First 7 String Bought Today

80sMetalDude

Inspired
I'm pretty excited (and my wife won't be...but I did follow the purchase decision flowchart and everything agreed I should spend the money) ordered my first 7 string guitar today.

Chris Broderick Soloist in white gloss (not USA model, not rich) can't wait. Been having the itch to try more modern metal stuff :)

I'm not overly excited about the floyd special that it comes with but meh that can be changed later.
 
Nice. I remeber the day I received my first 7 string. I would lose the orientation all the time because of this additional bass string. Now it feels strange to me to play a 6 string.
 
Nice. I remeber the day I received my first 7 string. I would lose the orientation all the time because of this additional bass string. Now it feels strange to me to play a 6 string.
I've never played one and worried about the same thing happening! I'm expecting it will be very odd at first.
 
Nice! I got my first 7 string two years ago. I still prefer 6s, but it is very fun!

This Ben Eller lesson shows a way to tune your 7 string to make the transition a little easier:
 
My first 7 string was a Jackson Soloist SL7. I still have it. It is SO EASY to play because it has super low action and the B string is a light 54. A word of advice. If you are going to tune to drop a then you will need at least a 64 IMO for tuning stability. I use 9 - 46 and a 65.
 
Yay came on Monday.

Had to change strings immediately, tried those Ernie Ball Cobalt... man I hate those... when you slide they grab your finger tips. Meh. Ordered some regular slinkys (I'm a Ernie ball guy.)

Guitar was setup very nice and impressed that the action was like perfect and the intonation was even spot on...

What I HATE:
These Chris Broderick DiMarzio pickups.... they sound like a fully pressed wah wah pedal all the time on the bridge pickup. I've pretty much only owned Seymour Duncan and EMG pickups so this is 'new'... I'm kind of hoping the string swap will help as well. Hate these strings.

Clean sounds like utter crap. All the AXEIII clean amps sound like at 'break up' on default patch settings. Turned instrument level to 1% same thing. Had to take input trim to like .500 to get a clean sound.

Yeah yeah turn the volume knob on guitar down. LOL!!

Construction was awesome and Jackson QA is very good, not a single scratch or anything.

Will replace the floyd/machine heads at some point.
 
I built my own 7 string as to me all 7 strings looked like metal guitars. All dark, all spiky looking, or Ibanez. Not my guitar taste, thank you very much. So I built a 7 string Tele. But does it add very much? 4 extra notes basically, 6 if you go for a drop A tuning. Sounds cool, but I could have detuned my E string for that too. Which I actually prefer as it opens up a world of different chord voicings. I also suffered from a lot of string disorientation. It takes some getting used to it. Overall I like my guitar but I'm glad I built it myself, because now at least its special to me. Had I bought one I would probably have sold it already. As with everything, your mileage may vary.
 
Only thing bothers me is the very bright tone of these strings/pickups. Will see how new strings fair before I jump on different pickups.

Guitar itself is exactly what I hoped from a feel/construction perspective.

And @Muad'zin I am a metal dude so I love superstrats :)
 
I switched to sevens a few years back and now it bugs me to play a six. Sure you technically only get 4-6 extra notes in standard tunings, but the possibilities opened up in all positions by having that extra string are pretty huge. This is particularly true for jazz (not something I do at all) and metal.

Personally I didn't find the adjustment confusing at all, maybe because I do majority riffs and don't mess much with chords? To me it's just an extra string that I can jump down to if I want to. Occasionally when I'm noodling I'll mess up and think I've gotten to that 4th between the 2nd and 3rd strings when I'm actually still on the 3rd and 4th strings... But that doesn't happen too often.

In some regards I could just tune a 6 down to B and roll with that, but for a lot of the stuff I write that ends up making things very difficult to play when they're much simpler than that on a 7.

As far as your pickups... Sounds funky to me, if it seriously sounds like a wah engaged I'd be worried there's something wrong with the wiring or with the pickup itself. Hot I'd understand, but thin and shrill like a wah sounds like something physically wrong.
 
Yep so bright. I read these are the same pickups that are in the USA model and I doubt Chris Broderick would go for the tone I'm seeing....

You may be right about the wiring because now come to think of it when I FIRST plugged it in and hot the strings first time it did not want to play...kind of like I got the string hard enough with pick then it would burst the note out in very noisy fashion....and then just started working and I put that to rest.

Going to have to open and look... maybe poor solder joint?

May have to retract the Jackson QA statement. Something is loose inside.
 
I bought my 1st 7 string about 20 years ago. It was a Schecter Avenger and the pickups were horrible. I sold it because I hated the design because I kept hitting myself in the face with the front body horn every time I put on or took off the guitar. My next 7 string was an ESP LTD H-207 and I still have it. Then around 2004 I really wanted an Epiphone Les Paul 7 string and a Flying V 7 string and a Schecter Jazz 7. They were pretty hard to find and I kept not winning Ebay bids but then a few of them showed up and I bid on them all hoping I'd win one and guess what? No one else bid, so I won them all for really low prices and ended up with 4 Epiphone Les Paul7 strings, 3 Flying V 7 Strings and 2 Schecter Jazz 7 strings. Just like an addict I couldn't stop and kept buying more and bought a Black and Red ESP LTD H-207, Metallic Charcoal Dean ML X7 and a Sapphire Blue Ibanez RG7421PB. I mainly play 6 strings now and only play my Sapphire Blue Ibanez RG7421PB 7 string. I've recently sold a Schecter Jazz 7, Epiphone Les Paul and Dean Dean ML X7.
 
Yep so bright. I read these are the same pickups that are in the USA model and I doubt Chris Broderick would go for the tone I'm seeing....

You may be right about the wiring because now come to think of it when I FIRST plugged it in and hot the strings first time it did not want to play...kind of like I got the string hard enough with pick then it would burst the note out in very noisy fashion....and then just started working and I put that to rest.

Going to have to open and look... maybe poor solder joint?

May have to retract the Jackson QA statement. Something is loose inside.
Check your volume pot value also. If it's too bright a lower value may help and cheaper than new pups
 
Sounds like a bad joint or a loose jack maybe. Could be a faulty pot or worst case a bad pickup, but the symptoms don't quite match up to either of those, assuming the volume does roll off like it's supposed to.

Does it sound better in the neck or middle positions? I'd be most suspect of the output Jack or the switch, next up the volume pot, maybe a bad ground job.

If the pickups are 4-conductor then make sure the right pairs are soldered together and done well too. Not sure if that guitar has a 5 way or other type of push/pull or mini toggle for coil splitting and such but if it does then those wires would be connected there rather than taped off.

If you already know what you're doing then don't mind me ;)
 
Know what I'm doing 'never' LOL. I do try though! Sometimes for the good, sometimes leads to opening my wallet, always a little wiser after.

LOL@GotMetalBoy where do you put all those guitars!

@ChainOfThought I will look deeper at this tonight and post back, thx for the suggestions.

I think the truth is in the rattle I found when you spin the guitar around something is rolling around on the inside.... loose piece in there I will open it up later.

I did look at Guitar Center RMA if I can't figure this out tonight I'm contacting for an exchange or return. I'm not paying a grand for a PoS.
 
Opened her up. First found a solder chunk laying in there which was the piece I heard rolling around. Next found a wire leaning sideways with enough insulation stripped off touching another lead of the volume pot. Pried it way so it wasnt touching. BAMN! Wah Wah sound gone! Now it's thick sounding like it should be.

So I lowered the pickups and now I can play clean at full volume without it being distorted.

HAPPY.

Thx for the replies guys.
 
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