At the same time, Paul was going through a public divorce from wife and vocalist partner Mary Ford, and his popularity was dwindling as music tastes had changed in the early 1960s.

In the early-to-mid 1960s Gibson's parent corporation, Chicago Musical Instruments, revived the Kalamazoo brand name for a short time.

Because of its ease of play, comfort to hold, popularity, and vintage heritage, the body style of the SG is often copied by other manufacturers, although much less frequently than the Les Paul and the Fender Stratocaster.

The SG Standard features pearloid trapezoid fretboard inlays, as well as fretboard binding and inlaid pearl "Gibson" logo and crown; the mid-level SG Special features pearloid dot inlays and an inlaid pearl "Gibson" logo, without a crown.

High-end models, including the Diablo, occasionally sport decorative maple caps, carved tops, and gold hardware.

This design continued until late 1971 or early 1972, when variations of the SG were sold with a raised Les Paul style pickguard and a front-mounted control plate.

In 1972 the design went back to the original style pickguard and rear-mounted controls but with the neck then set further into the body, joining roughly at the 20th fret.

It had a clear finish and an ebony fingerboard and was accompanied by low-cost "Les Paul" and "ES 335" type guitars.

Visually similar to the SG Standard of the time, the special features included an ebony fretboard, two Dirty Fingers humbucker pickups, and a master volume, two tone controls, and rotary coil tap that gradually eliminated one coil from each humbucker.

The finish was black with cream color plastics and the truss rod cover read "Exclusive".

In 2008, Gibson introduced the Robot SG, which feature a motorized tuning system developed by Tronical.

Around 2000 through 2009, Gibson introduced the SG Classic, which harked back to a Junior/Special type design, with bound mahogany fret board with dot inlays and two P-90 pickups, with a thin '60s neck profile.