitars along side with the Semi-hollow. The semi-hollow guitars may look exactly like the full-hollow versions, but in my opinion, they sound and behave more like a solid-body guitar. If you want to enjoy the magic of the Gibson ES line, Epiphones, or Gretsch guitars– I say go “full-hollow”.

The reason for the success of the solid body and semi-hollow design was that they did indeed help to increase the sustain and prevent feedback at high volumes.

Why I love the full hollow electric guitar

These guitars are pretty loud when unplugged which is a fun thing to have if you just want to practice and not wake up the neighbors. They are very lite comparing to Semi-hollows and Solid Body guitars– good for the back when you stand and play for a long time.

But the main reason is that I am an acoustic guitar player and hollow bodied guitars have a more acoustic guitar feel to them. Sustain is not always a good thing especially if you are a rhythm guitar player. Chords and riffs sound so much clearer without a lot of sustain. Especially if you use percussive fast strumming like on an acoustic guitar. Also the notes and chords are “softer” and “airier” which is more pleasant to the ear than the heavy mid sounding solid and semi-hollow bodies. I mean you can actually hear the wood of the guitar rather than the pickups if that make any since. Sweet and warm.

They also have a very nice grindy rock & rollish vintage overdrive sound (good examples of this is: John Lennon’s Epiphone Casino on the “Let it Be” Album and rooftop concert or George Thorogood’s Gibson ES-125 on “Bad to the Bone”)

I recently got my hands on a 70’s, made in Japan, Epiphone EA-250. It resembles the Gibson ES line and it is a relatively cheap (around $450) full hollow body guitar. I started playing it and loved it much more than the much more expensive semi-hollow Gibsons and Rickenbackers I played before. Even my girl friend (soon to be wife) who usually can’t stand me playing and practicing in the house said that this guitar doesn’t bother her at all and as long as I play it, she won’t kick me out of the house (lucky me).

So for Gibsons I rather have the ES-125, ES-330 models or even the later ES-325 all full hollow bodies over the more expansive and known semi-hollow ES-335. For Epiphones I’d rather have the Casino model over the Reviera, Dot, or Sheraton.

But hey, that is just me…..

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3 Responses to “All about Hollow Body Electric Guitars”

1. Juan says:

   June 29, 2010 at 3:54 am

   I would like to see if you are selling that wounderful Gibson ES 325, because I will buy it. I always wanted a Gibson ES 325 and better if it is a brown color.

   I would like to buy it no more of $900 dollars because is to much how people in internet sell it like in $2,540 or something like that, well I will be waitnin’ for your answer please consider it to sell it.

   Bye
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