Jordan Rudess is best known as the keyboardist for prog-metal icons Dream Theater, but did you know he’s also a budding (and rather incredible) guitar player? And given his predilection for far-out, cutting-edge sounds, it’s hardly surprising that when it comes to guitars, he’s a big fan of LAVA MUSIC’s revolutionary LAVA ME 3 acoustic-electric.
“To me, it makes a whole lot of sense,” he says of the LAVA ME 3.
As most guitarists know by now, LAVA MUSIC boasts a range of innovative acoustic-electric guitars that combine top-notch sound with modern construction approaches and technology-forward features. But none of the company’s offerings are quite as head-turning as their LAVA ME 3, the best-selling acoustic-electric amongst LAVA MUSIC’s smart series.
The radical model boasts a three-and-a-half-inch multi-touch display screen that aims to make the guitar “as intuitive as a smartphone,” and we’d say the LAVA ME 3 achieves this and more, adding in effect pedals, a looper, a tuner, an audio recorder and other tools, all housed in a lightweight and travel-friendly carbon fiber-built body.
At the heart of the LAVA ME 3 is its proprietary HILAVA operating system, which supports Wi-Fi and Bluetooth, cross-device syncing, and enhances its empowering apps through constant updates.
Notable apps in the guitar include Effects – empowered by 50 audio algorithms – which lets users visually tweak a range of onboard sound effects, each of them powered by LAVA MUSIC’s FreeBoost 2.0 and easily customizable, and Loops, which contains a library of built-in grooves of different music genres and supports overdubbing up to three tracks continuously.
You also get a Practice app with five practice modes that offers instant feedback to playing and detailed report after practice; a Tuner app with support for alternate tunings; a Tempo app where you can set BPMs by scrolling or tap-tempo, and which offers four different click sounds; and a Recorder app for easy recording and editing of song ideas.
In fact, Rudess reveals in the above conversation with Guitar World Tech Editor Paul Riario at this year’s NAMM convention, “The demo that I’m doing at NAMM, I actually have my backing track file in the guitar, which is really fun.”
Which, Rudess continues, speaks to the truly innovative nature of the LAVA ME 3. “It actually does more than one would think,” he says. “You pick it up and you go, ‘Oh, it’s got built-in effects and chorus and reverbs and flangers and all this stuff. Then you start scrolling and you go, ‘Wait a minute – I can message somebody over this thing?’ Or, ‘I can choose these drum loops?’ ‘I can upload my file to the cloud?’ It’s pretty crazy. The more time I spend with it, the more time I’m going, ‘Wow, this thing’s awesome!’ ”
To spend some time with the LAVA ME 3 yourself, head to LAVA MUSIC.
