Lucius, You wrote "Guitar strings have memory." "...halfway through a song my strings want to return to their original setting." I'm a bit skeptical about that, did you buy that guitar from Stephen King *grin*? I use 5 tunings other than standard and have never had that problem. If you have decent tuning gears and not-too-old strings on your guitar they should stay there, assuming it's not a top or bridge problem. I do sometimes find it tough to get into low tunings (eg, those involving going to CG on the low strings) as things can get flabby, to borrow someone else's word, but I put bluegrass sets on the guitar that gets most of the retuning. These strings sets have heavier gauges in the lower end and their extra tension removes some of the flab. I know D'Addario puts them together and I think John Pearse does also and I think someone, not sure who, puts a set together for DADGAD.

Regards, Dave