This Gibson 1958 Les Paul Gold Top Electric Guitar is Owned By Billie Joe Armstrong, Guitarist Of Legendary Punk Rock Band Green Day.

By fall 1955, the tuneamatic bridge and stop tailpiece was adopted on the Les Paul Goldtop (solving the earlier intonation complaints), making the 1955 to 1958 Gibson Les Paul Goldtop a big winner. The combination of P-90 pickups and a tunematic/stop tailpiece is considered by most Les Paul players as a great setup.

Hence the late 1955 to early 1957 Les Paul Standard Goldtop is regarded as a very usable and versatile guitar. They played great, sounded great, and looked great. How could it be improved? The tune-a-matic bridge was fitted to a great number of Gibson guitars during 1954-1955 including the Les Paul. It was a great addition to the solidbody line of guitars.

In early-1957, Gibson changed from P-90 single coil pickups to their new humbucking pickups, making the Les Paul Standard what it is today (one of the most popular electric guitars of all time). The humbucker goldtop is an amazing model and one I would love to find (please email me if you have one for sale!) The new humbucking pickups were not met enthusiastically by players at first. Most Les Paul players still wanted and used the P-90 goldtop models. But this idea eventually changed, making the humbucking pickup Les Paul models very desirable.

The humbucking pickups were designed by the engineer Seth Lover, who sought a way of eliminating the 60 cycle hum and other interference that single coil pickups exhibited (single coil pickups include the P-90 pickup). His idea was very simple - make a pickup with two smaller pickup coils instead of one big coil, and wire the two coils in series and out-of-phase. This way the hum from one coil cancels the hum from the other.

The resulting pickup was not merely one that had no hum, but also that the sound was different. Humbuckers generally produce a higher output signal and also a mellower tone with greater midrange and less treble frequencies.The newly designed humbuckers fitted in the 1957 Les Paul goldtops came to be known as "PAF" pickups.

This was due to the "Patent Applied For" decal on the bottom side of the pickups. The patent for these was applied for in 1955 and granted in 1959, but Gibson still continued to label their humbucking pickups as "PAF" for at least another three years (in 1963 the PAF label was replaced with ""Patent Number"" label). Gibson seemed to be in no hurry to apply the patent number to their pickups even after the patent was granted. This was probably to not help the competition copy their pickup design, by telling them which patent to look up at the US Patent Office.

The final change to the Gibson Les Paul was in 1958, which was largely a visual change. The finish was changed from a "goldtop" to a sunburst. Also the back of the guitar was changed from a brown to a cherry red color. Mid-1958 to 1960 "sunburst" Les Paul Standards are consider to be one of the most attractive electric guitars ever produced (even though they are identical to the 1957/1958 humbucking goldtop model, except for the finish).

Serial: 88119. Holy. Mother. Of. God.

DISCLAIMER: Reverb can only host 25 photos at a time. We have blacklit photos on hand as well as snaps of the original tuners, insides of the cavities, shots of the PAF's and anything else you would like to view per request. Send a message and we will pass those along.

BJA Personal Guitar SKB Flight case + original Lifton case. The belle of the ball. All original Gibson 1958 Les Paul Gold Top. Marks and wear across the guitar. Sounds beautiful. Neck as some beautiful aging and wear. Original tuners are inside of the case.

Billie had swapped out newer tuners because he had used this live. Neck PAF has some patina on the interior. Bridge PAF looks remarkably new.

Some patina and checking. Bucklerash and marks along the bouts. This was one of Billies favorite studio and around the house guitars, he has also played it at a number of Longshot and Coverups shows.

Includes a heavy duty ATA flight case as well as the original Lifton.

NOTE: Buyers who are purchasing outside of the Continental US will need to file for appropriate CITES certification through the Fish & Wildlife Administration due to the rosewood on this guitar. Shipping lead times could be anywhere from 1-4 weeks while export documentation is organized. Buyer be advised!

All Items in the Official Green Day Reverb Shop ship fully insured with delivery confirmation and include a signed Certificate Of Authenticity from the respective member of Green Day.