Saturday, March 16, 2013

Mmmm, this 7-String crow tastes good!

Let me preface this post with a simple truth:

I don't like seven string guitars.

I never have.  I've played several over the years, but I've never found one that felt good to me.  Ibanez?  Nope.  ESP?  Uh-uh.  Schecter?  No.

On top of that, I've never seen a good reason for me to play one.  I'm not generally a super drop-tuned metal machine, and I've never been a good Steve Vai type player either.  On top of all THAT, I've spent the past 25 years trying to figure out what to do with six strings, so adding a seventh seemed almost silly.

Then work happened.  This happens to me a lot.

I work for a guitar parts manufacturer, which is a lot like an alcoholic working at a liquor store.  It's being constantly surrounded by temptation, tempered only by knowing that if I spend all my money on guitar stuff, I'm gonna be REALLY hungry in no time flat.

But I digress.

About a week ago, the powers that be did a very quick assembly of some seven string parts to test out the routing we did for the Original Floyd Rose seven string bridge.  Being a wee bit on the obsessive side, when I see a guitar sitting around with strings on it, I have to pick it up and start playing with it.

Do you see where this is going?

I picked up the seven string and started playing with it.  And damn it, I LIKED it.  A lot.  Our sevens are a 25" scale.  Maybe that has something to do with it.  I've always loved the back contours on our necks (in fact, that's why I work where I do).  Perhaps that's it.  I really couldn't tell you.  All I know is that for the first time in my life, I picked up a guitar with that pesky extra string, and I found myself thinking "hmmm, this is cool, I wonder how much it would cost for me to put one together".

I'll be posting some sound clips of the guitar through various permutations of my rig shortly.

Right after I finish choking down this crow.

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