Bringing gear on vacation.

  • I have a week-long vacation coming up (with wife) and want to bring my guitar along. She thinks I'm nuts and aggravated I might want to play the whole time. I promised her I'd do just 20 minutes each day. I explained to her I would feel like I am cheating on my wife (her) if I left my guitar at home. Does anyone else feel the same?

    I needed a headphone amp so, after many reviews, I ordered the Positive Grid Spark Go. My other choices where the Fender Mustang Micro, Nux MP3, or the Boss Katana Go (which got discontinued). I like the added features of the Spark. The Kemper Player would be ideal but not in the budget for this trip.

    Larry Mar @ Lonegun Studios. Neither one famous yet.

  • I almost always bring a guitar with me when I travel for work or pleasure. The exception is when it is multi stop travel. In and out of multiple airports is too much hassle. I have rented guitars at my destination as well. Most of my playing time is on an unplugged electric. I don't need to plug it in except for a gig and some performance setups at home. I've played long enought that I know what will happen when I do plug in. I don't need any more experience on the amp/effects side. I focus on simply playing the instrument.

    I always take a a bolt-on neck guitar (tele or strat) in a soft sided gig bag. I take guitars that I am not worried about getting dinged and these can take a beating. Gibsons or guitars with angled headstock are a non-starter for travel for me. I never check the guitar and the soft sided bag makes for a convincing argument that it can't be checked. Guitar mostly ends up in the overhead. I have to watch and make sure that some other traveler doesn't try to jam their luggage on top of it. So, I have to defend it. Sometimes, a nice attendant will find a safe place to stash it as well. Always appreciated when that happens.


    It is always worth the effort for me. Some wake up with coffee, I wake up with the guitar. I wind down every evening with a guitar as well.

  • She thinks I'm nuts and aggravated I might want to play the whole time.

    Trust me, it's not about how many minutes a day you spend playing.

    What guys say:

    "I'll bring a guitar, but I'll just play a few minutes each day."

    What women hear:

    "I know this is supposed to be quality time that we spend together, but that's not really important to me so I'll bring my guitar in case I get bored."

    You can try to use logic and explain it to her until the cows come home, but all that's going to accomplish is you sleeping with the cows.

    Kemper remote -> Powered toaster -> Yamaha DXR-10

  • I know its not a guitar, but…

    I bring a pair of CME XKEY midi controllers with me. They’re slim and 2 of them (25 and 37 keys) fit in the case sold for them. The case straps to my back and airlines don’t give me any problem at all about carrying it on the plane.

    I connect them to Logic on my iPad, and practice whatever classical piano piece I’m working, as well as blues improv.

    My wife is totally cool with my occasional play.

  • I got the Spark Go today and must say I am impressed. I will mainly use it with IEMs and it sounds great that way. It's a little heavier than I expected but I guess most weight is from the battery. It came 80% charged so I already spent over my 20 minutes on it today. ;)

    Larry Mar @ Lonegun Studios. Neither one famous yet.

  • Most of my playing time is on an unplugged electric. I don't need to plug it in except for a gig and some performance setups at home. I've played long enought that I know what will happen when I do plug in. I don't need any more experience on the amp/effects side. I focus on simply playing the instrument.

    This 👍

  • Well, effects inspire me to write new stuff even though I find myself backing off of them quite a bit during the mixing process. I still have a crutch on delay when playing in stereo. :P

    One thing that used to bum me out was these big Texas lightning storms. Now, I won't have to totally shut down!

    Larry Mar @ Lonegun Studios. Neither one famous yet.

    Edited once, last by BayouTexan (July 11, 2024 at 12:18 AM).

  • I don’t feel complete traveling without a guitar. Fortunately my wife thinks it’s absolutely normal that I take my guitar with me, she even encourages me. My advice, don’t noodle scales if the wife is near, play something beautiful and relaxing using the looper, it might even make her fall asleep. That’s why I spent quite some time in finding a good travel guitar equipment.

    If a standard electric guitar is too big, I take my Steinberger Synapse guitar, which fits in an extra-long suitcase. But most airlines accept a standard electric guitar in a bag as carry-on luggage.

    Most practical solution is the Quad Cortex (which is surprisingly light), since it is very flexible with a very good internal looper. Kemper Player is also good, but it’s missing an internal looper and the looper pedal adds to the weight (I really don’t understand why Kemper would not include the Looper in a travel friendly device…???!!!???). If it has to be very light, the Tonex One is the best solution (you don’t even need a power supply, just use the phone charger). If you use it right, it sounds very good! And even together with the looper pedal it is still lighter than the Kemper Player, but it only has Reverb and Compressor as effects. Hotone Ampero Mini is not bad either, all effects and looper included, very light and small and the sound is more than ok.

    For Speakers I choose between Marshall Kilburn 2 which sounds very good with zero latency (Attention! Many Bluetooth speakers have quite some latency on line in). Even better is IK Multimedia’s iLoud which gives you a great travel sound system even working fine for small spontaneous parties.

    I would say that all theses solutions will sound better than any travel amplifier I ever tried, but that’s just my experience.

    The best option in my opinion is Quad Cortex together with iLoud, sounds awesome and you can even connect up to 4 Instruments to QC if needed, each having it’s own signal path.

    never thought that I would like the Kemper that much...! 8|

  • I have taken a guitar away with me on holiday and I only play when my wife is doing something else, so she is cool with that. She gets irritated with me noodling, even acoustically...

    I also work away every so often so I have a guitar in my car ( I have it today). I bought the nux mighty pro...the sound is not bad, certainly good enough, it is extremely small and light and you can play mp3s back through it.

    The only thing it doesn;t have is pitch shift as I often learn songs in a different key and re-tuning is a pain but otherwise its fab. I use it at home as well when I can;t be bothered to fire everything up.

  • some weeks ago we stayed 2 weeks at Dutch seaside, and I decided not to take a guitar with me - that was a terrible experience because beginning with day 1 I had ideas coming up and I had no chance to practice... so I decided not to be out for vacations without a guitar and my tiny Zoom G1Xon in the future.

    Fortunately my partner has no issue with this :love: (she knows she will profit from my better mood :D)

  • I've just spent 2x weeks in Italy (best country in the world, no arguments accepted) and I was super missing having a giuitar with me.

    Why I didn't bring my Yamaha silent guitar - which packs fairly small as carry on... I don't know.

    I now live there....couldn't agree more:). I've bought my Silent Guitar exactly for that purpose....and the discovered how well it tracks:P

    If something is too complicated, then you need to learn it better

  • My vacation rig is a Traveler guitar and a Positive Grid Spark mini. The mini is also perfect as a bluetooth speaker to listen to music. Also has a headphone out if needed. But love the sound in the room.

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    Mix is not perfect but you get the idea :). Using Moises AI to remove the lead guitar.

    Kemper PowerRack |Kemper Stage| Rivera 4x12 V30 cab | Yamaha DXR10 pair | UA Apollo Twin Duo | Adam A7X | Cubase DAW
    Fender Telecaster 62 re-issue chambered mahogany | Kramer! (1988 or so...) | Gibson Les Paul R7 | Fender Stratocaster HBS-1 Classic Relic Custom Shop | LTD EC-1000 Evertune | 1988 Desert Yellow JEM