D'Addario XL Nickel EXL158 Electric Guitar Strings, Baritone 13-62

My favorite strings. I use D'Addario on most of my guitars because they are consistent and long lasting and sound great.

Drop a# tuning 6 string for metal you can’t go wrong sound great and great tension

I regularly play acoustic and electric guitar and so my playing technique is very "heavy handed", which is somewhat necessary for playing an acoustic guitar if you really want good intonation and presence. Unfortunately, electric guitars require more finesse and dexterity if you want to get the most of your vibrato or bends, which is why 0.9 to 0.11 gauge string sets are the de facto preference for every player. Back in the 50s and early 60s, guitar strings didn't come in the lighter gauges that we have them today. 0.12 and 0.13 sets were commonplace. Electric guitar strings were more or less lighter-gauged acoustic guitar strings. This is how the Beatles were able to get those thick clean tones, and how Stevie Ray Vaughan (who also used 13s on his Strat) came to create his legendary tone as well. "Heavier is better" is just a myth though. Dozens of guitar heroes use standard gauge strings, sometimes as light as 0.8. It really just depends on your playing style and the amount of physical response you want from your strings. In this case "heavier is better..." IF you have a strong picking technique and hard attack. These days I have been playing a lot of heavy metal and I needed strings that wouldn't flap around when playing those tight galloping rhythms and alternate picking runs. I decided to try out this "Baritone" guitar set on my Les Paul, and I've been really impressed with the thickness of the tone. You don't necessarily need a Strat-scaled guitar or anything longer to rock these strings, so long as you adjust your bridge accordingly. Another benefit of using .13s is that the G-string is WOUND, which means more tension and less tuner slippage while playing. Every guitarist knows what I'm talking about when I say how frustrating it is when the G-string slides out of tune more so than any other string. On this set, the G-string is a wound 0.26, so literally twice the thickness of the high e-string. While this doesn't make it totally immune to tuning slippage, it'll get you really close. The last benefit of using .13s is that it is like resistance weight training in every respect. After playing a couple months on .13s, if you go back to .9s or .10s you'll feel like you can fly across the fretboard with ease.

Really the only real option out there for playability on an extended scaled baritone guitar. This is the only brand and gauge I buy for my Danelectro 56 and I wouldn't recommend anything else.

Great strings

I use these strings on my Schecter C-1 EX Baritone and they are excellent. I tune to "Drop B" and play rythmic hard rock. These strings feel great, not slack and not too thick so it plays more like a regular guitar (The "EX" is the baritone model, 26.5" scale) I also use the D'Addario "Jazz Light Gauge" (52-12) strings on my regular guitar and they are great also. Both sets use a "Wound" "G, or 3rd" string, which I find to be very nice. I was surprised how much I preferred the wound string after trying my first set, I would recommend giving it a shot if you have never used a set like that.

I've been a big fan of D'addario strings after recently switching to them (about 2 years ago) and falling in love with just about everything about them. These strings are no different from the rest of their line-up - I'm using them on a standard scale (non baritone) Epiphone Les Paul in C standard to play Queens of the Stone Age songs. The strings have a great tone, they tune nicely (no slippage) and are priced at a very fair price. I'll be buying these again whenever I break a string on my Les Paul from rocking too hard.

Strings are strings, of course but I, wanted to review these in case anyone was planning to attempt the experiment I bought these strings to try. I was curious if these could be tuned down to one octave below middle C on a 25.5" scale guitar like the extra Mexico Strat I had laying around, and the answer is yes. They don't work perfectly because the gauges are designed to be tuned a half step lower to B on an actual baritone guitar with a much longer scale. They are a touch floppy, but with a light touch single note lines can be played for an accent on country recordings. Think of the opening lick on Clint Black's "Killing Time", for example.