Cutlass RS HSS thoughts after a few months

[marmatkat]

Hi everyone. I bought a used mint '023 EBMM Cutlass RS HSS this April ($1650), and I thought I'd share my experience here and maybe get your comments. (Obligatory pic in this thread.)

Overall I'm really starting to love the guitar. It likes to be played . I've only used it in a handful of gigs, but it does its thing well: A super comfortable guitar with four sweet Strat sounds plus HB. My only other guitar is a 2017 PRS CE 24, which I like a lot. (My only complaint is that I don't love the bridge pickup, but not enough to explore replacing it. I'd hate to screw up the split coil sounds, which are pretty usable. )

Pros:

• I love the finish (tobacco). It's not flashy, but I think it's pretty.
• I love the neck. Smooth, a little narrow but not bad, a little thick but not bad. I took it to an experienced guitar tech who said "I don't want to put it down." Neck details are excellent (smooth fret finishing on the sides, etc.)
• Great sounds. I practice with a Fender Micro headphone amp, and it's a hoot. (Ironic side note: Fender sent me this free after I wrote them about unacceptable issues the new Strat ultra I had to return.)
• Great weight, balance, and overall comfort.

Cons:

• I couldn't get it happy with stupid low action (my preference) combined with 9s (my preferred gauge). Too buzzy (and I know acceptably buzzy vs too buzzy). Between the choice of switching to 9/10 hybrids and 9.5s, I went with the latter, which did the trick. But I was a bit disappointed that the 9s wouldn't work. (I "train" with 10s on my practice guitar, so the outcome is ok.) Note that I paid two different experienced techs to get to this point, including some mild fret leveling.
• It had a sitar-like buzzing/ringing on the G string. The second tech knew right away that it was a saddle that needed attention (bend angle, string touching twice, etc?)
• Bridge saddles: I am not impressed with these vintage-like saddles. I much preferred the Ultra ones, which are smooth and work great when palm muting. That said, palm mutes are not a huge problem with the stock saddles, and it hasn't bothered me enough to use shorter grub screws, filing, etc.
• Hard-to-see fret market dots on fingerboard. This is due to the dots being black and not contracting much with the darkish roasted maple. Happens on stage under the lights where I missed a few notes/changes. I'm adapting, though.
• Upper fret accessibility: The neck + body "sandwich" feels like a lot of wood in my hand when I'm playing the upper registers. I've gotten used to it, but it required a tweak to my playing style. At least there's a nice smooth carve.

Pseudo cons:

• SS frets: This isn't a con so much as a required adaptation on my part. The fret buzz is very bright due to the fret material. Not a problem per se, just something I had to get used to.
• Case: the Mono case does its job, and it's light, but on the bulky side. Plus, unzipping is a little more work than a few latches. Not a giant problem.
• HSS: There are a few songs where I wish I had a bridge single coil, but I substitute the middle SC, which works ok. I've tried playing with the HB and the tone rolled off, but that's different sound. It's worth it to have the HB available, though. My bands don't have a lot of room on stage, so I'm usually stuck with one guitar for the whole set, and I need the HB for rock, 90s, etc.

That's all I can think of at the moment. Overall, after looking for a year or two, I'm pretty happy with this axe I think it's a keeper.