Re: 90s Greco vs MIJ Epiphone.. what has your vote?
Not sure about Grecos, other than that I've played a few and thought they were nice. What I can say for sure is that my '02 MIJ Epi '61-reissue SG was one of the finest built "Gibsons" I've ever handled. It was built better than a Gibson in terms of raw craftsmanship – build quality and attention to detail. The finish was flawless. The frets were flawless. The fit and finish were perfect. It looked like it had been built by highly sophisticated robots, not human beings – and I mean that in the best possible sense. It's weak point was the electronics, but that's all. I sold it during a purge when I was eliminating redundancy (I have a '68 Standard). But I refused to sell it without "keeping it in the family," so I sold it to my bandmate. I bought the thing for $400 on E-Bay, two years old, in perfect condition, already imported to the U.S.A. Ridiculous price in the best way!
If you like lacquer instead of poly, some older iterations of the same basic guitar line used it. Orville or Orville by Gibson. I forgot which had which specs, so I'd look it up online.
Also keep in mind that, physically speaking, Epiphone Elitists were 99 percent the same guitars as JDM Epis, so are just as good. The only difference was a different headstock (non open book – just an ugly hump). However, they had much better electronics than the JDM Epis, and are usually found for sale in the U.S.A., so shipping costs less. It's a compromise either way. With JDM, you usually pay a premium for the guitar, plus expensive shipping from Japan, and you probably benefit greatly by gutting the entire electronics system and installing a new one...but you get the gorgeous headstock. With Elitists, you usually find them within North America, so you pay less for shipping, and the electronics are good enough to keep stock...but you get the ugly headstock.
