Six months of 000-18 Marquis

[jaginn]

Hi all,

I'm a relative newbie to acoustics in comparison to many on this forum but thought I'd share my thoughts on my 000-18 Marquis (essentially a 000-18GE) nearly six months after purchase. Apologies if I don't include enough technical terms

WHY:

Do I need a reason? Lol. I bought the guitar back in April after playing a friends Martin (a laminate model). Being mainly a strummer/flatpicker, I had been dabbling with fingerstyle and wanted a more balanced guitar to use for this than my Maton dreadnought.

TONE:

My wife and I had a baby a couple of months ago so I haven't had as much time as I would like to start breaking it in. Even so, this guitar sounded great right out of the box. The dry, crisp mahogany tone is amazing and sounds great both picking with bare fingers and strumming. Occasionally it sounds a little tight (especially on bends) but given it is just a baby with an Adi top I'm hoping it will open up over time. Being a big John Mayer fan, I've been playing plenty of his songs and this guitar really lends itself to that folk style of playing.

PLAYABILITY:

I get some tendon issues in my left wrist (hazards of being a computer programmer!) which was one of the reasons I went for a short scale. The combination of wider 1 3/4" nut and 24.9" scale really works for me and makes for comfortable playing. The biggest (only?) complaint I've read about this guitar is the neck profile. It did take me a week or two to get used to the mod V neck as my other guitars all have low profile necks but I don't notice it any more and find that I can use the neck profile to vary my left hand position to help reduce fatigue. Thumb wrappers may not like the combination of wide nut and chunky neck though. The one gripe I have so far is that I hit the frets when strumming sometimes (usually with nails rather than a pick). The action has been setup reasonably low for fingerpicking so the combination of short scale, low action and light strings means I can't be too aggressive. I'm thinking about stringing it with Martin medium/lights to see if this will reduce the 'floppiness'. I've heard others say that this guitar comes alive even more with heavier strings. I'm too scared to string it with mediums in case it causes any structural damage but it would also make bends/vibrato harder. I think this guitar will help to improve my fretting technique as it is not forgiving when you become sloppy!

QUALITY/APPEARANCE:

We don't have access to boutique luthiers here in South Australia, but in terms of mass produced guitars, the quality is much higher than other brands (I won't mention which ones!) I've played in stores. I love the sunburst finish and I think the lack of bling gives it an understated beauty.

CONCLUSION:

Coming from playing a dreadnought it took me a little while to 'get' how this guitar wants to be played. Now that I do, I find it a pleasure to play and can't see myself selling or trading it any time soon. While Martins are quite expensive in Australia I don't regret spending some extra $ for a quality guitar that I will enjoy for many years to come. Looking forward to putting more miles on it now I may also consider installing an aftermarket pickup that will not require any drilling etc, although I'm still too scared to take it out to jams etc!

[Jamie9]

Beautiful ! The only Martin OOO's I've tried have had the narrow nut width which is too cramped for my fat fingers. I tried the Collings version of yours and it was amazing but they did want $6500 for it over here. I've got a OOO28 style guitar made by Carson Crickmore a Victorian luthier which is also very nice, my local luthier says it sounds just like a 60's Martin OOO he used to own and he's not the type to be flattering to make the customer feel good. Hope the love affair continues for a long time.

[clicktone]

Very nice... And you could play the whole "Born and Raised" record on that little baby... Enjoy!! And congrats on the new baby too!

[jaginn]

Originally Posted by clicktone

Very nice... And you could play the whole "Born and Raised" record on that little baby... Enjoy!! And congrats on the new baby too!

"Born and Raised" songs make an appearance quite often actually Queen of California capo'd 3rd fret... mmmm

[rodmeister]

Normally I'm not a sunburst fan, but that is a beaut. The sunburst literally bursts with warm light like the sun.

[Pahc412]

Beautiful guitar. I'm usually not a fan of burst on Martins, but that looks great

[sharkydude50]

Originally Posted by Pahc412

Beautiful guitar. I'm usually not a fan of burst on Martins, but that looks great

Same here. Best of luck with both of your new additions!

[rmyAddison]

Congrats, Marquis are great guitars, enjoy your Martin 000-18 Marquis, nice burst..........

[clicktone]

Originally Posted by jaginn

"Born and Raised" songs make an appearance quite often actually Queen of California capo'd 3rd fret... mmmm

Lovin' that!!!

[Brant0086]

Very nice !! Love the burst. If it sounds a little too midrangish, you may can try using 80/20 strings and tuning down a half step. I do that with my D-16H from time to time. Your mileage may vary, but tuning down gave it a little more bass and the 80/20s added a bit more sparkle. Is that a Martin case ? I see the burgundy color often, but that interior looks almost brown..... maybe just lighting, but I don't recall seeing brown.


Bryant

[jaginn]

Thanks Brant. I'm pretty happy with the sound balance, it's more that the lower strings are reasonably loose given it's a short scale (24.9). Tuning down half a step would exaggerate the 'floppiness' but I agree, it does sound cool

As for the case, it's the standard 533E Geib style and burgundy as you mentioned but it does look brown in those photos.

[jaginn]

I picked up my guitar today after getting my guitar dude to set it up for some Martin PB light/medium gauge strings (12.5-55). It doubt it would have needed much adjusting from the lights I was using but what the hey.

Lower strings feel a lot less floppy as expected but not too over-the-top chunky. I can still pull of the bluesy bends that I like this style of guitar for but strumming has improved a lot. Also as expected, the guitar is a bit louder. It feels a bit like a mini-dread now. I know some folks use mediums on this guitar but I think they would be too heavy for my playing style.

Before light/mediums: awesome finger style, reasonable strummer
After light/mediums: fairly awesome finger style, excellent strummer

I hope the string jangliness will settle down in the next few days though as I'm used to having a much less bright sound. Might try out the same gauge 80/20s and see how I like them.

[JJI]

Some info you may appreciate
There were only 21 of the 000-18 Marquis sunbursts made...TOTAL! There are hundreds of GE's but because of the Braz head plate they couldn't get shipped internationally and so they made a model with EIR and labeled it a Marquis. They are exceedingly rare. Congrats, my man!
I got all of this info directly from Martin. Mine is #9 of 21

[jaginn]

Originally Posted by JJI

Some info you may appreciate
There were only 21 of the 000-18 Marquis sunbursts made...TOTAL! There are hundreds of GE's but because of the Braz head plate they couldn't get shipped internationally and so they made a model with EIR and labeled it a Marquis. They are exceedingly rare. Congrats, my man!
I got all of this info directly from Martin. Mine is #9 of 21

Really? Wow, I had no idea. I knew that they were made as an exportable version of the GE but didn't know there were so few made! Did you find out yours is #9 from Martin? I'm curious to find out which mine is now �� Thanks for the info, it made my day.

[JJI]

I called and asked! The 000-18 Marquis falls in the GE category BUT technically it isn't. It is it's own, very rare, model.