A Taylor Big Baby.
http://www.taylorguitars.com/guitars/model.aspx?model=307
You guys gave some very good advice. battleminnow - you have good insight about strumming on a Seagull. The guy I know with the Seagull 12 string does very little strumming and I notice that his Seagull is very punchy which is ideal for his type of playing (Dave Matthews-ish).
In the end it came down to a Seagull S6 and a Taylor Big Baby. They both sounded good and reasonable for their price range (less than $400 new).
Frankly, if I were purchasing a guitar for playing/listening enjoyment I would have chosen the Seagull over the Taylor.
The deciding factor was that the Taylor had less bass response and more high end. After paying more attention to recorded acoustic guitar sound on records that I like I found that most players have very little bass response on thier recordings of acoustic guitars and are likely even using Nashville tunings.
The Taylor has a smaller body that lends to less bass. It's sort of between a parlor and standard size guitar. Once I got home and recorded (AKG C414 to preamp and straight to ADAT) it needed no EQ whatsoever - just what I was looking for! The bass was tight and more mid-ranged, not at all overbearing or boomy and the high end was crisp.
It does sound like it's lacking the full bodied bass I'm used to though; and its sustain is weaker than most acoustics too. The neck is held on to the body by - get ready for this one - *two screws at the 16th fret.* I've never seen anything quite like it... main thing is it sounds perfect though for my applications. I recorded it in a mix with electric guitar, bass, drums and vocal and it sounded excellent - left plenty of room for all the other instruments while allowing the chords to be heard clearly. I'll post some sound samples tomorrow