The sides appear to be solid maple but the top and back are ply. It has an interesting back as well - it's flat and has ladder bracing rather than press-arched without any. The body is in good shape, too, with only minor wear throughout. Post-repairs it plays spot-on quick and easy and the sound is, frankly, delicious. While we chatted, I put this together with its owner over a couple hours - leveling/dressing the frets, reinstalling the harness and wiring it to the new pickup, adding a new ground wire, fitting all the parts, and setting it all up. The '40s P90s I've played through have all been feedback hounds on hollowbody boxes so it's nice to play an ES-125 this old without thinking about my placement at all. It also doesn't squeal like a raving banshee if you get it close to your amp at all. The late '50s were killer years for P90s and this one sounds gorgeous - it's not too hot, it's relaxed enough to sound jazzy, but it still has some good bite and punch. That swap-out makes a major upgrade, though, in a sense. The only thing not original to this guitar is the pickup which is a 1958 P-90 with adjustable poles rather than a '48 P90 which would likely have had Alnico rod (non-adjustable) polepieces configured a bit like a Fender pickup. The owner of this guitar bought it as a husk from a partser-outer seller and then bought back as many of the original components as possible as well.
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