Carvel Made in Japan Les Paul

Les Paul with a tremolo arm!!

One day, while casually browsing guitars on Mercari, I stumbled upon a shocking find. What do you know! A Les Paul with a tremolo arm!!
And Carvel? That’s the company that made the late Van Halen’s Strat, right? And it was only about ¥15,000!!

Between the color and the slight archtop, I think it looks pretty darn good. And above all, I absolutely love tremolo arms (even if I don’t use them that much…). I couldn’t resist buying one, starting with the silver metallic finish.

Playing it, the maple neck gives it a brighter, more solid feel than a Gibson. And the Wilkinson tremolo bridge is a blast too.

One pickup on this guitar was dead, so I swapped it out for a Chinese humbucker I had lying around and replaced the knobs with glossy ones… I’m super satisfied.
I have this habit where if I think “This is good,” I end up wanting two. So I searched for a while… this time I wanted a black one… Oh well, I ended up buying a second one.

This is a slim-profile basswood body Les Paul-style guitar, featuring hardware with an indescribably cool matte finish.
After some research, I found this Carvel Les Paul (style) guitar was Made in Japan, with a retail price of ¥43,000 back in the 90s. It was a Japan-only release, based on an American design, manufactured by Chushin Gakki in Nagano Prefecture.

It’s equipped with two Gotoh pickups, and the bridge, as mentioned earlier, is a Wilkinson.
There wasn’t much info online, but I’ll jot down what I found out.

Chushin Gakki Seizo (bankrupt in 2011), formerly located in Matsumoto City, Nagano Prefecture, exclusively handled the manufacturing of Charvel and its sister brand Jackson (Grover Jackson / Jackson Stars) models for the Japanese market from the late 1980s through the 1990s, through its Japanese distributor Kyowa Shokai.

Japanese-made Charvel guitars produced during this period are renowned for their high assembly precision and continue to command a solid reputation in the used market today.

The existence of charvel refinement les paul

The Charvel brand has always been strongly associated with the “Super Strat (Dinky shape)” image, with Strat-type models dominating the majority of its lineup.

These models featured Charvel’s unique interpretation (such as neck joint and bridge specifications), differing from the traditional Gibson Les Paul. The technical expertise of the manufacturer, Chushin Gakki Seizo, ensured high quality as instruments.
The specifications listed in the 1999 catalog are as follows:

BODY: Basswood with Arched Top 45mm 

NECK: Maple bolt on

FRETBOARD: Rosewood 22F 628mm Scale

BRIDGE: Tunamatic with Stopbar

HARDWARE: Satin Chrome

PICKUPS: Gotoh Humbuckers in satin chrome

CONTROLS: 2 V, 2 T, 3 way selector