The acoustic guitar has been around for hundreds of years; the first steel-string acoustic guitars appeared over 150 years ago and have remained largely unchanged in that time. Many manufacturers have explored different shapes and sizes to change the character of the instrument, but the first real revolution was the inclusion of a pickup to an acoustic guitar.
Initially this amplification was simply to allow guitars to be heard over the brass sections of jazz bands, but in the mid-1960s the sound of the electrified guitar became a sound in its own right with use of overdrive and eventually other effects. However, the electrified acoustic guitar (as opposed to solid-body instruments) was still largely for amplification purposes. It wasn't until the mid-80s and 90s that musicians regularly used effects on acoustic guitars. Until the invention of the loop pedal. KT Tunstall and the ubiquitous Ed Sheeran demonstrated that the acoustic guitar could be the whole band with the correct processing and looping.
The guitar
This brings us to the LAVA ME 3 smartguitar. This is an electro-acoustic guitar with effects and looping built into the instrument itself. There is also a tuner and some training software, so this instrument has the potential to be everything an acoustic guitarist might need.
The guitar itself is made of carbon fibre. I'd never played a carbon fibre guitar before – and was pleasantly surprised with the acoustic sound. It was reminiscent of the plastic, bowl-backed Ovation style guitars from the 80s – largely made to reduce feedback when amplified, so there is probably a reason that LAVA have chosen this as a material. It has a balanced sound across the frequencies and doesn't lack bass as I'd feared it might. Another advantage of carbon fibre is, because it's very stiff, intonation and tuning will be much more stable because nothing will move.
Key features
- Carbon fibre body
- Built-in effects
- Looper and recorder
- Built-in metronome and tuner
- Link to app and cloud storage
- Training programme
The effects
The clever stuff starts once you activate the credit-card sized touchscreen on the top bout of the guitar. This provides access to all the tricks that the LAVA ME 3 has to offer. I began by exploring some of the built-in effects to enhance my sound. Fortunately, the manufacturers have focused on sounds that will enhance an acoustic guitar (reverbs, delays, subtle modulation etc.) and have steered clear of over-the-top effects such as distortion and fuzz that will just turn into a mess of feedback once amplified. I found the effects quite inspiring and, with some of the longer more ambient effects, I started playing differently. I tend to overplay on acoustic, and the ambience helped me play more subtly.
The screen provides access to the tuner, effects, looper and training software
The looper
The inclusion of a looper within the guitar is an excellent idea. It captures the output of the guitar for pre-set periods of time (I preferred 8-bar loops) and allows you to record multiple parts to create a backing-track. This works particularly well in conjunction with the effects section because this includes an octave effect to capture bass lines.
In education
The LAVA ME 3 is potentially a great product for the education sector. It is likely that some students might want to attempt the solo performance route and normally this would involve connecting to a loop pedal and then into an amp. This isn't complicated, but more time consuming than ideal with the rest of a class in front of you. The LAVA ME 3 is an all-in-one device, so all it needs is handing out and the students are ready to go.
Further, with the training mode of the LAVA ME 3, if a student is struggling with a technique, chord shape or chord change, the training mode can help by indicating finger positions and improving speed through a series of exercises.
Final thoughts
The LAVA ME 3 smartguitar is an incredible piece of kit. However, and there's no getting around it, it's expensive. However, once I started calculating the accumulated cost of a guitar, loop pedal, amp and a number of effects pedals, then the price didn't seem that bad. It would certainly cost a lot more to purchase all the elements separately.
This is an expensive instrument, but it has an awful lot to offer to the education market and could be a great resource for the wannabe guitarists, singer-songwriters and composers in your establishments. I recommend exploring this further.
Price: From £1079
Find a helpful glossary of terms used in our music tech reviews here: musicteachermagazine.co.uk/other/article/tech-column-music-technology-glossary
