mellow strings?
 

I find myself in need of very mellow strings, attempting to offset excessive brightness on a new guitar. Normally I use GHS White Bronze, Elixir Nanoweb PB, or D'Addario EJ-16 PB's. Those work well most of the time on most of my guitars and are easy for me to get, but none of them have worked well on this guitar. I've even tried medium gauge too (it is a short scale so somewhat lower tension). Your suggestions are appreciated -- this is something I have not run up against before.

Silk and Steel strings might be worth trying. What model is the guitar?

I find the DR Sunbeams to be a mellower sounding string....not sure how far in that direction you need to go. Good Luck Earl !!

Thanks for the suggestions. I need to go pretty far toward mellow perhaps approaching "dead". I might make a run to my LGS and pick up sets of each. First I need to try medium gauge GHS White Bronze instead of PB EJ-17's.

Normally I don't watch the "which strings" threads very closely because string choice is such a personal matter based on taste and hearing. But this is a whole new experience for me - taming a tone which is too harsh and bright. I'd rather keep the make & model quiet for now. I suspect this one will need strings that are way different than any of my other guitars.

YOU WANT MELLOW, SHOULD'VE GONE NYLON.................

DR Rare PB's are on the mellow side...
Elixir Polywebs are also mellower because of the thicker coating.

You may want to try Martin Strings. I think all of them are quite mellow. I used to have the old one (Martin PB SP7200) but they are not very resistant to corrosion comparing to Elixir. I have to change it once per month or 2, depends on whether I have gig outside or just practicing at home, but that's reasonable to me.

GHS has a set called Silk & Bronze. These are much better than Silk &Steel. They sound very much like Phosphor Bronze strings minus just a bit of sizzle.

Highly recommend pearse pure nickels.

Maybe it`s just the guitar. Many guitars can sound stiff and bright at first, but in the end strings wont do it. If you dont like the sound of the guitar, maybe you should buy another one.

That is exactly my fear. Trying different strings is an effort to salvage the tone of a guitar that otherwise would have been returned immediately based on tone, if it were a stock model. Customs are not returnable, and I may have to resell at a substantial loss.

Based on these helpful responses (mahalo) I placed an order with Strings and Beyond last night. Some GHS silk & bronze, GHS silk & steel, Martin Monels, DR Sunbeams, and a couple others are on their way for testing. I have JP Pure nickels on hand already but those REALLY did not work on the Blackbird Lucky 13 - I could not get them back off that guitar fast enough, yet I like them on other guitars. I can try the remaining set, but am not very hopeful.

mellow strings?
 

Earl, still don’t know what guitar we are talking about but the Retros sound fabulous on RainSong guitars and many here on the forum agree.

I agree with the suggestions provided for mellow strings, but Monel is kind of an odd string (especially when your ears are used to phosphor bronze or some variation of it). You may need to be patient as they get sweeter with time to my ears. However, I have a hunch we are not talking about a RainSong.

I am pretty sure we are not talking Rainsong, but +1 on the Martin Monel Retro strings on my Rainsong when I had it, FWIW

I hated putting new D'Addario PB (EJ16s) on my Composite Acoustics GX. The bright, nails-on-chalkboard "sizzle" was way too much until they'd been played in for several weeks. So last string change I decided to try out some other options, looking for something more mellow, like you.

The first trial was a set of DR Rares, and I can happily report that they are much, much better than my standard D'Addarios. They have some brightness, but softer, and almost none of the annoying top-end "sizzle".

I also have a set of Monels (Martin Retro) that I haven't tried yet, but even if I don't end up liking those I can recommend you try the Rares.

Have you tried Sunbeams? Excellent strings!