I'm now thinking of getting a new S-100, mainly because I have never been able to find a Gibson SG that will play right and stay in tune. I have owned at least 7-8 SGs over the years, and not one would hold it's tuning for any length of time. I just sold another one for this reason.
I've been on a bit of an SG kick this year, trying out different '70s models after discovering a beat-up '72 Deluxe at my local guitar emporium in January and being totally wowed (much to my surprise!) by it. There are currently two Deluxes, two Standards, a Special, a Custom and a super cool SG-250 (great sounding Melody Maker single-coil pickups, 527 made total (not that anyone cares)) in my house. I'll whittle this down after I've lived with 'em all for awhile.
One thing these guitars have in common is a strong neck/body joint and a stable neck. All but two of 'em have single-piece bodies, and they all play & sound
really good. The tuners vary in smoothness—some have seen more use than others—but they all hold tuning just fine. Much better in fact than my '67 Jr. did with its original three-on-a-plate tuners (since replaced with Gotoh Kluson replicas). They've pretty much wiped out any preconceptions I had re. Norlin-era SGs. You've gotta get along with the 1 9/16" nut width, though…not a problem for me.
All that said…get an S-100. :love-struck: Along with all the SGs I had to finally get myself a Guild too. Tried out a couple new ones with the smaller HBs and really liked how they felt & played. Sounded good too, though IMO an S-100 and the larger HB-1 pickups are made for each other. Then I found a dark cherry '71 and it was all over. It's no museum piece—plenty of scratches, nicks, & dings—but it is light and resonant, in great structural shape, and plays & sounds absolutely fab. The pickups are very expressive, fairly low wind (7.1 & 6.9 KOhms DC resistance for the neck & bridge respectively) and yet plenty juicy. They can really purr up at the neck while down near the bridge you get loads of bite and chime along with the
oomph. I've been playing the guitar mainly clean-ish, where IMO it excels, though it works great with dirt pedals and cranked amps too. If the repro HB-1s in the more recent S-100s are anything like these originals then they're up top with the best. Yow!
-Dave-
