The ubiquitous iPod, third party developers everywhere are scrambling for the next thing into which eager consumers can cram their shiny Apple toys. Clothing is manufactured with iPockets, radios have iPod bays and at least one car now has a connection for an iPod. People are making up silly internet words like “Podcasting” to make the act of downloading an MP3 seem cool and connected to the iPod frenzy. I don’t own an iPod and I wasn’t planning on buying one until I saw the iCoustic guitar. This is either the coolest thing ever or the most desperate attempt to link a piece of equipment with a popular craze.

Guitar shops are funny places that seem to exist outside the normal space-time continuum. I’ve been going to guitar shops since the mid 1980’s to ogle all that fancy equipment and maybe play some high end guitars. It’s always the same thing: you walk through the doors and are instantly accosted by the haltingly played opening bars of “Stairway to Heaven.” It’s never the whole song either; I think it is some inviolable natural law that dictates if any greasy haired chubby guy in a guitar shop were to play, or even know how to play, all of Stairway to Heaven that a great rip would appear in the fabric of space and time just above Robert Plant’s house. The iCoustic guitar is a Martin acoustic travel guitar with a built-in mini amplifier and a speaker where the hole would normally be. You can plug in your iPod and jam along with illegally downloaded MP3s or chain two guitars together in series.

iCoustic claims that the speaker does not detract from the sound or playability of the guitar, and with the amplifier powered up it actually makes for a richer sound beyond the normally subdued travel guitar. So now perhaps many of the iPod faithful will take up guitar playing; at least enough to keep Robert Plant glancing nervously at the sky.

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