The darkest tone you've heard from an acoustic

[[J.K.]]

I'm always curious about guitars with a really "dark" tone, at least in the sense of having very subdued, contained treble response. I've spent a lot of time looking at unwound strings options to see how the tone can be crafted from there, but I'm really interested in what specific guitars people have felt sounded really mellow and dark.

Granted, this is probably fairly subjective (unless you're using a spectroscope), and a poorly built guitar can sometimes sound darker than a well-built one by being overbuilt. On paper, I would guess that the top contender would be a fairly traditional non-scalloped, x-braced, mahogany-top guitar and with a shorter scale. Then again, my experience with modern generation mahogany guitars is that they're still the same relative brightness, only with a different mid-focus, more compression, and softer bass response.

Just to keep the conversation from sprawling too far, let's limit the guitars to models that are built with solid wood, not laminate.

So what about you lot? What's the darkest li'l six string flat top you've played?

[gitarro]

The darkest toned guitar i have ever played is a Kevin Ryan Nightingale in cedar and east indian rosewood.i have also played sitka/eirw nightingales and they were almost aa dark.

[Liam77]

definitely this one:
https://youtu.be/rwhvFLHIlBs?t=27

[SalFromChatham]

Look at the Martin D15 or Martin J15.

[colins]

A guitar I have with African blackwood back and sides. It has a wonderful tone which, relative to my other guitars, could definitely be described as dark. I am sure it has nothing to do with the colour!

[AndrewG]

I owned a Martin J-40 which was the epitome of 'dark'. Think 'D-35' and add more bass

[Mbroady]

Originally Posted by AndrewG

I owned a Martin J-40 which was the epitome of 'dark'. Think 'D-35' and add more bass

I had an HD-28 that was dark. In fact it was a little 2 dark for my tastes and traded it.

[TBman]

My Martin D-16GT of the ones that I own. I've played a few Martin 000-15 and they sound even "darker" than my D-16GT. You might want to look at baritone guitars though.

[stringjunky]

The darkest I've heard and played are an OM35 and D35.

[llew]

OM-35 and 000-28 EC.

[jaymarsch]

Originally Posted by TBman

My Martin D-16GT of the ones that I own. I've played a few Martin 000-15 and they sound even "darker" than my D-16GT. You might want to look at baritone guitars though.

The darkest guitar (subjective as to what exactly that is) that I ever played was a Wingert baritone that was made with African Blackwood. The guy who ordered it specified that he wanted a deep, dark tone. Not sure what else contributed to the sound construction-wise but the tone was amazing - it didn't sound out of balance, just an overall rich, deep tone. I played it not too long after it was first strung up so would be interested in hearing that guitar today after some years of playing under its belt.

Best,
Jayne

[PorkPieGuy]

An old-ish Martin D28.

Super dark. Sounded like mud. Hated it.

[Muddslide]

Originally Posted by [J.K.]

...Just to keep the conversation from sprawling too far, let's limit the guitars to models that are built with solid wood, not laminate.

Your post = your rules, but you'll be leaving out a good number of great-sounding guitars that have naturally dark tone.

[noledog]

Martin OMC35e

[stringjunky]

Originally Posted by noledog

Martin OMC35e

Looks like the OM35 is taking an early lead.