1973 Martin D-12-35 12-String Dreadnought Guitar

I've said it before -- I love Martin slope-shoulder, 12-fret dreadnoughts. Their late-'60s/early-'70s 12-string versions are just icing on that cream-cheese-frosting carrot cake. The D-12-35 (as stamped in the soundhole, though people usually write it as D12-35) is always lush-sounding whenever I encounter it in the world ant this '73 is no exception to that rule.

It's owned by a local customer who keeps his action high (as he bangs on it heavily with bare fingers), but I convinced him to get the underlying structural problems of this guitar addressed. That included regluing its already-modified bridge and planing and refretting the neck to remove a generous warp and badly-worn/too-low frets that'd transpired over time. The new jumbo/pyramid wire has a long enough tang that the neck is perfectly stable tuned to pitch rather than adding relief when tuned-up.

I set it up "like butter" for the clip above, but when he came we spent a few hours getting it setup for his particular style and that included making a new saddle to compensate even farther to the rear to counter the bends of the higher action he likes.

Martin 12-fret 12-strings have a different sound from your run-of-the-mill 12s in that they're a bit deeper, wider, and mellower-sounding. They're not the kerrangy punch that one associates with Guilds or the thumpy/bluesy boxy sound that Gibsons and Harmony products share. They're, well, more refined.