Les Paul has moved on to the next realm

[GattonFan]

Truly one of the legends - "Chester and Lester" still one of my fav albums. The man was an innovator, and a dedicated player. RIP ...

Dennis

[jnslobaugh]

I was fortunate enough to see him play at Club Irridium on his regular Tuesday's in New York. He always had guest appearances and even though he wasn't able to play as well as in the past, His jokes certainly were top notch.
And treat I'll never forget, getting to meet with him after the show.

I'll post some pics from that day later this evening.

[pauliventura]

R.I.P. Lester William Polfuss....

We've got a lot to thank this man for , he was nothing short of a genius....pioneer of the electric guitar / tape echo / sound-on-sound and later on multitrack recording to name only a few , he was an american original and the Thomas Edison of rock 'n roll !

[Strat-o-rama]

In honor, tonight in my household we'll be looking at the documentary "Chasing Sound", and a collection of Les Paul/Mary Ford TV appearances a friend gave me for my birthday just a few months ago.
Wish I had the chance to see him at The Iridium. Goodbye Les.

[thunderhead]

My Son and I caught the Headline News piece this evening. Very good story on the Legend. When my Son{Tyler} heard the reporter say that Les had pioneered Reverb, Tyler looked at me and said, "He invented Reverb"???? Tyler is only 6 years old but is Fascinated with my 1964 Fender Stand Alone Tube Reverb Unit!!!!! I told him, yes Son he pioneered Reverb. We then hooked up the 1965 Sunburst Mosrite Ventures MI, 1964 Fender 'Verb and my new Vox AC4TV amp and Tyler learned a G Chord!!!! Thanks Les Paul for continuing to influence a whole new Generation!!!!!

[dubtrub]

News report: Les Paul
There's some great still photo's in a slide show if you click on his photo.

[Haole Jim]

Geat article. Thank you.

Now to put, "The World Is Waiting For The Sunrise" on the stereo....

[Deke Dickerson]

It's been interesting to see the news reports of Les' death and the various claims that people are making about what Les did.

I certainly am a huge, giant fan of Les Paul and really appreciate the things he did actually invent, but sadly "reverb" is not one of them. (although I appreciate the reverbed out "G" chord, Thunderhead! Don't take it the wrong way!) What the hapless news reporter meant to say was "delay," or "echo," though that doesn't sound as good.

Les pioneered the use of delay on his guitar signal and his recordings in the early days of disc recording....he would record with a disc cutter, then take the signal from a regular turntable arm mounted a few inches behind the cutting head, and feed that signal back into his mixer. Voila! Delay. Later when they invented magnetic tape recorders, he did the same thing with magnetic tape heads in a staggered position, and it became known as "tape delay" or "tape echo." There is absolutely no question that Les pioneered delay and tape delay, especially for use on an electric guitar.

Reverb, however, has its roots in the echo chambers that were physical rooms lined with tiles used in recording studios since the 1920's, and the first commercially available reverb "effect" was the Hammond Organ Reverb pan, used on electric organs, which of course they started putting into guitar amps around 1959 or 1960. (as you can see though, the terms "echo" and "reverb" get flip-flopped a lot, as people still refer to reverb rooms as "echo chambers.")

The news also keep referring to Les as the inventor of the electric guitar (nope, that was Lloyd Loar around 1923 with his Gibson experiments, and the National Ro-Pat-In company that marketed the first magnetic pickup electric guitar and amp around 1931-1932. The news also keep saying that Les invented the solidbody electric guitar in 1941 with the "Log." Nope, that honor goes to George Beauchamp, Paul Barth and Adolph Rickenbacker with the Frying Pan solidbody electric lap steel in the early 1930's, the Rickenbacker bakelite Spanish solidbody electric from 1936, and the first wood bodied spanish electric solidbody guitar, the Slingerland Songster of 1937-1938.

I would love to give Les all the accolades and credit he actually deserves, like inventing the first multi-track tape recorder, his pioneering work in direct recording of guitars and other electric instruments, and for being a heck of a great guitarist. That's who I'm remembering today....and I guess some geek like me needs to keep the facts straight or they'll be saying that Les invented bread or the automobile or who knows what else....

R.I.P. to Les--

Deke

[Deke Dickerson]

And, in the 30 seconds since I posted this, now a guy on the news is saying that Les invented stereo. Oh god, when will it stop....ha ha!

Deke

[dorkrockrecords]

It should also be said that Les was indirectly responsible for the Mosrite octave neck. A young Semie Moseley was infatuated with Les's super-high, super-fast leads (a product of recording innovation), and whether out of ignorance or homage Semie felt this sonic novelty required a super-high, super-fast guitar. And voila, the Mosrite doubleneck/tripleneck was born. So without Les, Mosrite might've just been another whitebread guitar company; thanks to Les, Mosrite will forever and always be resigned to the oddball files...

...and I don't think I'm alone in saying I wouldn't rather be anywhere else.

Thank you, Les.