Absolutely stunning. This is the crazy rare thinline version Emperor made by Gibson after they bought out Epiphone. It uses a lot of Epiphone parts but the construction is strictly Gibson. Epiphone parts include the neck, pick guard, tailpiece and truss cover. Gibson parts are the body, electronics, knobs and the bridge. Tuners are Grover Imperials. The strap buttons aren't original-they look like they came off a Gretsch. These guitars were full hollow and had an 18 and a half inch body-the widest made by anyone. The pickups have no stickers and are almost certainly PAF mini humbuckers. This guitar appears to be all original including the frets. The Emperor was the most expensive guitar in the Gibson/Epiphone line competing with Gibson's own Super 400. I have to mention that the middle pickup selector position gives you the bridge pickup and the middle pickup out of phase with each other and it's not a tone you're going to want to use. Interesting but not very useful. I would consider re-wiring it so that they are in phase or the middle position is just the middle pickup. Condition is 9+ (near mint). Original hard case. I guarantee your friends don't have one of these.