Aria AMG10 Electric Travel Guitar

For a travel guitar, a lot of features. The other ones I looked at (Pignose, Fernandes) didn't even compare. Humbucking dual blade pickup, high quality bridge and tuners. Nice neck and frets. I paid a little extra for mine because the store I bought it from does a super set up job prior to sale, plus I got the rare tobacco (Aria calls it black) sunburst model. One piece Alder body (same as early Strats). Like I said, blew away the competition.

I am convinced that I'm either living in a parallel universe or a vast majority of people just don't know how to tweek sounds because I was instantly able to get a great clean sound out of the onboard amp by first turning the tone control almost all the way to the bass end (counter clockwise) and then adjusting the volume to just before it distorts, it sounds great with fingerpicking. With volume half way, add a little more treble with the tone knob and its "Twang Time". I dont know what anybody else was expecting out of this little axe, but I got way more than I expected. The distorto sound is unusable but funny! Even though it sounds like a jammed garbage disposal it still puts a smile on my face every time I try it.

This is the best part, well constructed with higher quality parts than any of its competitors, neck fits super tight in the pocket.

Well constructed, time will tell, lifetime warranty.

Overall rating is based on how it compared to its competition in the cheapo travel guitar category, it blew the competition away so I have to give it an 8. Lost or stolen, I would buy another and I would hope to find the sunburst model I have, though I'm told they are rare.

This is my second review of this guitar based on having bought a second copy of the guitar, but since I already listed all the features in my first review, no need to list them again.
My first one was red/white pickguard, this one is black/white pickguard.

Okay, I'm giving the sound a little higher rating than I did this time, I'm starting to get used to the distortion thing. I'd still like to be able to get a clean sound out of it, but I've learned to work with it.

There's only been one other review here besides mine, and that reviewer mentioned the amp cutting out and just getting noise. I haven't had that problem. One time though, I set the guitar down without turning it off, and when I came back to it, it was making a noise, but after turning the guitar off and back on, the noise was gone.

Okay, either the last guys got very unlucky or I've gotten very lucky because this second one, same as the first, did not require any tightening of stuff, or action edjustment, etc. It played fine out of the box with the exception of the strings being undoubtedly low quality. The controls all work smoothly and the finish and fit look great.

First time, I did "no opinion" because I hadn't had the first one very long before posting the review, but now it's got a little time in with me, and based on the first one, I believe it will hold up well for a long time overall as far as body and neck, etc., electronics, I'm still not sure, but then electronics are always fixable or replaceable.
As for gigging, my rating doesn't not pertain to that at all as I do not think of any travel guitar as something I would play out, it's just not it's intended purpose.

Again, "no opinion" on this because I have not dealt with Aria at all.
This second guitar did come with a defect though. Something was rattling around inside when I took it out of the box and the amp did not work at all, so I sent it back to Musician's Friend and they replaced it with the one I am reviewing here. So for customer support, I can only say in reference to MF, and their customer support was very good.

As usual, I'm not wasting anyone's time geting into my history of guitar playing and listing all my guitars - who cares.
But for this guitar, I have bumped up my overall rating after having had the first one longer now. It's a nice little travel guitar, nice looking, nice playing, and even the distortion sound, I can get used to - overall, it serves the purpose it was intended for, a nice smaller little guitar to carry about for practice.
Would I replace it if anything happened to it? I don't have to worry about it now since I have two. Of course some may wonder why I bought two, especially if I said earlier I think it will last me a long time. I bought this second one because I have wanted a decent little travel guitar for years. Some out there are way too high priced for a small travel guitar, and the ones that aren't, for various reasons, I was not impressed. Them MF dropped the price on this guitar another ten bucks, and something could happen to the first, damaged, stolen, who knows - I did know that it was obviously a travel guitar that was going to be history at some point and I would have a heck of time finding another one later on, so I went ahead and bought the second one so I wouldn't have to worry about it.
Personally, I'm very happy with this guitar, I can't say much more than that.

brand new. china. 22 frets. won't bore ya with the rest. i got the red w/ white pick guard.

out of the box it didn't sound great. with just headphones, sounded ok. But, we're talking about an 89 dollar guitar. unfortunately, after jamming about 5 minutes the built in amp started cutting in and out, and finally, just noise. tried the headphones again, and sounded the same thing through the headphones. this is why it earned a 1 in this category. The thing i need to mention about this guitar is this - if i were a good with electronics, i would have replaced that part of the guitar, and would have been very happy.

pretty much, the action was hilarious out of the box. i went through the usual routine of tightening screws and nuts, changing the strings, battery, pickup height, etc. But...it was a good playing guitar after a few adjustments. the neck was super fast. frets were smooth. guitar felt solid.

you might could gig with it. but your buddies and rival bands might laugh at you, because it's so small and toyish looking. The hardware wasn't great, but i think it suffices for a practice guitar. Strap buttons are ok. I could not depend on it unless i put it through an electronics overhaul.

i will return this one to musician's friend. they are pretty cool about returns if they know it broke on you as soon as you started jamming.

overall? i am going to go ahead and give it a 5, because if the electronics would have been even decent, i would have loved it for practice and travelling. i shouldn't have put my faith in an 89 dollar guitar. Man, if Aria would put some time into improving the amp, these things would sell out.

Alder Body, Maple Bolt-on Neck, Rosewood Fingerboard, 22F Frets, Scale: 610mm (24"), Pickups: 1 OS-1 Single Coil, VF-1 Bridge Tailpiece (strings through the body), Chrome Hardware, amp jack for external amp and headphone jack, Controls: 1 Volume - 1 tone - 1 power switch, built-in speaker, onboard amp powered by a 9-volt battery, gig bag, strap, amp cord and 2 allen wrenches.

Let me say right off, that I have only had this guitar a few days, but I've been playing with it as much as possible to get a review on here. The reason is because when I was thinking about buying it, I could find absolutely no info on it. I found it for sale a few places (Musician's Friend being the cheapest), all with the same brief generic listing of features, but could find nothing for info otherwise. So though this is a very early review, it will give other potential buyers a little something more than the generic features list otherwise available.

Okay, this guitar gets a very low rating (2), which would be lower except for the fact it sounds like any other electric guitar played acoustically, so that gives it something.
If you like playing everything with distortion, hey, then give this guitar a 10, because it does that well, problem is, that's all it does. You can NOT get a clean sound out of this guitar to save your life (except turned off).
Wait, I might have to take this back. This guitar can be plugged into a regular amp, and maybe, with enough playing around with the settings on the amp, you might be able to clean up the sound. I have not tried it. This is a travel guitar, I have no intention of playing it through a regular amp, so have only tested it the way I will use it.
The guitar also has a jack for headphones, and playing it through the headphones, the distortion didn't seem quite as bad, but still very definitely there. So that tells me it is the pickup. What kind of single coil pickup it is, I don't know, I don't see a name. I have had, and do have single coil pickup guitars that do not have this distortion. And I played with the single volume and tone knobs extensively, trying desperately to get a clean sound. I almost got it once, but not quite, ended up with a very low volume, muddy sound in order to kill some of the distortion.
Perhaps someday, I'll see about getting something else in there for a pickup, maybe not.
It's a shame really, as it's the only thing I really found lacking in this guitar - other than the crappy strings it came with (like so many guitars).

Everything in this category was excellent, the finish, the fit and the action. This guitar comes in about a half dozen colors, though most places that carried it seemed to only have black or red, I got the red which looks very good.
Very nice, unflawed finish, everything nicely put together, tight, no gaps where parts join, nothing loose, all very good.
The action was good, no problems there, no rough edges on the frets, pickup seems properly adjusted. The neck is slightly thinner than I'm used to, but that's nothing against the guitar, it's just different, as it often is when you get a new guitar.
Really not much more to say here, because it all appears good (which makes the sound thing more of a shame).

I'm leaving this "no opinion" because, as stated, I haven't had it long enough to know that, but will tell you what I think so far.
My early opinion is that it will probably hold up quite well. It seems solidly put together from the start. One of the questions for this section is the strap buttons, and yes, they appear to be solid and safe, though I don't expect to be using them. I pretty much figure this guitar for sitting down relaxing, just sort of playing around and practicing. And it is good for that, fits very comfortably, sitting back in my easy chair playing this guitar.
I don't gig, so can make no reference to that. I think it will be dependable for what I plan to use it for.

Again, I can only offer "no opinion" for this as I have not had any reason to contact the company about this guitar.
Though I do plan on writing them about the distortion sound as it really is a shame, they'd have a winning little travel guitar here if not for that. It will be interesting to see their response, though I don't expect much since going to their website and not seeing this guitar in their "catalog". Since Musician's Friend had it on clearance, and it's not in Aria's current "catalog", I'm guessing they don't make it any more.

Okay, I'm going to take this line by line (by Harmony Centrals list of things to write);

First, I've been playing guitar since about 1976, as to what I have had, or have, in guitars, who cares? When I read these reviews, I don't care about the writer's other guitars, just in finding out about the one I'm reading the review about. Suffice to say, since '76, I have owned and played a wide variety of guitars.

As for something I wish I had asked, couldn't really ask. I didn't figure I'd get any info from Aria since it's apparently not a current model. As mentioned, I searched for info, and could find none.

If it were stolen or lost, yes, I think I would replace it, especially at this price (more than a 100.oo, I'd probably have to think about it, again, only because of the sound), but that will depend on how much it bugs me in the long run that I can't get a clean sound out of it.

What do I love about it? The looks, the size, the "fit" and comfort when sitting and playing it, the fact that it does seem very well put together and is playable for an adult, unlike many "smaller" guitars.
What do I hate about it? Bet you know the answer to this - the sound.

I did compare this to other travel guitars. Many of the other ones seemed either too cheap and cheasy, or way too expensive for what I wanted to spend on a travel guitar. I whittled it down to two I was torn between, this one, and the Hofner "Shorty" guitar. I really liked the Hofner because it seemed even a bit smaller with a full size neck, but reading the reviews, there just seemed to be too many problems. Many of the owners were able to correct the problems, but I don't want to buy something new I have to fix right off.
Finally finding some dimensions on this guitar, told me it was smaller than I thought just looking at the pictures (35" long and 10" at the widest part of the body), so I just took a chance on this one even though I could find no info about it.

Anything else I wish it had? Yeah, a better, non-distortion pickup, probably a humbucker would have been real nice.

Anything else? Yeah, a couple things. Of course, my one disappointment with this guitar, has been obvious throughout this
review - the sound. It is very disappointing, especially since every other aspect of the guitar seems very good so far.
Why that would make this so distortion is the only sound you can get out of it.......I just don't get it.

The strap and amp cord that come with the guitar are cheap, but I don't see myself using either. I bought a 3 foot amp cord to keep in the bag to hook up to an electronic tuner. The gig bag looks to be protective enough, but the accessories pocket on the front of the bag definitely could have been bigger. I have the three foot cable, strap, a tiny zip lock bag of picks and a very small electronic tuner in the pocket, and it's a VERY snug fit. You can plug regular headphones into this guitar (like you would use for a portable CD player), but I could never fit headphones in this pocket, unless maybe it was one of those annoying, tiny, foldup little ones.

Because of the pickup, I couldn't give this section a high rating, which is a shame because the rest of the package deserves a higher rating.