NSASD!

shinksma

What? I get a title?
Joined
Mar 20, 2014
Messages
5,322
Last week a fellow PRS forumite mentioned he had been to a particular GC to try out a used Swamp Ash Special that had arrived recently. As it turned out, that fellow forum resident was not impressed by the SAS, and opted for a McKorina - a fine choice too, IMHO.

I have lusted after an SAS for a while now, so I thought I'd check online, and see which GCs had SASes in stock near that forum member's location (handily stated in his profile). Ah, there it is, Downtown Chigaco's GC has an SAS in blue. I don't have a blue PRS (don't tell Sergio about this one). Hmm, maple neck, which is what I want. Birds - a definite want. Trem bridge - good there too! But it looks like a solid blue in the online photos...not a transparent blue where you can still see the lovely swamp ash grain.

So I call up the store, ask about the finish, does it come with a PRS hardshell case, is the trem bar included, is the maple neck flamed at all, etc. Traded some more pics via email.

I present to you my seventh PRSi:

IMG_20150309_111459_738_1024_zpsrkeauixn.jpg


Yes, the grain is visible through the finish, though it isn't obvious from far away. And it came with a PRS OHSC and trem bar. A 2007, based on the SN.

The grain is quite difficult to photograph, but is very obvious in person:

IMG_20150309_110626_043_1024_zpswgm8jsqn.jpg


You can see the only real ding this guitar has in the above shot. there are a couple of dents below the bridge, and the fretboard is worn through the finish in a few spots. Otherwise this thing is in great shape! It seems to have been played a fair bit, but whoever owned it took pretty good care of it and wasn't careless on stage (or wherever they played it).

Most curiously, the color is not quite as shown above, because it is Blue Matteo. But the online photos looked even more blue, like this one I took under fluorescent lights:

IMG_20150309_103943_536_1024_zpsxuqhcnvn.jpg


The neck is not very flamed, but there is a hint of it:

IMG_20150309_104040_592_1024_zpsjuio29fw.jpg


IMG_20150309_104007_629_1024_zpsi27xncd1.jpg


The back shows the grain better, probably because I can control the reflections off the flat back better than the carved top of the front:

IMG_20150309_111846_829_1024_zpsideexuza.jpg


It needs a bit of a set-up - action is higher than I'd like, and the bridge is decked to the body - I like the "stock" float setup.

IMG_20150309_111212_021_1024_zpslnokmic7.jpg


Thank you for passing this one over, cjmwrx! For what it is worth, the neck feels great to me!

This wasn't due to arrive until tomorrow, so I did not come to work prepared with an amp today to try out the pickups, etc. Now I can't wait to get home and plug it into the Archon I got a couple of weeks ago...

(And have I satisfied my GAS for a while, or is it accelerating...?)
 
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The blue color is quite interesting. If you get an oblique look to the guitar - like it is laying flat on a desk, and you walk away 10 or more feet, it looks much more royal blue - at least under fluorescent lights. I will be seeing what it looks like in the direct sunlight later this afternoon. Most of the shots above were taken with indirect natural light - I turned off the overheads in my office, and opened the blinds.

So, I have PRSi in amethyst (purple), blue, emerald green, yellow/natural, and red, plus a tortoiseshell (brown) and a natural spalted maple. I clearly need an orange PRSi (maybe the blood orange?), and a light green or yellow-green (chartreuse?). Does PRS do "indigo"? Or does that just end up looking like a deeper blue or blue-ish purple? Then I can move onto the "glows" and bursts.
 
Gorgeous! I bought a Matteo Blue CU24 one time just for the blue color based off of online photos, of course in real life, Matteo is really green looking... or at least mine was...
 
The blue color is quite interesting. If you get an oblique look to the guitar - like it is laying flat on a desk, and you walk away 10 or more feet, it looks much more royal blue - at least under fluorescent lights. I will be seeing what it looks like in the direct sunlight later this afternoon. Most of the shots above were taken with indirect natural light - I turned off the overheads in my office, and opened the blinds.

So, I have PRSi in amethyst (purple), blue, emerald green, yellow/natural, and red, plus a tortoiseshell (brown) and a natural spalted maple. I clearly need an orange PRSi (maybe the blood orange?), and a light green or yellow-green (chartreuse?). Does PRS do "indigo"? Or does that just end up looking like a deeper blue or blue-ish purple? Then I can move onto the "glows" and bursts.

Oh, yeah, haha, your GAS has just begun!
 
Gorgeous! I bought a Matteo Blue CU24 one time just for the blue color based off of online photos, of course in real life, Matteo is really green looking... or at least mine was...

This particular instance of Blue Matteo is quite blue - just not a royal blue, more like what Wikipedia calls Bright Navy Blue, a.k.a. Crayola Navy Blue. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Navy_blue#Bright_navy_blue

Except the color really does go Royal Blue (ish) when seen at a more oblique angle.

The PRS color sample for Blue Matteo is pretty well what my guitar looks like, absent the lovely quilting, of course (so it is more uniform and closer to the average color you see here):

lg_bluematteo.jpg


https://www.prsguitars.com/csc/color/blue_matteo.html

But I have seen photos online of "Blue Matteo" PRSi that were definitely greener than the one I have. Like the one in this forum thread (second picture seems more "aqua" that the first):

http://prsguitars.com/forum/showthread.php?6857-N(O)GD-2007-PRS-513
 
OK, I just took this out into the sun, and the blue looks amazing in the sunlight! And you can see so much grain showing through that way too. But I can't capture it usefully on my cellphone camera, the blue just get oversaturated and darker looking, and the grain fades - I will try with a proper DSLR when I get a chance.
 
Very, very cool guitar! I had a similar one in red, and was really impressed with it.
 
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