Comparing wood Breedlove with CF Rainsong, and also Elixirs with Martin Retro Monels
 

In this video, I am essentially comparing the Breedlove Oregon Concert Mytrlewood with the Rainsong WS1000 Classic both with Elixir Nanoweb PB .013-.056 tuned D to D. And also comparing similarly constructed Rainsongs (WS1000 Classic and Black Ice BI-WS1000N2) but with different strings...Elixirs vs. Martin Retro Monel .013-.056 tuned D to D. All run through AT4033a large diaphragm condenser mic into Scarlett 2i2 with no post-processing.

https://youtu.be/d623sSdJqFU

I just wanted to do this comparison before I put Martin Retro Monels on the WS1000 Classic to do a true apples-to-apples between the Rainsongs to help me decide which one to keep and which one to sell. I will also compare the pickup systems, although I am 90% sure I prefer the Baggs over the Fishman already based on my experience with them in other guitars.

Thoughts?

Rick

Interesting, my order of preference was as follows...
1.) Breedlove
2.) Bi-1000
3.) WS1000

Which means nothing really, what is your preference? Which do you like to play the most?

Nice comparison, but both RainSongs sounded much warmer to my ear - and since warmth is my thing, I would take either of them over the Breedlove

Interesting, warmth is my thing too, and I've owned a lot of Rainsongs, No disrespect to what you hear at all, but i would never consider any of my Rainsongs a "warm" sounding guitar. I did like the sound of the Bi-WS1000 though and I hear the new Rainsongs with the veneer are warmer sounding.

First off - as a fingerstyle player, I didn’t listen to any of the strumming - I can strum some rudimentary things, but I admit I’m pretty crude, and with my ham handed technique, there is very little difference between different guitars.

For bare flesh fingerstyle, the Trebles on the unwound strings of most 14 fret wood guitars tend to sound thinner and metallic to my ear compared to the wound strings (though the G-string can be an issue on some guitars for me). Over the years, I’ve learned some techniques that can nearly neutralize it if I apply them perfectly - which on a good day, I’m maybe 85%. Since January I’ve played 5 RainSongs and owned two, and all of them had this incredible full rich treble fingerstyle tone. The first RainSong I had was a concert-WS body size. After the honeymoon was over I began to notice that the mids of this guitar, while full sounding, lacked warmth that I typically see in wood guitars. This was the very first time I ever had trouble achieving warmth on the wound strings. The Nashville jumbo with its larger body and spruce veneer nicely warmed up the mids while keeping the full sound on the unwound strings.

A huge caveat - I’m fairly certain that the tonal ideal in my head is well outside the mainstream of 98% of steel string guitar players. And for me, RainSongs eliminated the distinction between the wound strings and the unwounds and have afforded me an evenness in response across all the strings that I didn’t think was possible. Here is an example of some of the stuff I’m working on:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_aMJ21HwlT0

If you try playing something like this on many 14 fret wood instruments (steel strings) and are not really careful, the zing of the unwound strings can give you a harpsichord effect. Not a bad thing, but certainly not what I want.

That would likely explain our difference in what we are hearing, I'm mainly a strummer. Thanks for the response.

Tommy Emmanuel can pick up anything and make it sound fantastic- none of these things matter in those hands! A great deal of our back and forth on this forum is passed forgetting the filter of the personal attributes of the player. Are you a strummer, flat picker, fingerstyle player, loud band or acoustic ensemble? The best answers should always answer those questions first.

While there are some guitars, necks, strings, DI boxes, amps string spacings that do almost everything great, isn't finding the best for you really ultimately about you?

This forum is great for getting general guidance though; the wealth of information here is invaluable and I'm thankful for it. Finding the right gear for you can be fun, but at least for me it often is at the expense of just practicing.

Very well said steelvibe! “Finding the best FOR YOU is really ultimately about “YOU.” I never make gear recommendations here because not only is everyone playing different kinds of music, but we hear things differently - and even if all that is the same, we might come to completely different conclusions about whether something works for what we want (or not).

And of course you are correct that we should try to present context as much as possible. I admit I jumped the gun here when I said I liked the RainSongs better because they sounded warmer to me - and I should have added “for fingerstyle.”

The OP asked for our "Thoughts".....I think that's what we gave him. They don't have to be the same.

That's one of the great things about this sub-forum: in the world of acoustic guitars, carbon fiber is definitely a niche. BUT, there are quite a few people on this sub-forum who have plenty of real world experience with carbon fiber guitars, making it a great place for someone interested in CF to do some buying research.

Put another way: we have opinions, and we aren't afraid to use them! ;)

And I hope it's always with good intentions and in good fun. There are some awesome, talented people here. I do not include myself in that group! Sometimes things come across a bit different than intended on the internet. I enjoy reading views different than mine and generally assume that I missed something.