Carry-on By Blackstar Mini Jet Black Electric Guitar – Perfect for Kids and Adults, Beginners and Travel

Honestly have no idea how this thing only has an average of 3.8*, at the discounted price it is the most fun you can have for £100 and even at 149 it'd be a steal.It is beautifully made, very high quality feel given it's their cheaper model! The neck particularly is beautiful, easy and fast to play and has a solid quality to it. I don't experience the flex problems of other reviews at all, but you can do a certain amount of neck bend if you fancy seeing what SG players are on about.It has an adjustable bridge to set intonation so maybe some aren't set up so well out of the box?You do need to give the strings a good stretch as with any new setup before the tuning will hold, but it's rock solid when it does.As for the sound, paired with a Vox G2 Mini 3, it blew me away. The clean sound is nice, but hey I have acoustics for that. The crunchy sound is great and bluesy, but the metal sounds are where it's at - it absolutely rocks. I mean that combo packs a serious punch that's hilarious coming from such a tiny setup. The tone dial gives a range from really very smooth to wall of noise, and the sustain for such a small body low end model is fantastic.I've played acoustic exclusively for about 20 years because I got so fed up with the weight and faff of an electric setup and this has made it fun again.

I had previously bought the bass version and it was brilliant. I saw this come up for 99 quid on prime day so thought why not? It is smaller than the bass. But the frets are nice and it's easy to play chords etc. the pick up is a mighty beast. The action is a little high on delivery so needs a little adjustment. Used with a multi pedal you can get a decent range of sounds. the overdriven are the best. It is not so great at jangly sounds, but there are some single coils travel guitars available if you want that. At the normal price of £160 ish maybe not the best buy of this type, but then I have not tried the Vox ones or some of the others.

There's a bit of confusion over what it is so I'll clear it up.If you search online you'll find the Blackstar Carry-On. This is not that one. That one retails about £300+ is carved entirely out one piece of wood, had a painted front with bound body and neck and a push/pull volume knob for coil splitting.This on is the Blackstar Carry-On Mini and the name is where the confusion is because people think this is smaller. It's not, the dimensions, body shape and neck scale length are all the same but it's bolt on neck and a fully poly painted body.Now on with the review. The humbucker has some meat but will do cleaner tones. I've had the backplate off and it's alpha pots and humbucker has the four wires so you can fit a push pull pot if you want.The neck feels like a full size guitar, I'd say like a thinner modern Gibson LP. It's light, really light and it's just a joy. Fretwork is perfect though I'd say the need a polish. They're shiney but on bends you can feel friction but they're all level and well crowned. I've seen comments about the 1:14 ratio tuners by people without the guitar in their hand as that ratio usually says cheap but you have to remember these are small tuners so smaller ratio makes sense.I've honestly practiced and played more since I got it than I have in such a long time. I've take it to work, it's easy to just sit with and it stays in tune. I love the thing.The one negative I have is the control knobs, they look great and are quality, sort of a Gibson style top hat/speed knob hybrid with numbers lensing through clear plastic but they're soft rounded out and very slippy. They might be perfect for you but I prefer the telecaster metal types from the more expensive model so I've got some on order.Btw, no gigbag or case but the short scale means the instrument is the same length as a Baritone Ukulele so it fits gigbag for those or a hardcase if you're willing to put a bit of furniture foam in.

I'm very sad that this purchase didn't work out. I use a small, short scale acoustic guitar (Lukas Brunner B-Compact) which I love and hoped this would complement it very well. I don't feel comfortable with full sized guitars any more.The format is excellent, it looks and feels great, there's a proper grown up guitarist's neck, just shorter. Definitely not a child's guitar. It's just what I've been looking for for quite a long time.But there were tuning problems that I just could not sort out despite being quite an experienced guitarist, with a good ear. There has been at least one other review saying the same thing. You get the strings all set up nicely in tune, the intonation seems to be OK on the upper frets then you start playing and it sounds awful.After a couple of days experiment I found the reason. The guitar is flexing like mad. Strum a chord, apply the slightest pressure to the neck and it's like a tremolo. It is a lighter cheaper version of the original Blackstar Carry On guitar which has rave reviews (and nearly three times the price) but it feels like they've compromised way too much.I can't comment on the sound as I was only playing it through a small powered PA speaker to test. It didn't sound ideal but I'm sure that can be sorted with the right amp or preamp and some attention to the pickup. But I didn't get that far. Maybe I'm expecting too much from a £120 guitar when I'm playing a much more expensive acoustic but stiffness and decent intonation seems to be a basic requirement.