More on Breeders Gear

I've been coveting  cheap gold top Les Pauls with open pickups over the last few months (like Kim's). I almost bought one in Indiana at the start of the year, but it sold before I could get to it. There's one available, a red quilt top classic (like Kelley's), available at my local GC for $299 right now. I'm basically waiting to see how much my car repairs are going to be (mechanic is mere blocks away from the guitar) before I go look at it (and maybe hoping it will sell before I touch it). I was trying to figure out how close it looks to Kelley's and stumbled across these excellent circa 2008 pedal photos by "dietspritezero."

At first I was just looking at the photos and didn't notice who's account it was. Then I saw and was like...right. Of course. I have a long history of bumping into "dietspritezero" online. She's the person who taught me (via youtube video) how to play Debaser. I think we chatted briefly about the fan-only Music Box Pixies show once on a forum too. It's fun to cross paths with the same super fans from time to time. 

UPDATE:

Found some good pics of the red les by searching under Cheryl instead of Kelley (photo in Kim's basement by Glass, natch):

And the one for sale, a "classic":

It isn't an exact match. Kelley's doesn't look like it is a quilt top and it has old-style tuners, but in my price range it might be close enough ($299 for this Epi. It's a discontinued model so no comparable price new).

For comparison, here's the gold Epi Traditional Pro I've been eyeing (they run ~$450 new or ~$350 used):

and Kim's below (she has one black and one white pickup as opposed to the zebra, but I kind of like the zebra. I suspect the pickups on Kim's have been changed out from stock):

In the end I think any gold top or red les that I can get for under $350 that has uncovered pickups will fit the bill so long as it isn't one of the super shitty models (100, studio, junior, etc). I know that newer models allow you to split the coils in all kinds of weird ways, but I really don't think I'd use that function.

And, as I find myself less than 20 songs away from finishing the tribute project (and unlikely to ever play the tribute project out live) this is all basically a waste of money anyway.