Best PA Systems for Acoustic Guitar and Vocals (Solo Acoustic Gigs)

Bose is one of the best-sounding audio brands in the market today. Everything from their belt-clip Bluetooth speakers to the largest PA systems sounds outstanding. Well, the S1 Pro+ is just another link in that chain, making the legend bigger.

Is it perfect? Well, no, but it’s an amazing option, let me tell you why.

The Bose S1 Pro+ is a battery-operated 150-watt portable, powerful, great-sounding piece of equipment that’s ideal for the busker, the working musician, the DJ, and the public speaker. The cabinet design is just beyond clever. You can use it as a tilt-back floor wedge, monitor, or even mount it on a speaker stand.

I set it up like a wedge and plugged in my acoustic guitar on channel two and my vocals on channel one. Let me tell you that this thing can very well fill the room with sound. It’s like a “surround” thing going on; it doesn’t feel like a single speaker.

The mic preamp is great; my vocals through a simple Shure SM58 sounded pristine yet round and powerful. Although there are no noise reduction capabilities, the 2-band EQ became quite helpful to get rid of low rumble and high-end squeals.

Speaking of this, the knobs are a bit too sensitive for my taste. Doing little on-the-fly modifications can be quite difficult since you go from 0 to 100 quite rapidly. I found that the free app that comes with the speaker is wonderful for making those modifications more accurately. But it involves using your cellphone.

Also, on the not-so-good side, there’s no phantom power available, and Bluetooth has no separate volume control; you either push it all up or nothing up. That’s kind of annoying, but you can handle it with the volume control of the original source.

I played many songs like Tom Petty’s “Free Falling,” and every salesclerk’s favorite, “Wonderwall,” and it all sounded like a record. You don’t need anything other than this portable PA and a couple of cables to set up and play on the spot, wherever you are. Oh, and if you bring your laptop and a USB cable, you can even record yourself using the S1 like an audio interface.

The battery is advertised to last 11 hours, and it lasted a solid 5 hours while I was testing it (and playing Wonderwall in a loop, LOL).

So, if you’re after great ease of use, light weight, superior sound quality, and power, this is a great candidate.

In other words, if it fits your budget, try one out before you buy.

JBL is one of the biggest audio brands in the world. Every time I’m playing somewhere and see their orange logo, it brings comfort to my soul that it’s going to sound amazing.

This battery-powered 120-watt EON One JBL speaker is a great cordless audio source. Although it’s advertised to be the loudest in its class, in my opinion, it’s not louder than the competition. What it does have is a little push in the lows and the lower-mids that DJs and bass players will appreciate a lot. This is because of the special-design 8”. For the definition of the mids and highs, the unit comes with a very capable 1” HF driver.

I know, it sounds pretty on paper, but what does it sound like?

To begin my test, I set it up as a floor wedge and plugged my guitar into the Line channel, a microphone on the first channel, and another on the second channel. The mic preamps were absolutely amazing; the sound was pristine, powerful, and round. The line input features a Hi-Z impedance, making my guitar feel and sound more organic.

Also, the available reverb and 2-band EQ were great to add more depth and some magic to the overall sound. All effects are by Lexicon, which is quite amazing too. I did some very cool versions of “Hotel California” and “Road Trippin’,” and they sounded perfect; the two vocals were defined and smooth in the final mix.

The one thing I couldn’t believe, though, was that when hooking two of these together through Bluetooth, the analog instruments only play on the host speaker. This means you can’t use it as a stereo PA when doing a gig! That said, for a solo gig, the standalone unit is more than enough for a small venue.

Let me say that this is a very versatile PA system that comes with some unique perks like the intelligent Ducking control that lowers the volume of music when it detects your voice. In the same vein, having phantom power and two USB outlets to charge devices makes this speaker as handy as it can be.

What I didn’t like was the fading green light used to signal battery life and the value for each knob. I mean, I get it that digital knobs save space and all, but for stage use, analog knobs can’t be beat.

This is a must-try for those after a reliable, powerful yet portable battery-powered PA.

Electro Voice is a synonym for high-end audio equipment. You can find their logo on any size of stage around the world. This is the first product they have released for this kind of use, and it holds perfectly with the rest of their catalog.

But don’t let me get ahead of myself. Let’s start from the beginning.

This is a very powerful, battery-powered speaker with an 8” speaker and a 1” titanium driver. It’s built like a tank, and it can withstand the hardships of weather and the road. Furthermore, it comes with a plastic heavy-duty cover for the controls, and a rain cover so you can perform outdoors even when light rain is falling.

One thing I have to say is that this is a very capable and powerful speaker, but it doesn’t fill the room. Yes, it sounds closer to what a regular speaker would do instead of dispersing the sound in a broader sense to capture the whole audience. That’s something to note because it can be a game-changer, especially in a small room.

That said, the number of features they managed to pack in such a small vessel is outstanding. To begin with, it has a full DSP effects factory with chorus, delay, reverbs, and more. You can even activate those effects via footswitch, which I think is cool and handy. Also, the master volume knob next to the screen is just perfect for on-the-fly changes.

What’s not so handy is the tiny screen to handle the entire thing. From there, you can access ducking, noise reduction, phantom power, and EQ, but it’s a total bummer if you’re not into apps or screens. At least I found it quite annoying to go into the menu to touch any parameter.

Besides that, another thing to bear in mind is that this PA underlines and highlights the solo-performer idea because it’s good for one instrument and one voice. You could also plug in an external sound source, but that’s it.

I plugged in guitar and vocals, and the result was an oh-my-God sound. Yes, it’s that good in terms of sound quality after tweaking the thing from the app. I played hard things like “Revelation Blues” and simple songs like “The Same Boy You’ve Always Known,” and the guitar was tight, expressive, organic, and natural. The vocals, with a bit of delay and reverb, had just the right depth to convey emotions.

If it fits your budget, then it’s important that you try it, because the Everse 8 is an amazing piece of gear.

The Roland BA-330 is one of the many pieces of gear Roland makes that outdoes all contemporaries upon release and also endures the test of time. When it came out in 2009, there was nothing like it in the market, and it still is a worthy competitor for the pole position.

What’s the thing that makes you understand the age of this design? Well, the need to employ 8 AA batteries to use it without plugging it into the wall socket. Another way to prove it is to go for the 16-year-old promotional video.

The Mackie Thump GO is definitely a beast. I don’t say this because it sounds super loud; on the contrary, it’s on the quieter side, but it does shine when it comes to the dynamics, the clarity, and the punch.

But let’s start from the beginning. I plugged in, just like with every other model on this list, my acoustic guitar and a SM58 microphone to check out what I need the most: the basics. Well, it was an unpleasant surprise because this unit has anemic preamps. You need either a mixer to have enough volume for busking or a guitar with a very good built-in preamp to push the sound forward.

Once I changed guitars to one with a powerful Fishman preamp and cranked the thing, I was blown away. I mean, the sound! The high-end has the ultra-high rolled off, so it feels like it’s musical, with a pinch of warmth, and the right amount of midrange and bottom end. This comes as no surprise since Mackie is top-class in everything they do. Yet, seriously, when pushed a bit from the instrument, this portable, battery-operated PA gives you back unmatched sound.

Moreover, the unit comes with four different modes to accommodate different situations, and they are very useful. For example, I discovered speech mode is great for acoustic gigs because the compression and feedback suppression help shape vocals and the guitar sound.

Also, the outdoor function helps tame the lows and project the highs, which is perfect for sound loss in open spaces. No, I didn’t drag the clerk and the speaker out of the shop, but I did try it inside, and the change was noticeable. Same when you use it in Monitor mode. It’s tailored to eliminate the low rumble when the speaker is in contact with the floor, so it helps hearing yourself better without noise.

Speaking of which, the feedback eliminator is quite helpful to avoid low, booming noises and high-pitched squeals coming from the guitar. I just wish the mic input had a phantom power switch.

Other than that, and the fact that you can stream to a second Thump with BT but can’t hear your voice through the second speaker (it only comes out from the host speaker), this PA is outstanding.

If it fits your budget, you just can’t go wrong with it. Oh, and you can do everything with the free app except turn it ON and OFF.

This is a straight-to-the-bone, no-nonsense piece of equipment made for the working musician who wants results, affordability, and reliability.

Well, in case you didn’t know, Behringer is a European giant that has been making outrageously affordable gear that’s not top-of-the-crop in terms of craftsmanship, materials, and specs, but that will get the job done without bells and whistles night after night (or morning after morning if you play coffee shops like me).

There are two inputs with universal jacks to fit ¼” and XLR cables. These inputs come with a dedicated volume level for each and feature microphone preamps. The third channel is dedicated to Auxiliary inputs and Bluetooth connectivity. It has a dedicated volume as well and an old-school RCA connection to dust off that old CD player or turntable.

I went straight in with a microphone and a guitar, set everything at noon, and, although I wasn’t blown away by the way this sounds, I could see myself playing through this PA anytime, especially with my Martin. Let me put it this way: if you plug in a good instrument with a decent preamp and a good microphone (like a SM58), the Behringer MPA40BT will give your audience a faithful representation of your sound.

I mean, don’t expect it to sound like a Bose or a Mackie; there are no stellar, organic high-end or warm, defined, and round bottom-end. It sounds flatter and with less dynamics, but it also costs maybe 1/3 of what you’d pay for the other models.

I played everything from “Blackbird” on a nylon-string guitar to a powerful version of “We Won’t Get Fooled Again,” and “Wild Horses,” and it all sounded just fine.

Could it use some reverb or effects to sound prettier? Well, of course, that would be very nice, but this is a bare-basics PA system that’s rechargeable, easy to use, and that offers everything you need for a stellar performance.

The rest, of course, is up to you!