GS-Travel Mahogany : Lovely, sweet little guitar

I bought this to play lounging on my sofa, laying on my bed or outside in the garden.

Out of the box, it's very playable - I haven't changed anything.

The mahogany gives a warmth to the sound, which I like. On a guitar body this small I don't think you'd need the brighter sound of a spruce top - I haven't tried the spruce version though.

Mine has a closely grained mahogany top rather than the more striped look of the one in the pictures - mine looks lovely. It's pretty light weight - ideal for what I bought it for. It sounds and projects much better than you'd think from the size (and price).

If I hadn't bought a CLA-15m soon after I'd be picking this up all the time - as it is, I pick it up a lot.

It has clarity, punch and warmth that are way above it's size and price tag.

Now the big question - is it as good as the Taylor? I have no idea, I've never played one. But it's the wrong question and missing the point; For the likely intended uses of this guitar, it's as good as you need.

Don't get me wrong - it sounds good, it plays well and it's fun to play. But do you really need to pay over £500 for a travel/sofa guitar?

It's hard to justify that unless you're recording with it a lot (to cut through the mix - and this will do the job). Or maybe want a smaller scale instrument for a child/teen. You could buy this and get two custom line acoustics (Harley Bentons) for that money - I know which I'd prefer and that's exactly what I've done.

Tuners - they do their job. People complain about a lot of new guitars not holding their tuning but it's just because they haven't bedded the strings in - (pull them away from the guitar 3-4 times, tune the string back up, do this 3 times for each string - you'll now hold your tuning). Speaking of which - when I tried that on this guitar the peg came off on the lower E string - I'm not bothered; I put it back in and developed a method of pulling the string parallel to the body, which works fine.

Construction is fine - don't expect bone nuts and bridge saddles at this price.

It's very neat and tidy, rather attractive and I love the curve on the back.

I have an old Martin travel guitar - I never play it. This is so much better - it's a proper guitar, just a bit smaller and light weight.

For the price it's a bargain - it even comes with a neat little gig bag.

If you want a full blown acoustic, I'd recommend one of the custom line ones. But I have plenty of guitars and I can't resist this little beauty - it gets far more of my attention than the price would suggest.

You know you want one.