Blondie&OldBlue Posted February 19, 2011 Share Posted February 19, 2011 So I got my 356 last month and figured I share my initial impressions. Because I'm sure everyone is dieing to hear ;-). First the easy stuff. I got it from Wildwood and the quality of the bugger is outstanding. The korina on the back looks real nice and the fit and finish is superb (and frankly for the money it had better be). The 3rd string catches on the nut a little but a little lube should take care of that. I like the scale length and absolutely love the fingerboard. It is fairly light, just under 7 pounds. I like the balance. My other guitar weighs 13 pounds so it is nice to have something lighter. My amp is a Fender Concert from around '83. It's a nice amp but it has a lot of controls. Which means a lot of work messing around to get a tone I like. I'm used to my Strat and its settings so now I'm working to find the sound I want. I like the sound I get with the bridge pick up and clean (or slight gain on the dirty channel). The neck pick up tends to be sort of boomy and a little muddy on my Concert. However, it sounds warm and mellow on my 20W transistor Yamaha (go figure). So I'll be messing with the EQ on the big amp until I find what I am looking for. (And does anyone else have the situation where you pick up the guitar on one day and love the tone and the next day, same settings, you pick up the guitar and hate it?). But all in all, I like the tone: not quite a 335 nor an LP but sort its own bluesy mellow sound. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
eljay Posted February 19, 2011 Share Posted February 19, 2011 sounds like a wonderful guitar! maybe time for a new amp to go with? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Blondie&OldBlue Posted February 19, 2011 Author Share Posted February 19, 2011 Not sure I can convince the boss on a new amp. The amp is OK, just a lot of settings and really touchy on getting it just right. Or maybe I'm picky :-) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
clayville Posted February 19, 2011 Share Posted February 19, 2011 For what it's worth, I've found my CS-356 to be extraordinarily responsive to very small changes in the pickup and polepiece heights - just a couple of half-turns on any of those screws can make a really big difference in the character of the guitar. If you like how it is now and are a bit nervous of straying too far from that... you can literally count the half-turns, quarter turns, etc of the screws to get back to where you are now. Experiment, but: it really doesn't take much to change the sound. A boomy neck pickup might be too high, or just a bit too high on the lower string side. If you don'thave the proper sized nut files, you might be able to alleviate some of the G-string nut tightness with pencil lead, or by drawing a thin piece of sandpaper back and forth through the sides of the slot - being careful to not alter the neck-edge "take off" point of the slot. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Blondie&OldBlue Posted February 20, 2011 Author Share Posted February 20, 2011 Thanks CLayville, good advice. I don't mind tinkering. I'll give it a shot with the pickup. I was going to throw some graphite of the nut when I got the chance. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
minnella Posted February 25, 2011 Share Posted February 25, 2011 Try it thru the new Fender Deluxe VM....I have a Boogie F100 , a Leslie 45 and had a Blues Deluxe ...there is something about the front end of the VM that is different and wonderfull...it is killer with both my 68 Les Paul and my 2000 137 custom... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tartanbeastie Posted February 26, 2011 Share Posted February 26, 2011 try it through a fender blues jinior.. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Blondie&OldBlue Posted February 27, 2011 Author Share Posted February 27, 2011 Hmm, new amp... Well the amp has a nasty little buzz that is annoying the tar out of me. Notes around the 9th fret and E and A strings I get this dang annoying buzz. It's not the speaker (sucker is new). Ugh. On the good news front I dialed in a nice tone on the guitar. Really like the sound I get out of it. Different from the old Strat. Played until my fingers were sore. Fun. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ISirius42 Posted February 27, 2011 Share Posted February 27, 2011 Great guitar! Re: the amp buzz. I recently had a similar problem and found it was the power tubes going microphonic--particular notes were causing the tube insides to resonate and hit against the tube glass. Before finding out, I took the amp apart looking for the problem. Some people sell little rubber rings to put around the tubes. They are supposed to help dampen the vibration, but it didn't help me. I replaced the tubes and the problem was gone. This may or may not be your problem, but it is something you can look up and check out. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JazzGtr Posted March 3, 2011 Share Posted March 3, 2011 And does anyone else have the situation where you pick up the guitar on one day and love the tone and the next day, same settings, you pick up the guitar and hate it?. To answer your question, YES! Unfortunatedly, we guitar players are so "picky" when it comes to our tones. Sometimes I hate myself over this tone thingy. Seriously, I think it's a by-product of a couple things. The first is our ears or the way we may have felt that day. When we discover a tone we like one day, our ears wants to hear the same sound again. But we may not be feeling the same way which will effect the way you react to that tone. Second, what you may not realized is that you may have discovered that tone an hour or two after the amp have been on, maximizing the tone from the amp. My Fuchs amp sounds it best only when it's been on for an hour. Anything less, it sounds like crap. Also, try not to adjust any EQ until the amp have been on for one hour. The third thing is having more than one guitar requires different EQ settings to bring out the best sound for each. Believe it or not, I spent hours, days, weeks, months documented the best EQ settings for each of my guitars, amps and effects to avoid this problem. I kid you not, I have a blue binder with columns for guitars and rows for each EQ setting (treble, bass, mid, drive,etc.) for each guitar/amp/effects combination. I found that there's no way for me to remember all of the settings in my head or getting around this problem. You have to spend some time "turning knobs" to find your tone for each guitar. And fourth, the CS 356 is a different type of guitar. I too love this damm thing. But it requires a different EQ setting compared to the LP, CS 346 or any other guitar that I own. You may also discovered it's the amp. Not all guitars works best with same amp. It's a long, dry road to find your tone. Stay thirsty! Jazz Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Blondie&OldBlue Posted March 4, 2011 Author Share Posted March 4, 2011 @ISirius: yeah I thought a tube might be an issue. DOes anyone know if the "tap it with a pencil" test works? And what is it supposed to sound like? @JazzGtr: I learned real fast that the EQ for the new guitar is a lot different from my Strat. And the Strat has like 9 diffferent tone settings so even a decent setting for one combination can sound not so satisfying with another. Only thing to do is play some more until I find what I like :-) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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