| Sound |
I mainly play a rock/fusion style with my electrics heavily influenced by Satriani, although when I play an acoustic, my softer side comes out. I have played for many, many years now and owned many different guitars over the years. This one is a true keeper. I am generally a flat picker as my finger picking style is sadly lacking in skill. I have lots of rack gear and pedals to play with. I use Marshall and Peavey amps with a multitude of pedals, although when I'm recording with this acoustic, I usually go directly into the pc with a Guitar Port by Line 6 as an interface. I have been using an open D tuning with this guitar for the last couple of months and it has a very beautiful sound to my ears. I have a 12 string Martin to compare it to. I will occasionally string the Martin as a 6 string and it has more mids and highs in the mix than the Martin, but the sustain is as good or better than the Martin. Another distinct difference is the seperation that can be heard between the lows, mids, and highs. The Martin has the lows and mids more muddied together in the overall mix, sometimes overpowering the highs, whereas the Blueberry has distinct seperation between them. I had a Gibson Hummingbird years ago that also was similar to the Martin, in that the lows and the mids were often overpowering the highs and again, not as much seperation in the mix. I'm not saying the Blueberry is better than the Martin or the Gibson, just different. More distinct seperation of the lows, mids, and highs. When I was "victorious" and won this guitar, The owner, Danny Fonfeder contacted me and asked me about the setup options. The factory default was medium/low which sounded right for my style of playing. I had them wire it with the optional LR Baggs Active iBeam Pickup and strap locks. This guitar came, again with the factory default setting, a set of med/light bronze/phosphor strings which at first were brighter in sound than what I've been used to, but after playing the guitar for about 3 months now,the brightness of that style string has mellowed considerably. I originally bought this as a collector as I truely believe these will increase greatly in value but after playing it, I find myself picking it up almost everyday. It was handmade and took over 6 weeks to complete. It comes with a deluxe hardshell case that is topnotch. Mine is the 486th one made by this new company and they generally have an auction on E**y once a month. They sell about 2 dozen each month and they come to fruition with about 5 min intervals between each auction. They list these with no reserve and as such, have many bidders. Since I won mine, I've watched the winning bids on these nudging upwards a little each month. I love mine and at some point will be getting another. Probably one of their "Groove" models. Groove models come with the surface of the guitar laced with hundreds of fine grooves which "radiate" the sound in a unigue way that a sound hole cannot. At each listing they have sound samples to listen to which is a nice touch. They also can custom make one to your specs if you have something specific in mind.
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| Action, Fit, & Finish |
The action I had them do, and they will set them up anyway you like, is the factory default med/light action with a set of bronze/phospor med/light strings. It was perfect right out of the case and no further tweaking by my local luthier was required. I could not find any finish flaws and I looked very closely for any.
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| Reliability & Durability |
I've only had it for about 3 months now, but so far no problems.
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| Customer Support |
I have talked with the owner, Danny Fonfeder, twice on the phone, and we have traded a few emails and must say he is very gracious, personalble and extremely pleasant to deal with. How many other guitar company owners will give you their cell phone number when buying a guitar from them. As well, there is a lifetime warranty with these guitars and they will buy them back if you ever want to trade up or just sell them. They very much stand behing their product.
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| Liked about it |
The amazing sound. The craftsmanship, and believe it or not, the smell.
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| Didn't like |
Ok this is a hard one as I love this guitar, but if I were to pick one thing, it would be to have strap locks as standard items when buying and not as an option, although I can understand why they do not. The strap lock at the bottom also serves as the cord input if having them install the pickup option, which I'm assuming most opt for when buying.
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| Overall satisfaction: |
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5.0 |
By belleswell Dec 20, 2009
Last updated: December 28, 2009
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