Regular production McCarty 594?

[aristotle]

The text doesn't match the picture. I think that they pulled some stock photo for the ad. The text says stoptail and 2 volume and 2 tone controls. Clearly not what's pictured...

edit: not quick enough on the post. You guys are fast!

 

[tonaholic]

Text confirms layout and low turn spec pickups

 

[sergiodeblanc]

Ahh... AMS, the paragon of PE guitar announcements.

 

[ViperDoc]

Well, it's all a matter of what sound and touch you like - as with guitars.

As a classically trained piano player, I can honestly say that nothing plays like, or sounds like, a Steinway.

That isn't to say there's a "best" piano; it's all a matter of personal taste.

Steinway's dominant presence and quality is non-negotiable. In fact, *everyone* has heard the beauty of Steinway, whether they realize it or not. The same cannot be said about Bosendorfer, or the Shigeru K. I find most people have never heard of them. All three makers offer an excellent comparison in the effects of piano design, selection and handling of tonewoods, the action as you mentioned, etc.

Well, it's all a matter of what sound and touch you like - as with guitars.

As a classically trained piano player, I can honestly say that nothing plays like, or sounds like, a Steinway.

That isn't to say there's a "best" piano; it's all a matter of personal taste.

If Steinway is your cup of "P", then by all means, stay with it. No one can discount Steinway's legacy.

That said, there was a particular afternoon in California where I stumbled upon a performer in a piano store seated at a 7.5 foot Shigeru Grand and I literally balled, it was so beautiful. I've heard many wonderful pianos, but that particular Shigeru was like an Archangel reciting instructions from God. I also heard on another occasion a Grand Konzert Bosendorfer which cleansed me of all sin. I find that most people will herald the Steinway, and for good reason. If just so many could also hear these other Grand Pianos of the world in the hands of a skilled performer, they would also be as much the better for it.

It's kind of like whether you've played a PS or not.

Cheers!

 

[László]

That said, there was a particular afternoon in California where I stumbled upon a performer in a piano store seated at a 7.5 foot Shigeru Grand and I literally balled, it was so beautiful. I've heard many wonderful pianos, but that particular Shigeru was like an Archangel reciting instructions from God. I also heard on another occasion a Grand Konzert Bosendorfer which cleansed me of all sin. I find that most people will herald the Steinway, and for good reason.

My best friend has a beautiful Bosendorfer Imperial Grand that I play often. It's of course got a different voice, a different feel, and yes, a different number of keys. The tone is thicker, a little darker and less silvery than a Steinway, but it's very rich and warm sounding. I've recorded with it on a number of occasions (he has a studio and we've partnered on several projects).

I love the way it sounds on classical and solo piano music; it's harder to fit in a pop track due to its very rich tone, where the Steinway comfortably sits right on top of the mix with its brightness.

I think this is one reason so many concert artists choose Steinway to play with orchestras. The Yamaha C7 is another piano that fits nicely into a mix.

The other thing is that the Bosendorfer's key travel is deeper than a Steinway. So a slightly different technique is needed that takes a few plays to get used to, but that's true of any piano.

I've played the Kawai concert grand size piano. It's also very sweet and nice, but again, different. So much of this is the sound one is used to, and for me of course, the sound that can fit into a mix easily.

When I moved from my house into a condo a few years back, I sold my grand piano, and haven't yet replaced it. It'll be interesting to see what happens when I land somewhere else.

 

[ViperDoc]

My best friend has a beautiful Bosendorfer Imperial Grand that I play often. It's of course got a different voice, a different feel, and yes, a different number of keys. The tone is thicker, a little darker and less silvery than a Steinway, but it's very rich and warm sounding. I've recorded with it on a number of occasions (he has a studio and we've partnered on several projects).

I love the way it sounds on classical and solo piano music; it's harder to fit in a pop track due to its very rich tone, where the Steinway comfortably sits right on top of the mix with its brightness.

I think this is one reason so many concert artists choose Steinway to play with orchestras. The Yamaha C7 is another piano that fits nicely into a mix.

The other thing is that the Bosendorfer's key travel is deeper than a Steinway. So a slightly different technique is needed that takes a few plays to get used to, but that's true of any piano.

I've played the Kawai concert grand size piano. It's also very sweet and nice, but again, different. So much of this is the sound one is used to, and for me of course, the sound that can fit into a mix easily.

When I moved from my house into a condo a few years back, I sold my grand piano, and haven't yet replaced it. It'll be interesting to see what happens when I land somewhere else.

I like factory Bosendorfer polish on my McCarty, it really enhances the lower mids. LOL! Happy hunting for that next Steiner. Until then, you could settle for a Nord Piano 3...

 

[clasbtenn]

"I like factory Bosendorfer polish on my McCarty, it really enhances the lower mids. LOL!"

I believe!

 

[László]

Until then, you could settle for a Nord Piano 3...

The Nord is surprisingly good sounding, but meant for live performance in a band setting, so there are a limited amount of key samples it can handle. For the time being, I have been using EastWest Pianos. Each piano has about 30-40 gigabytes of sample data, and it can - almost - fool the ear.

 

[tiboy]

I guess I'm responsible for the derailment of this thread. My original inquiry was precipitated by the PRS trying to be a Les Paul post. I have a low end no name (actually Otto Altenburg) baby grand. I just never asked myself if it was trying to be a Steinway or some other big name piano. I never thought of it as a piano best suited for Classical, Jazz, Ragtime, modern pop etc. I just assumed that with the right hands it could excel in any genre. It never occurred to me to describe its sound as vintage or modern. It doesn't have the equivalent of an Angus vs Slash vs Clapton tone to me.

 

[clasbtenn]

Ugh.. its disappointing. You can't out Les Paul a Les Paul. I would choose a new Les Paul standard over a core 594 in a heartbeat, especially now that the LPs have the axcess heel on them. Thats because I'd want the authentic sound, not something pretending to be that. In case you don't know. 24.594" is the golden age Gibson scale.

I love PRS, But, its disheartening to see Paul have all this Gibson envy. Paul should stick to his thing. 25" scale double cuts. Suhr and other builders are doing the same thing with strats. So, its not just Paul. People think they can outdo the originals but they really can't. No one wants to innovate anymore. Paul was THE innovator in 1985. Now its retro this and retro that. We can't even get out of 1959 with pickup designs. I love my 85/15 pickups in my CE but they are a 1959 PAF design with maybe a few extra winds. I think Paul released the Floyd CU24 and said thats the modern guitar just to wash his hands of it. Everything else is going back in time. I don't like that Paul has alienated the modern players in favor of the near retirement crowd with bucks to spare. At least Suhr, while doing retro stuff, still has a large focus on the modern crowd and Music Man pretty much has gone totally that route. Kiesel too. I would just hate to see PRS plummet one day because they are focusing on a market where the money will eventually dry up.

Let the flaming begin.

No flaming here, Drew. My thoughts since having played Gibsons for over 5 decades and now buying my first PRS, a 594 PS, is that no one has to out-Les Paul a Les Paul. The 594 is your version of your father's Les Paul, but with updated features allowing you to do more with a similar, but improved version of a Les Paul.

I'm almost 68 and after having played LP's for most of my life, find that I even look at it with reverence, but it is out-dated by modern standards. I unloaded a LOT of Gibson Historic guitars, Fender Master Builds, and other guitars back in 2008 after I finally "hit the wall" on playing those guitars for so long. I went European with one-piece body carbon fiber guitars and a Vigier.

Last year, I was contemplating a True Historic Les Paul, and thought, "Maybe I need to try it yet again".
Then, for some reason I got a PRS-rection, and got wrapped up in PRS-mania. Two days ago I ordered my first PRS. It is a 594 PS, and will be done as I would like it done. I had been vascilating between that and a McCarty PS, but since all of my current guitars are 25 1/2" scale, I thought I should go for the most difference between guitars with the 594.

Anyone who has owned Gibson guitars knows that you either hunt for awhile to find "THE ONE", or you go custom shop or historic reissue and hunt one down. The same is true for the True Historic versions. One way or another, you WILL hunt for the one that speaks to you, unless you just get stupid lucky.

I believe PRS takes the "hunt" part out of the equation and gives more guitar for the same money. I know that, and I have never owned a PRS prior to placing my order. Certainly those here that have been playing PRS guitars absolutely should know this. Gibson is about 1950's technology and tradition. PRS is about innovation and staying current, while still respecting tradition in how they build guitars using old-world craftsmanship.
Gibson cannot match this with any consistency.

Your mileage may vary

 

[drdoom8793]

No flaming here, Drew. My thoughts since having played Gibsons for over 5 decades and now buying my first PRS, a 594 PS, is that no one has to out-Les Paul a Les Paul. The 594 is your version of your father's Les Paul, but with updated features allowing you to do more with a similar, but improved version of a Les Paul.

I'm almost 68 and after having played LP's for most of my life, find that I even look at it with reverence, but it is out-dated by modern standards. I unloaded a LOT of Gibson Historic guitars, Fender Master Builds, and other guitars back in 2008 after I finally "hit the wall" on playing those guitars for so long. I went European with one-piece body carbon fiber guitars and a Vigier.

Last year, I was contemplating a True Historic Les Paul, and thought, "Maybe I need to try it yet again".
Then, for some reason I got a PRS-rection, and got wrapped up in PRS-mania. Two days ago I ordered my first PRS. It is a 594 PS, and will be done as I would like it done. I had been vascilating between that and a McCarty PS, but since all of my current guitars are 25 1/2" scale, I thought I should go for the most difference between guitars with the 594.

Anyone who has owned Gibson guitars knows that you either hunt for awhile to find "THE ONE", or you go custom shop or historic reissue and hunt one down. The same is true for the True Historic versions. One way or another, you WILL hunt for the one that speaks to you, unless you just get stupid lucky.

I believe PRS takes the "hunt" part out of the equation and gives more guitar for the same money. I know that, and I have never owned a PRS prior to placing my order. Certainly those here that have been playing PRS guitars absolutely should know this. Gibson is about 1950's technology and tradition. PRS is about innovation and staying current, while still respecting tradition in how they build guitars using old-world craftsmanship.
Gibson cannot match this with any consistency.

Your mileage may vary

Brilliantly said!

 

[László]

I believe PRS takes the "hunt" part out of the equation and gives more guitar for the same money

All true, but I'll add a distinction based on growing up with Gibsons from the 60s on. From 1967-1991, I was a dyed in the wool, devoted Gibson player, and my main guitar was a mid-'60s Gibson that I still have.

While PRS guitars sport a lot of vintage Gibson flavor in certain models, even the ones that are most LP-like still have a beautiful set of tones on tap that even vintage LPs don't have. Whether this is a good thing, or a bad thing, depends on one's point of view.

I think it's a good thing. I can dial in an LP tone, but also other tones, on my McCarty Singlecut. The same will doubtless be true of the 594.

For those wanting an exact reproduction of an iconic, late 50s, LP - and by this I mean as close to the same as one might find on the new guitar market - you still won't get it from Gibson; you're more likely to find it from folks who specialize in exact reproductions, like Yaron, and you're spending more than PS money to get there. Of course, what you don't get is the more modern feel, and added bonus tones, that you get with, say, a 594.

I always like to say there's no "best" anything. There's only what works best for you, the player, with your hands, your ears, your eyes, etc.

For me, the best LP isn't an LP at all. YMMV.

 

[clasbtenn]

Les,
Excellent points!
In the good old days, you didn't have a choice really. If you wanted a specific tone, you had to get that specific guitar. Not so much today, however. Of course, guitar players being a truly conservative bunch when it comes to changing to modern instruments, there will always be blow-back from this group. "If it isn't the original instrument, it isn't!"

However, as mentioned, the person playing has a lot to do with it in how they handle the playing, and set up the amp.

PRS and other companies have brought out guitars which do a great job of emulating the "big four" electric guitars. That is Tele, Strat, LP, and 3X5's, I say the big four, as back in the day, those were and probably still are, to a point, the most recorded for commercial music,

It's now more possible then ever before to have less guitars but still cover the bases.

One big point which Les mentioned is that now, with a given guitar, you can not only get some of the basic big four guitar tones, but other tones as well from one guitar. This gives the players more alternatives, a better chance to be expressive in their own playing and interpretation, and enjoy the benefits of using modern gear based on modern technology.

With the right amp or two, you can really cover a lot of sonic territory. I use a Kemper Profiler and a Marshall and really cover almost anything asked of me. While I do have another amp, it really isn't needed.

In the old days, circa 1957-66, I used an Ampeg to play jazz, but the Marshall actually has, imho, just as good jazz tones as any amp I ever played through.

I believe that PRS players are more forward-thinking then guitar players as a group. However, in this respect, and due to the ongoing popularity of PRS and other guitar companies, that "conservative nature" is being broken down more each year.

You used to hear players refer to F&G as "The Big Two" in electric guitars. Now it is "The Big Three", which naturally includes PRS.

 

[tonaholic]

Well said, Les! I agree on almost all points. I do believe that putting some vintage correct PAF in a 594 would get one closer to a LP than an off the shelf version. The PRS pickups are fabulous. Especially the 58/15.

That said, I do get the feeling they are deceptively higher in their MV output (not resistance) which leads to them playing nicer with higher gain situations. If one wanted to take a 594 to the max vintage territory, an RS wiring kit and some PAF replica would be a very fun experiment. Also an expensive one, but what's a few hundred dollars when chasing burst tone among friends?

Like yourself, I'm kind of just over F&G for my personal playing but prefer my guitars to get the sound of established guitar sounds. Suhr and PRS are my mainstays. I have a Suhr Tele, getting a Suhr strat, have a PRS DGT and a Custom24. For me, the DGT covers the Les Paul and 335 territory better than either model from Gibson has for me. In fact, I love the scale length and trem so much that while I want a 594, I'm reserving my judgement until I can compare it to a DGT side by side.

 

[aristotle]

Maybe I lost the bubble after 8 pages, but what's the basis for comparing a 594 to a Les Paul other than the arrangement of the controls?

 

[shinksma]

Maybe I lost the bubble after 8 pages, but what's the basis for comparing a 594 to a Les Paul other than the arrangement of the controls?

I suppose:

Body and neck woods
Scale Length
Double Humbucker pups voiced in the PAF-style from what I gather. (I must admit I have no clue what PAF-style really means, in terms of a sound. I need to research that more.)

 

[bodia]

Maybe I lost the bubble after 8 pages, but what's the basis for comparing a 594 to a Les Paul other than the arrangement of the controls?

I think it was this way back on page 5:
"I don't need to try a 594. My post was simply a critique on direction, not on the guitar. I'm sure the guitar will play and sound like a million bucks. Our definitions of innovation are apparently different. Innovation looks to the future, not the past. Since 08, Paul has been largely stuck in the past. In 10 or 20 years, there is going to be a huge shift in the industry. These boutique fad 50's pickups and the vintage spec guitar craze is going to go away, as older players stop playing and/or buying. Guys like me, who grew up as children of the 80's and 90s, are going to be the ones with the wallets and expendable income. We won't be looking for guitars that sound like 59 Les Pauls. Up until 07 and 08, PRS was shipping out custom 24's with high powered pickups. There were guitars like the SC250 that had same. The alder and mahog CEs. PRS was definitely a modern guitar company and then like a whirlwind, they grab onto this vintage craze and run with it. I think it will be at the expense of their future."

 

[tonaholic]

I suppose:

Body and neck woods
Scale Length
Double Humbucker pups voiced in the PAF-style from what I gather. (I must admit I have no clue what PAF-style really means, in terms of a sound. I need to research that more.)

PAF-style is very nebulous. In general, it's an approximate recreation of a humbucker produced by gibson during the "golden era." Original PAF are like snowflakes and varied greatly from 1 pickup to the next in magnets, winding, output and even voicing! There was generally poor documentation on any kind of consistency used during construction of them leading to both incredible pickups and not so incredible pickups. Here's a great read: http://pafpickups.com/

There's an entire cottage industry of makers purportedly getting more and more accurate but Seymour Duncan's custom shop and even floor models are pretty bang-on. I guess the point of the rant is that if you go searching for "that paf tone" you'll be inundated by misinformation about why one particular winder is better than the next. They're all fairly similar at the end of the day and the ones that sound good are the ones that get my money.

 

[shinksma]

PAF-style is very nebulous. In general, it's an approximate recreation of a humbucker produced by gibson during the "golden era." Original PAF are like snowflakes and varied greatly from 1 pickup to the next in magnets, winding, output and even voicing! There was generally poor documentation on any kind of consistency used during construction of them leading to both incredible pickups and not so incredible pickups. Here's a great read: http://pafpickups.com/

There's an entire cottage industry of makers purportedly getting more and more accurate but Seymour Duncan's custom shop and even floor models are pretty bang-on. I guess the point of the rant is that if you go searching for "that paf tone" you'll be inundated by misinformation about why one particular winder is better than the next. They're all fairly similar at the end of the day and the ones that sound good are the ones that get my money.

heh, maybe that's why I didn't have a "tone" in my mind when I read "PAF" - because there is no single tone or characteristic that is "exactly authentic PAF" for all "PAF" pups, just "great PAF pups with a range of tones that all sound great, possibly created by accident" and "other PAF pups notionally made the same way but that don't sound as great for some reason". Billy Gibbons has a great PAF tone, and Joe Bonamassa has a great PAF tone, but they are different tones.

 

[Skeeter]

PAF-style is very nebulous. In general, it's an approximate recreation of a humbucker produced by gibson during the "golden era." Original PAF are like snowflakes and varied greatly from 1 pickup to the next in magnets, winding, output and even voicing! There was generally poor documentation on any kind of consistency used during construction of them leading to both incredible pickups and not so incredible pickups. Here's a great read: http://pafpickups.com/

There's an entire cottage industry of makers purportedly getting more and more accurate but Seymour Duncan's custom shop and even floor models are pretty bang-on. I guess the point of the rant is that if you go searching for "that paf tone" you'll be inundated by misinformation about why one particular winder is better than the next. They're all fairly similar at the end of the day and the ones that sound good are the ones that get my money.

This is a whole other source of consternation IMHO. Since vintage became the only thing that matters in the guitar world (like 2000 and on?) every pickup is described as PAF-style, PAF-inspired. Heck, even traditionally high gain Dimarzio has some new PAF-master style pickup out every week, being played by shred guys.

I USED to think I knew what it meant. Now, it's like, anything that's not high output ceramic is a PAF pickup. And this isn't to say that there aren't a number of awesome pickup companies making great pickups(including the one I just mentioned above) and appreciate striving to make the best vintage pickup possible. I've just personally reached max PAF-capacity .

I think in general, with modern pre-amp gain amps and a thriving OD/distortion pedal market, people are relying less on powerful pickups to enjoy higher gain tones. And that's great. I just appreciate pickup makers that can describe their pickups using other characteristics or metrics than just calling them PAF-like. </end rant>