The last in line.....

[Phantasmagoria]

All good things come to an end...it's been fun


Now it's time to play them and enjoy them.

Anyway, last but by no means least..

My new Cort X700 Duality II Lava Burst :bigthumb:

Another absolutely perfect-playing axe out of the box. Pretty flawless in every respect. Once more all I had to do was level the angle of the tremolo bridge because I tune down a half-step. I was a bit surprised that the neck was rather chunky , not baseball bat chunky but definately still chunky for a shred guitar. though some to think of it none of my Cort's have super-thin (Ibanez Wizard-type) necks. Anyway, happily It still felt great to play and was nice & nippy/really comfortable.

Guitar Specs:

Brand: Cort
Model: X700 Duality II
Colour: Lava Burst
SKU: X700-DII-LVB
Top: Flame Maple
Body: Mahogany
Neck: 3pcs Maple & Panga Panga
Fingerboard: Ebony
Fingerboard Inlays: Abalone Dots with Luminlay Side Dots
Fingerboard Radius: 15.75" (400mm)
Nut Width: 1 11/16" (43mm)
Scale Length: 25.5 "(648mm)
Frets: 24 (Stainless Steel Frets)
Tuners: Cort® Staggered Locking Tuners
Bridge: Cort® CFA-III Tremolo
Hardware: Chrome
Pickups: Fishman® Open Core Classic Humbucker Pickup Set
Controls: 1 Volume & 1 Tone, 5 Way Toggle Switch
No. Of Strings: 6
Gigbag


https://www.cortguitars.com/product/..._id=1641198680



I'll be honest, though I love my Cort's, I bought this one for the Fishman Fluences more than anything cuz I'm curious to see what all the fuss is about. Anyway these were raised way up against the strings as well. I'm beginning to suspect the store has someone doing in-house setups who has a fetish for bridge pups that practically scrape against the strings. ::

I'll lower them later. But right off the bat it's obvious that these are indeed way more like passives than actives as far as both sound & feel go.. and I mean shockingly so. It really felt like I was playing passive pups. I don't know what "voicing" I was on (apparently there are three). Just had the bridge pup selected with the blade switch.. I'm guessing that's the Paf voice.

Anyway after levelling the bridge & re-tuning here's how it sounds through my Laney (getting a bit sick of this backing track though:laugh2 ..

 

[GuitarDoc]

I don't like the trans black in the middle. Would love it if the body was the same as the headstock.
Other than that, man, that is a totally awesome looking guitar! Love, love it! :eyecrazy:

I don't see the voice selector switches. Is this one of the models that has some auto settings wired into the blade switch?

Congrats man. You've gotten some mighty fine guitars lately. I'm a little jealous. OK, so I'm a LOT jealous. :yourock:

 

[Phantasmagoria]

Thanks! It's kinda different/unusual and probably not for everyone but it works for me. I dig it, but I can see a lot of others thinking it's absolutely hideous :laugh2: They actually had a blue version too but I think I've had my fill of blue now :lmao:

The headstock is the same w/ the trans black in the middle....it's just my camera and maybe the angle that's kinda crappy..

Yeah postion's two and four on the blade switch give you the third voicing (single coil). The tone knob is a push-pull that activates the second "hot-rodded"/high ouput voicing.. I've yet to try those two voicings....only used the default PAF.. (push-pull pushed down) to record the ^^ clip up there..

Thanks again....they're a great bunch of guitars & they're all PLAYERS. That makes me happy....

Don't be jealous ..buy more guitars :bigthumb:

 

[GuitarDoc]

Don't be jealous ..buy more guitars :bigthumb:

Well, I've got over 5 dozen and I've got about 8 that are just about ready for final polishing and assembly, so I don't think I need to buy anymore. But that Cort with the Fluence pups sure is a temptation. I've at least been considering getting a set of the pups lately...my wife would kill me if I bought another guitar, but I could justify the pups (heh, heh, heh). I've also been lusting after a Sustainiac neck pup.

 

[Phantasmagoria]

lol, I was justt kidding about the guitars.

But Yeah that's precisely what I wanted to do as well...get myself a bunch of "firsts" ie ..stuff I'd never had or tried before. ..like a Sustainiac & there's so much noise about Fluences I was aching to try them just out of plain curiousity and since I could also get myself the guitar that came with them ..why not? I do love Cort's anyway. SS frets were another "first" for me which I was curious about that came with this guitar :bigthumb:

 

[GuitarDoc]

Looks like you've got all of your wishes filled...some great and beautiful guitars, one with a Sustainiac, and one with the Fishman Fluence.

When I think about that...man! I'm really jealous!

 

[GuitarDoc]

I mean, REALLY jealous!!!

 

[Phantasmagoria]

Damn! :laugh2:

 

[Phantasmagoria]

I was wondering if the Fishman pup's were meant to be adjusted like normal passives or higher up like EMG's (though I personally prefer EMG's bit lower down too). Anyway apparently their support recommends 8/64" on the low E side and 6/64" on the high E side (3.175 mm - 2.38125 mm)..so like a passive. MIne are probably less than 1 mmm under the strings right now :laugh2: They sound kinda flat/lack dynamics...looks like I have some work to do..


This axe sounds pretty sweet with the Fluences in the product demo's :bigthumb:

 

[Phantasmagoria]

Adjusted the height ...they sound/play great now. I get the hype ..very cool pups indeed.

Here's the neck/bridge on the "hot rodded" voicing (Tone knob pulled up)

Might mess around with height a bit more and fine tune things...let's see, they sound pretty sweet as they are..but I'm not quite there yet..

The other two voicings are pretty awesome as well. :bigthumb:

 

[Mincer]

I am seeing the bevel thing on more and more guitars these days.

 

[Phantasmagoria]

Yeah, apparently the point is to demonstrate that it's an actual 1/4" maple cap and not a veneer :laugh2:...I read that somewhere..


I'm not bat**** crazy about the aesthetics ..but it looked better than the Ibby's (Premium's) w these Fishman's (which were even more modern/Djenty looking) & it (Cort) was cheaper too ..so..


Anyway, these are all the 3 voices (Voice 1 - PAF, Voice II - Hot-Rodded, Voice III - Single Coil) neck pup followed by bridge ...pretty authentic sounding/convincing if you ask me (especially the bridge which I have squarely in the sweet spot )..


PAF:

^^ Sorry,the caption says 'hot-rodded' in the video , but it's all the PAF setting.




Hot-Rodded (Push-pull pulled)

Single-Coil:

Think I got the bridge pu adjusted the way I want it. The neck's almost there too (needs slightly more highs) ..maybe I'll just leave it as it is.....​

 

[Lovegun]

Nice guitar, but I expected something Vivian Cambellish by the name of the topic.

 

[Phantasmagoria]

Nice guitar, but I expected something Vivian Cambellish by the name of the topic.

Yeah, sorry about that :lmao:

I meant this was hopefully the last guitar I'll be buying for a while after going on a guitar buying spree over the last couple of months

 

[Lovegun]

Yeah, sorry about that :lmao:

I meant this was hopefully the last guitar I'll be buying for a while after going on a guitar buying spree over the last couple of months

No worries. I think mr Cambell played a Jackson Star or something close with the same colour scheme in his Dio years that your latest guitar has.

 

[Phantasmagoria]

Sweet!

 

[Phantasmagoria]

Well after playing them for a bit here are some initial thoughts on the Fluences. I can see what players like about them, especially modern players. They have some very cool compression to them which makes shredding/legato/tapping relatively effortless. They have a very pristine & overly "perfect" polished sound out of the box like everything you play has already been professionally produced. Personally, I think there's something a bit artificial sounding about them & by that I mean in a different/distinctive though not nessesarily "bad" way per say..but yeah, plastic-y.

My first impression that they were really passive-like was a bit off the mark. They actually don't quite sound or feel just like passives, but they don't sound or feel like actives either. They're somewhere in between... and have a sound/feel of their own. I actually like them ....they have really cool authentic sounding 'voices' that are very distinct from each other and really quite convincing (albeit "over-produced" sounding out of the gate) and it's really great having them in a guitar or two, cuz they're a novelty and a different flavour all to themselves, and that's always cool to have but I don't see them replacing my Duncans or Dimarzio's/fave stock pup's/Lace Deathbuckers/Fokin's/EMG's/cheap chinese Oripure's or any of those in a bunch of my guitars anytime soon.

Having said that it's a blast to play them (they shred insanely) and they're actually a lot of fun, but in the way that a Sustainiac is fun. You would'nt want one in all your guitars :bigthumb:

 

[80's_Thrash_Metal]

Man! you have some chops buddy!

 

[Phantasmagoria]

Shush... you'll lose all your friends :lmao:

 

[Phantasmagoria]

Ok. now that I have it all set up and adusted to my liking....pickup height, bridge angle etc..here's another clip.

Switching between all 3 voices on the bridge pup as it goes along.. The changes are perhaps harder to hear/distinguish between than in the slower clips I posted earlier, but I still hear them so maybe some others will too :bigthumb:

Bottom line...these are absolutely great pickups to shred with and I certainly can't fault the guitar either...it's no slouch