Sometimes you just want to noodle around on your electric guitar on your couch and don’t want to go through the hassle of setting up your amp and pedals. Sometimes you want to practice your guitar but aren’t near your guitar equipment. Sometimes you want to play your guitar late at night without waking up the entire house. For those times, the Fluid Audio Strumbuddy Guitar Amp may be just what you need.
The Strumbuddy is a battery powered 6W guitar amp that suction-mounts directly onto your guitar. Included DSP effects include distortion, chorus, and reverb.
In the box you get the amp, a USB-A to USB-micro cable, a 6.35mm to 3.5mm mono guitar cable, and instructions.
The amp is charged with the included USB cable, though note you will need to provide your own USB 5V power adapter. There is an LED light that is on when the amp is charging (red) and on (green). You can get roughly 3.5 hours of play time on one charge.
The amp attaches to your guitar with a built-in suction-mount. I tried attaching the amp to a variety of guitars and the amp attached well to all of them. However, I do not have a severely-reliced guitar–I would imagine the amp attaches fine to guitars with no finish whatsoever, but you could always try attaching it to the pickguard.
The amp has a 40mm neodymium magnet speaker. Though the amp is rated at 6 Watts, because of the small speaker size you aren’t going to get a lot of sound, and the sound you do get will be thin. However, this is not meant to be an amp for performing in public–just for your practice to help you get better playing your instrument.
You turn on/off the effects using the raised rubber buttons on the side of the amp. Selecting the correct button while the amp is attached to your guitar can be tricky, so it helps if you memorize the order of the buttons and effects so you can find the right effect by touch. The effects are either on or off (ie you cannot control the amount of reverb, chorus, or crunch), but you can stack the effects. To me, the crunch is the most satisfying of the effects.
In use, the Fluid Audio Strumbuddy Guitar Amp does its job–it allows you to practice your electric guitar away from the cables and clutter of your main guitar amp and guitar pedals. There is no volume control on the amp–you are meant to control the volume using your guitar’s volume control. Also, there is no on/off power control–as soon as you plug in the guitar cable, the unit is on, so be sure to unplug the amp when you are done playing or you will drain the battery. And finally, I really wish the amp had a headphone jack. But all in all, anything that makes it easier to play the guitar means you will play the guitar more often, which is what we are all striving for. This battery powered, suction-mount practice amp eliminates the resistance of having to deal with setting up a bunch of equipment before you can even pick up the guitar. With this amp, no matter where you are, you can just pick up your guitar and play.
- Pricing and Availability on Amazon: Fluid Audio Strumbuddy Guitar Amp
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