9 pounds 3 ounces. I rescued this R8 out of a trailer park in New Hampshire from an Iraq war Vet with a ball cap, mustache and goatee that matched his best buddies ball cap and mustache and goatee. These guys were straight out of South Park central casting, real nice fellows who offered me an American beer and kind of looked at me like I was from outer space, although I have a somewhat matching mustache and ball cap as well, (I can get along with anybody). I will say that the condition of the trailer was immaculate and extremely clean and organized, even the bed was perfectly made with straight 'hospital corners' (they wanted me to see his other guitars, which were in the bedroom, nothing much to mention there). It did stink in there though like cheap cigarettes and the ride back home to the island was a little chilly cause Freddy and I had to put the windows down because of it lol. But I can report that after a deep clean and polish there is no malignant odors to be detected at all.

This guitar came up on the local classifieds listed as 'Les Paul for sale', there was four or five fairly blurry indistinct photographs accompanying it and to tell you the truth I didn't think there was much here to be interested in, however I did send a message to the fellow saying 'We need more information!', heh. Fellow replied subsequently with a few more images that were slightly better and I saw the back of the headstock and it all started to come together. He was asking normal regular 'top dollar' so I told the guy pretty much what I would be willing to pay, he added 50 bucks on top of my offer, I replied to him 'I see what you did there', and agreed to a long drive south on 95. The thing is- I received his reply right when I was leaving a house that had 142 guitars in it, Gibson Custom Shops, Esp Custom Shops, Vintage pointy 70's-2000's guitars etc, where I was hoping to make some great deals, but nothing came out of that visit- I do hope to go back though! So it turned out to be a long weekend of driving.

Over those two days of looking at guitars I drove pretty much a bakers dozen hours, half of that with my young son Fred, which was nice, and I'll tell you I feel pretty justified through my efforts to have saved this one. We arrived at the trailer in NH, Fred wanted to stay in the car and play video games on my phone, which was fine, I went in and in the fairly dark interior of the trailer I saw, right away, hanging on the far wall- this Les Paul. I knew right away that this was no chinesium, and that this was the real thing. Theres no faking the patina and palpable perception of authenticity when it comes to this Les Paul. I initially thought that it was an intentional 'honey amber' top until I took the back plate and toggle switch plate off for an inside inspection and saw the original Heritage Cherry finish that was untouched by sun- I can't hardly believe the fade that has occurred to this top, this Les Paul has pretty much never had SPF anything on it and has naturally faded from UV to an incredibly subtle luscious honey amber that gives it the impression that this is straight out of 1958. The pickup covers were particularly aged in a way that Mr Murphy himself I imagine would have drooled over, the frets were oxidized to a point that begged for a polishing and I knew that I had my work cut out for me to clean this LP up. After a thorough fret polish with Frine fret polish, a 3x conditioning of the rosewood board with Dunlop 65 lemon fretboard oil, an hour of polishing with Music Nomad polish, a new set of D'addario NYXL 10-46's, and a set-up- this authentic light aged relic has had a total face lift and is ready to rock. My only regrets is that I perhaps polished the pickup covers a little more than I should have as they were pretty grody but also crazy relic'ed looking. Anyways, it came out pretty nice I think.

Official condition report I would say is 9 out of 10 as there are two small dings on the back of the body about a .5 centimeter and maybe 1 centimeter each (however there is zero buckle worming!) other wise there are no scratches on the headstock, or neck or top or sides, there is the faintest marks of hanger rash on headstock sides (barely perceptible, must have used a pretty good quality hanger). Therefore this is not a mint guitar but it is remarkably clean and beautiful and therefore I would say way above 'player grade'.

I like to have my Les Pauls pick guard off to appreciate the full top and you can see the original finish color under the screw mount for the pickgaurd on the bottom of the guitar- pretty cool.

Comes with all the case candy and a very clean case (no smells).

I can only imagine that this guitar was pilfered out of Saddams palace at the end of Desert Storm as 'battle booty' on this old soldiers way home from the middle east and now will go out into the world to be rocked on again. Awesome!

Have a wicked good one!

-Nate from Maine.