yeah, you're welcome brucie. I did some perfunctory searching on the 'net for Kottke's tunings (and in the process I also learned to spell his last name) ...but "perfunctory" in this sense means I didn't spend a whole lot of time on it, so I didn't find anything to back up what I was talking about in the 28 DEC 03 -12:42PM post.

I'm sure Kottke and your friend Gibson used something like that though (learned something too..thanks! wasn't familiar with Bob Gibson but I ran across his name a few times alongside Kottke's when I was doing the perfunctory thing..anyway, will definitely have to check him out).

I just stumbled across this alleged "Kottke" tuning one day many moons ago in an altered state of consciousness when a friend of mine and I were experimenting with open 'D' tunings on this old cheap 12-string I used to have. I started twisting the other tuners down away from the octave interval until they sounded 'cool.' When I was done, I strummed all the open strings and my friend exclaimed "Leo Kottke!" And sure enough, to my ear too it sounded like a tuning Kottke used. We were so happy with ourselves we had another smoke and a beer, and...sort of forgot about it after that. I couldn't swear to it now, but I think I tuned 'em away from the octave interval down to a perfect fifth. But I'm pretty sure I was using the 3rd string G as an F# in open D tuning, so a perfect fifth interval from F# is C#, which absolutely has no business in open D tuning, so maybe I tuned that one down to a D instead, just can't remember. Like I said, I was just twisting the tuners until they sounded good.

If I had a 12-string now I bet I could re-create it though. But I don't know anyone near me who's got one I could borrow, and I'd hate to walk in the music store and straightaway pick up a 12-string and just start twisting tuners all weird. Sales personnel giving me the evil eye, like I was an idiot or something.