[slimt]

Jeremy Morton, on 05 April 2012 - 01:30 PM, said:

Well EA it is clear that that guitar is not for you and perhaps you should just look forward at finding one that suits and the sound that you are looking for. I am sure it is exactly what someone else is looking for and it will find a good and loving home. All of the regulars here on the forum know that each guitar is individual and no two are exactly the same sound, burst, different wood etc. New Strings may do the trick, who knows? Perhaps the ball end is not snugged up to the bridge pins, there are alot of variables.
JM

Im not sure about that.. Ive seen and played many Gibsons lately... and its just not Hummingbirds with a dead tone.. the J200s have been terrible.. L&M and a few others in Calgary here have a wide range of dead horses hanging on the wall.. ( so something changed in the Build ) .. New strings or Old strings.. these should have more Chime to them.. not just a Thud.. I havent been able to stuggle up to a New Gibson for quite sometime now.. it almost sounds like there made of wet wood.. Not only L&M guitars are that way.. Ive noticed it at many dealers that house these. Ive mentioned this before in other threads.

[ParlourMan]

My Keb Mo model was slightly duller out of the case on the first day, but I'd bought a "small-box" guitar, even the name was 'Bluesmaster' and the sound suggested it was a 'blues' guitar.... a few months down the line and my blues box is now a general guitar (albeit a 12-fretter) and sounds great for many styles. I do believe some of these guitars have a waking-up period.

While the model EA played mightn't have 'struck a chord' with him (apologies, I should be ashamed of saying that ) my bet is that tight rubbery bottom end would make a nice guitar to record with. The compression and thud in its lower end at the minute would make it fairly easy to record with. While I might prefer to pick another one for myself if they had the choice of a few and I would see if any were already awake, I'm not convinced the guitar is dead. I have had masterbuilt strings that are a lot more muted in the bass myself and thought something was off for the first couple of days...

My best guess is a few people playing it in the coming weeks that it's in the shop and a string-change or two and the guitar will sing.

[fortyearspickn]

When I got my H'bird TV - it was 4 months old. It continued to open up for a year. If I had to guess here, EU, I'd say the H'bird Standard you tried was just out of the box new and needed some combination of new strings and giving the wood a chance to build up it's sympathetic response range. Maybe go back in a month to see if a little playing by other customs has warmed it up some.

[Hogeye]

I think there are a lot of good clues here. If the plain strings are crisp and clear and the wound ones aren't then there is a problem with the strings. The clue here is the wound strings are dead. Why you ask? The windings could be bad or they could be dirty or a thousand other reasons. If the guitar was a dud then the whole guitar would sound bad not just certain strings.

If you had the opportunity to go to a Gibson Homecoming you would know that Gibson dries each and every piece of wood it uses to 6% moisture content. This is very easy to do and very easy to measure. Why 6%? Because the wood is stable at an enviroment of 42% humidity. Why 42%? Because all studies point to that being the average that folks like to keep the houses. Any drier and your skin dries out and your dog scratches. Any higher and your hair get frizzy and you get mold between your toes. It's all very simple, really.

Now if a guitar goes to a place drier that 42% the top cracks. If it's any wetter then 42% the top gets heavy and the guitar sounds heavy like it's full of socks.

In this case the plain strings sound fine. The top and the wood are just fine. If the wound strings sound dead it's 'cuz they are.

[duluthdan]

A couple of days ago I spent 3 hours at Wildwood Guitars near Denver - I had my guy pull just about every Hummingbird and SJ, with a handful of J-185s out of the warehouse for me to play and try - I'll bet I played over 30 guitars - and except for two out of more than a dozen Hummingbirds they all sounded just fine to very good - the two that did not, judging from the stick in the cases, I was probably the first to play them. It is very dry out here, but I'm sure the warehouse is very closely climate controlled. If any of those birds had as pretty a cherry red on them that Frederick's has, I probably would have bought it. As it happens I casually asked if there where any Jackson Browne Model 1s (w/o pu)in the warehouse, there was, and that's the one that came home with me, but there is an SJ and an HB there that were swell candidates too.

[slimt]

I would rather have one bright and crisp right out of the box.. than wait for a year for it to open up.. they had it right a while ago..

[modoc_333]

I am sure it is the strings. Unfortunately, the strings Gibson is putting on these days tend to do this VERY quickly. they look brand new, but after just a little bit of playing and testing, you get the rubber band sound. it's quite frustrating. I have taken up the habit of restringing the new ones when they arrive at the shop with something different if I have the time. If it can't be done immediately, I do it as soon as possible. I have seen it with so many guitars that I am SURE this is the problem you ran across. a nice set of PB will do the trick.