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Darren Horton has built an enviable reputation for his custom-build vintage replicas and highly accurate aged refinishing, but the guitar you see here certainly isn’t modelled on an original from 1959. A recent addition to his Daniels canon is the Pugilist, so-called because “I figure it’ll fight with what’s out there”, says Darren today. And it’s quite the illusion: a new, original offset design that feels more like a Les Paul Special that was built decades ago.
“I’ve played and built Les Paul-style guitars for years,” Darren continues, “but then I built an offset, based on a Jazzmaster, and it turned out to be one of the best I’d built – really good. But I thought it needs a set neck, Gibson scale and a smaller body.”
The first things you notice when you pick up the Pugilist are the light weight (2.8kg/6.16lb) and big neck – both informed by the material choice. The 45mm thick solid body is obeche, as used by an increasing number of UK makers, but “it’s the first Pugilist I’ve made with an obeche neck, too”, says Darren. “It’s quarter-sawn, obviously, and it’s been unbelievably stable: no movement, nothing. I didn’t know what the obeche was going to do, so it’s fatter than I’d normally do, but it’s been so stable: I’m really impressed.”
If the material choice and shape are different, the rest of the build references 1950s-era Gibson. Under the lightly aged nitro finish, the neck joins the body “with a full-width long tenon like a Les Paul Junior, but I extend the tongue so it’s as far back as I can get it into the body”, says Darren, who allows the heel area to be beautifully shaped. He uses hot hide glue to attach the neck to body and also the Madagascan rosewood fingerboard. The scale length is vintage Gibson, likewise the single-action truss rod, while the Jescar frets are “medium jumbo, typical ’59 style”, he says.
This doesn’t feel like a new guitar at all – and it doesn’t sound like one, either. The Mojo Firebird-style neck pickup is like a wider, fuller and slightly smoother Telecaster, which is sort of where the soapbar-sized Staplebucker bridge pickup lies: some PAF-y honk with an almost Tele-like bright attack, blended with some ’bucker width. The low string response is a little rounded, which helps that old guitar illusion, while the pickups sound only lightly potted, creating a quite inspiring and lively drive.
This is glorious vintage-inspired guitar craft, with models all individually made
