Out For Delivery -- 30th

Oh My Freaking Goodness!!!! That is absolutely stellar, the curl on the wood is so tubular. I simply love it!!! Great pick.
thanks, and I do like it. More than I thought I would. I think the top on yours is outstanding, one piece and more subtle which I like a lot. To be honest I just took what was available.

Compared es to my other cu24 this one was way better setup, the neck is smother and the pattern regular neck suits me way better than either pattern wide or thick.

The clarity of the tone is excellent but breaking that down between the woods, construction and pups is too hard. All I know is that I've been able to think of little else all day at work.
 
I think the top on yours is outstanding, one piece and more subtle which I like a lot.

Actually, mine is a two piece top like yours. The color makes it a little monochromatic, so it is easy to miss that.

I didn't look for one with a pretty top, actually. I had asked my dealer about the tone of the pickups, and he sent me a short demo of the guitar, and based on that I was hooked. I didn't want a different one.

I always tell folks, and it's true, I can't see the top when I'm playing. After a few days you're used to it, and then everything else becomes far more important. I can't see the inlays when I'm playing, either. I guess that stuff is for the audience, or clients who come to the studio. The pics are fun to show off, but it's all secondary to the tone and how it plays.

I'm more of a flame guy than a quilt guy, but this thing looks great, and sounds so good I am really digging it.
 
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I always tell folks, and it's true, I can't see the top when I'm playing. After a few days you're used to it, and then everything else becomes far more important. I can't see the inlays when I'm playing, either. I guess that stuff is for the audience, or clients who come to the studio. The pics are fun to show off, but it's all secondary to the tone and how it plays.

I'm more of a flame guy than a quilt guy, but this thing looks great, and sounds so good I am really digging it.

i agree with every word of that 100%. Still my wife is an artist and I guess over many years I've come to appreciate the look of something, like a piece of furniture or a piece of pottery for instance, as an objet d'art if you will. and I like looking at the guitar, it says "pick me up and get me talking, yes indeed and walking,"
 
i agree with every word of that 100%. Still my wife is an artist and I guess over many years I've come to appreciate the look of something, like a piece of furniture or a piece of pottery for instance, as an objet d'art if you will. and I like looking at the guitar, it says "pick me up and get me talking, yes indeed and walking,"

A very true and good point!
 
Pickups should be mere translators to me, they should faithfully translate what the guitar speaks and not color it too much. I have a mahogany necked PRS that sounds great unplugged, but I don't like the sound coming out of its DGT pickups, yet I still rate the guitar very highly.

That's interesting - it's a very hi-fi kind of concept, but I don't think a truly uncolored sound is possible with the 1940s-50s guitar pickup technology guitar makers still use; a true uncolored one-to-one replication is hardly accomplished using the best $10K microphones. Being in the studio every day, you can record a vocal with a fabulous mic and still it doesn't sound exactly like the person singing in the room. There's always coloration.

How much more colored is a $200 pickup that works on technology invented in the late 1930s, when carbon button microphones that made everyone sound pretty nasty were the universal standard, even in film and on recordings (the early Neumanns excepted because they were still rare, and of course, they had coloration too)?

People think that all a pickup does is electronically sense the vibration in the strings, but all you have to do is plug in, turn on your amp, turn the guitar volume up, and knock on a knob or the top of your guitar with a knuckle, and you will hear how microphonic guitar pickups are. They will pick up the sound of your knuckles hitting the guitar, and that has very little, if not nothing, to do with sensing the string movement.

Thus the wood -- and how it vibrates, sustains, affects the movement of the strings and a million other things -- plays a more substantial role than people realize.

But the pickups themselves can't truly be hi-fi devices because you're not moving air in front of a polarized backplate, and you're not pushing air into a moving coil, ribbon, or other diaphragm as with microphones. A guitar pickup senses things magnetically (and via vibrations accidentally because the pickups are microphonic though they weren't initially designed to be). In any case, they are highly colored devices by nature.
 
That's interesting - it's a very hi-fi kind of concept, but I don't think a truly uncolored sound is possible with the 1940s-50s guitar pickup technology guitar makers still use; a true uncolored one-to-one replication is hardly accomplished using the best $10K microphones. Being in the studio every day, you can record a vocal with a fabulous mic and still it doesn't sound exactly like the person singing in the room. There's always coloration.

How much more colored is a $200 pickup that works on technology invented in the late 1930s, when carbon button microphones that made everyone sound pretty nasty were the universal standard, even in film and on recordings (the early Neumanns excepted because they were still rare, and of course, they had coloration too)?

People think that all a pickup does is electronically sense the vibration in the strings, but all you have to do is plug in, turn on your amp, turn the guitar volume up, and knock on a knob or the top of your guitar with a knuckle, and you will hear how microphonic guitar pickups are. They will pick up the sound of your knuckles hitting the guitar, and that has very little, if not nothing, to do with sensing the string movement.

Thus the wood -- and how it vibrates, sustains, affects the movement of the strings and a million other things -- plays a more substantial role than people realize.

But the pickups themselves can't truly be hi-fi devices because you're not moving air in front of a polarized backplate, and you're not pushing air into a moving coil, ribbon, or other diaphragm as with microphones. A guitar pickup senses things magnetically (and via vibrations accidentally because the pickups are microphonic though they weren't initially designed to be). In any case, they are highly colored devices by nature.

Great piece of info. Thanks LSchefman!

It's really nice to read and learn from you guys. Really appreciate your insights. I learn some more everyday.
 
Wow that quilted top is AMAZING!!!! Dang I love it! And those birds are gorgeous. Wow man. Beautiful.
 
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People think that all a pickup does is electronically sense the vibration in the strings, but all you have to do is plug in, turn on your amp, turn the guitar volume up, and knock on a knob or the top of your guitar with a knuckle, and you will hear how microphonic guitar pickups are. They will pick up the sound of your knuckles hitting the guitar, and that has very little, if not nothing, to do with sensing the string movement.

Thus the wood -- and how it vibrates, sustains, affects the movement of the strings and a million other things -- plays a more substantial role than people realize.

True that typical high-impedance pickups are microphonic to a certain extent. But the vibration of the strings is hardly independent of the acoustical properties of the guitar. In that respect, the wood, the hardware, the shape, all of that, makes a difference in the voice you ultimately hear. Anyone who spends enough time carefully listening to electric guitars unplugged knows that it's possible to hear a guitar's voice independently of how it's presented via the pickups and whatever amplification system is involved.

But the pickups themselves can't truly be hi-fi devices because you're not moving air in front of a polarized backplate, and you're not pushing air into a moving coil, ribbon, or other diaphragm as with microphones. A guitar pickup senses things magnetically (and via vibrations accidentally because the pickups are microphonic though they weren't initially designed to be). In any case, they are highly colored devices by nature.

In both cases the device is turning some sort of vibrations/waves into electrical pulses so, conceptually, there's a definite similarity. While I would agree that high-impedance pickups are low-fidelity by design (as are guitar amplifiers and speakers!) pickups still vary quite a bit in terms of how much they color the natural acoustic voice of the guitar.

In this respect it also makes a difference what's going on at the other end of the cable. Where is that signal going? DI into a console via a direct box or mic preamp? Into a clean amp? ("jazz" clean or Fender Twin clean or what? how loud?) Into a high-gain amp with the input maxed and the output level low? Through a bunch of pedals or straight in? Into a 100W "plexi" Marshall, dimed, and a pair of 412s? In all of those cases the pickup is going to have a pretty different response characteristic.
 
I'm digging the "sweet" switch. It doesn't sound anything like a single coil, more like adding a bit of overdrive into the amp. Loving the neck bucker on the clean channel into a horizontal 2x12. With a bit of Palm muting gives a classic thump much more musical than what I have previously been able to get. Look out Ec I'm coming for ya. :call:
 
And I'd like to share a thought experiment with you in return: I think in a way electric guitars are purer than acoustics - pickups capture the pure vibration of the strings carrying the inherent tone of the electric guitar. It's not immediately colored by a wooden soundboard, without choice.!

I love the thought experiment, but here is where we depart in our thinking. The inherent tone of the guitar is immediately colored by a wooden soundboard, i.e., the body of the guitar. Whether it's acoustic or electric that can't be avoided.

I've heard experiments done with strings on stand contraptions without the wood, and the sound is incredibly awful. The wood affects and colors the vibration of the strings on an electric as on an acoustic. The difference to me isn't just the soundboard on an acoustic, it's the very large resonant cavity under the soundboard.

True that typical high-impedance pickups are microphonic to a certain extent. But the vibration of the strings is hardly independent of the acoustical properties of the guitar. In that respect, the wood, the hardware, the shape, all of that, makes a difference in the voice you ultimately hear. Anyone who spends enough time carefully listening to electric guitars unplugged knows that it's possible to hear a guitar's voice independently of how it's presented via the pickups and whatever amplification system is involved.

We agree completely. I didn't mean to give the impression that I don't agree with this.
 
I'm digging the "sweet" switch. It doesn't sound anything like a single coil, more like adding a bit of overdrive into the amp. Loving the neck bucker on the clean channel into a horizontal 2x12. With a bit of Palm muting gives a classic thump much more musical than what I have previously been able to get. Look out Ec I'm coming for ya. :call:

We are thinking alike!
 
I got to play around with the Sweet Switch on the guitar a bit because my hand finally came around to letting me grip the knob while playing. It's very cool. Seems to focus the midrange of the tone, and with the amp in "edge of breakup" mode, gives it a little more edge. It's a very cool thing!

This is my first experience with a Sweet Switch equipped PRS. I dig it, though grabbing a lampshade knob and pulling up on it...well...it kinda squeezes out of one's grip very easily. At some point I'll either get used to it, or have the PTC install a small toggle switch.
 
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I hate to derail this thread a bit more, but:

ozboy, what is the official name for this color? Is that Royal Blue, or a Blue matteo? Or some other blue?

And where is this place called Guitar Factory, Est 1972? I can't find a website that matches the logo for a store around that long with that name...
EDIT: nevermind on the store locale, etc: found it: Parramatta. My Google Fu is lousy some days...
 
I would also be interested in knowing the color.

I hate to derail this thread a bit more, but:

ozboy, what is the official name for this color? Is that Royal Blue, or a Blue matteo? Or some other blue?

And where is this place called Guitar Factory, Est 1972? I can't find a website that matches the logo for a store around that long with that name...
EDIT: nevermind on the store locale, etc: found it: Parramatta. My Google Fu is lousy some days...
 
I kinda squeezes out of one's grip very easily. At some point I'll either get used to it, or have the PTC install a small toggle switch.
I recommend a push-push switch which makes the task much easier. The push-pull aren't my favorite either.
 
I recommend a push-push switch...(t)he push-pull aren't my favorite...

<----------- very confused.

But, it was a short trip, as I started fairly confused.

Ok, I see it now. Push push vs push pull.

Never mind...


(Emily...)
 
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I hate to derail this thread a bit more, but:

ozboy, what is the official name for this color? Is that Royal Blue, or a Blue matteo? Or some other blue?

And where is this place called Guitar Factory, Est 1972? I can't find a website that matches the logo for a store around that long with that name...
EDIT: nevermind on the store locale, etc: found it: Parramatta. My Google Fu is lousy some days...

prs describe the colour as "royal blue". I thought it was too flashy when I saw it on the web site. I've come to realise though that acoustic guitar culture is different o electric. In acoustics the very expensive guitars are mostly very plain looking. I am lucky enough town a 3rd hand Dudenbostel and it there is next to no flash on it, a plain varnished spruce top. It's all about the sound. For electrics though rock guys like to show off and have guitars to match. I like both schools of thought, but I can honestly say I refused to look at the prs when I auditioned it. I said to Lewis as he held it up in awe " that's how it looks can you plug it in please", and he did.

Btw one other comment on finishes. Prs nitro is beautiful but in acoustic world if you look at say Collings you pay about $1k extra for varnish over nitro. Had to adjust truss rod a touch last night due top e open string fret buzz caused by high humidity. Made me very very nervous because the setup on delivery was perfect, but fortunately for once I seem to have done it ok.
 
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prs describe the colour as "royal blue". I thought it was too flashy when I saw it on the web site. I've come to realise though that acoustic guitar culture is different o electric. In acoustics the very expensive guitars are mostly very plain looking.

Some are plain, then again, there's a long tradition of very ornate, expensive acoustic guitars starting in the late renaissance. Here's a little number from 1800 that's in the Metropolitan Museum in New York:



I could mention that very ornate high end Martins of the 30s onward, and other makers. But there is a definite trend among some acoustic guitar makers to make very basic-looking guitars without much ornamentation. Personally, I like something more or less in the middle.

Here's my Private Stock PRS, it's not too tricked out. It's a wonderful instrument, and I've done quite a bit of recording with it on my ad music projects. I'd put it up with anything out there in terms of tone quality, and PRS acoustic guitars are the weapon of choice for several very fine acoustic players like Tony McManus:

 
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