Caramel CAG28 Curly Acacia Concert Ukulele - REVIEW

As part of my wish to feature more affordable ukuleles on the reviews bench this year, I grabbed this one from a brand I've looked at before. It's the Caramel CAG 28 Curly Acacia Concert Ukulele.

And this is also an 'Amazon' ukulele, meaning an instrument that you really don't see in many other places and has the usual listing with an impossibly high number of 5 star reviews. I regularly dip my toe into Amazon ukuleles for the simple reason that, whilst I don't recommend them as a place to buy ukes, many people DO and it seems only right that those 5 star reviews are 'tested' more fairly. That's not to say all Amazon offerings are terrible - I first encountered Enya that way, and one or two others have shown a bit of promise like Donner. As for Caramel, well less so.. they've had three outings on Got A Ukulele and all have been distinctly average with some issues that gave them low scores. Lets see how this one fares.

SUMMARY VIDEO REVIEW

The Caramel CAG series seems to come in three flavours of all laminate concert ukes. You can choose either a dark ebony model (complete with Ovation rip off leaf soundhole design), a plainer red African mahogany model or this, the CAG28 curly acacia model. They are all double bout instruments with the modern ultra rounded larger lower bout which is very popular these days. And yes, to be fair, the laminate acacia here is somewhat curly. It's not the most striking example i've seen, but i'm not calling Trade Descriptions on them - it's pretty enough.. so far.

The bridge is not specified, but looks to me like a 'techwood' or possibly paper composite. It's jet black and shaped in an attractive asymmetric style which is different but still manages to look a touch scruffy. It's a pin style with plastic bridge pins and the unspecified saddle looks like plastic to me with a straight top. And here is my first alarm bell. The saddle is seated very low into the bridge indeed. Now that's fine if you need to raise the string action as you can easily put a shim under it, but if we find the strings need to come down, I am not sure there is much hope here as you'd then effectively be running the strings over the bridge mount. Not good. Anyway, spacing here is 41mm.

On to the finish and decoration and you don't get much. There is no edge binding meaning you see the laminate wood in cross section, and the sound hole gets an abalone ring. The body gets a gloss finish and before I give you my opinion I thought I would share what the Caramel marketing says...

"CAG28 features a unique glossy finish that sets them apart from standard ukuleles. Similar to the meticulous process used for piano lacquer finishes, each ukulele goes through multiple rounds of careful polishing. The result is a stunning, durable and glossy appearance that catches the eye..."

What the Got A Ukulele opinion says is this. It's thick, it's gloopy, it's rippling in places due to poor application and there are flaws in various spots. Don't you love marketing speak? I often put up ultra close up macro shots on the socials in advance of videos and I always say that macro photography brings out every little flaw and can make even a high end Kanile'a look scruffy in the right light. In this case though, the scruffiness was real... You may notice it in some shots, but this is not a good finish and when looked at obliquely in certain lights it turns kind of milky rather than translucent.

Inside is tidy to be fair, with regular thin braces and notched linings and not much mess I can see.

The neck wood isn't specified but is glossed and made of three pieces with visible joints in the heel and headstock. It's also your usual Chinese broom handle profile at the nut with a 35mm width and 27mm string spacing. Meh... not for me.

That is topped with an unspecified material for the fretboard which again could be techwood. I can honestly say though, other than on those £20 brightly painted junk ukuleles this is probably one of the worst conditioned fingerboards I have seen. I am not sure if it is just horribly dry or whether it is covered with remnants of polish they have not removed, but some fret spaces are almost milky white.  It's easily fixed with wire wool, but.... ugh... I don't want to touch it.

It comes with 18 frets joined at the 14th, and it's edge bound in something dark to hide the ends. In a surprise to me though, none of them are sharp, even at the upper end even if the dressing does look rudimentary. Fair play I guess. Outward position markers are inlaid in pearl at the 5th, 7th, 10th, 12th and 15th in flowery motifs which are nice to look at but totally spoiled by the poor finish on the wood they are sat in. They are paired with side dots at the same places.

Beyond the nut, which looks like plastic, is a slot head which I always think look too big on instruments smaller than tenors. It's faced in something glossy black and carries the Caramel logo in a greeting card sticker. BUT... unlike Martin, at least they glossed over it so there is no risk from clip on tuners. Who'd have thought it... Caramel beat Martin on a design feature! Sadly though the finish on the headstock otherwise is poor - scratches and polish remnants on the black edges, carving marks inside the slots that look like they were done with a hammer drill.. oh dear...

The tuners are specified by Caramel as 'Premium tuning machines' and are in black and, naturally side mounted. They look pretty generic to me, but I have seen worse and they work ok to be fair.

Finishing things off are the usual Amazon 'kitchen sink'. Firstly you get what Caramel call 'Carbon Fiber' strings which I presume is a 'lost in translation' thing meaning fluorocarbon. You get two strap buttons, a half decent padded bag, picks, spare strings, a strap, picks, cloth, bridge pin puller (and spare pins) and a clip on tuner. And (bearing in mind dynamic pricing) these are on Amazon at £99.99 at the time of review. That's above some of the cheapest you see on Amazon, but in the scale of all ukuleles out there it's still at the lower end.

So very much a mixed bag here. An overall attractive enough looking uke (at a distance) with a nice shape and some wood grain interest, but let down by some truly agricultural finishing... Though of course these things are less important if it plays well enough and sounds nice. Let's dive in.

Firstly, back to that bridge and 'Houston we 'may' have a problem'. I measure the action at the 12th fret here to be about 2.75mm. Now that is within what I would call 'normal levels' but it is on the high side. That doesn't mean it is not playable, but if you wanted to take it down (and I would) I think you are out of luck with that saddle. Add to that the fact that over time ukes to move and bend a bit, and if that neck started to move under string tension, pushing the strings higher still then you really will have an issue. At the nut on the other hand the action is what I would call low to the point I will be listening out for string buzz. The conclusion - something is not right here for me..... There simply can't be if you need the saddle to be THAT low to get, at best, a 2.7mm action. Hmmmm. Otherwise it's also quite a hefty uke for a concert at 665g though it does balance ok.

Basics first - volume and sustain. Sadly neither are out of the park here. Whilst this is not a truly quiet instrument it's not got that much punch and is distinctly average. Sustain too, whilst not totally staccato is average to short. Neither of those things will make for a really enjoyable playing experience.

Tone wise when strummed I find this far to thin sounding for my ears and the lack of volume allows any real 'pep'. It's not an offensive tone I suppose, but I just have little more to say on this style of play because it is so one dimensional!

Fingerpicking is a nicer sound, with a delicate chime that seems to intonate well up the fretboard. But again, when you have shorter sustain there isn't a great deal of expression you can get out of it and again I am short of words on how to describe it other than 'basic'.

I repeat though, it's not an offensive tone at all, and I have heard a LOT worse in Amazon ukes, but it's still extremely generic sounding with no real character. It sounds like a basic uke. I suppose that is what it is, but i've heard better at £100...

So another average one for Caramel. Nice to look at from a distance, very much less so when close up with some terrible finishing. And then a bit of a let down on the sound too which, whilst not horrible is quite easily beaten for the ticket price.

Meh....

Caramel CAG28 Amazon UK

UKULELE SPECS ROUNDUP

Model: Caramel CAG28

Scale: Concert

Body: Laminate curly acacia

Bridge: Unspecified pin bridge

Saddle: Plastic

Spacing at saddle: 41mm

Finish: Gloss

Neck: Unspecified

Fingerboard: Unspecified

Frets: 18, 14 to body
Nut: Plastic

Nut width: 35mm, 27mm G to A

Tuners: Open gears

Strings: Unbranded fluorocarbon

Extras: Gig bag, strap button, spare strings, clip on tuner, strap, cloth, picks, bridge pin puller and spare pins
Weight: 665g

Country of origin: China

Price:£99.99

UKULELE PROS

Nice enough body looks

Well dressed frets

Inoffensive tone I suppose

Cheap

UKULELE CONS

Gloopy gloss finish

Rough finishing on bridge

Very low saddle - something wrong
Horrible fingerboard finishing

Poor finish on headstock

Average volume and sustain

Thin strummed tone

Generic

UKULELE SCORES

Looks - 8 out of 10

Fit and finish - 6 out of 10

Sound - 7 out of 10

Value for money - 8 out of 10

OVERALL UKULELE SCORE - 7.3 out of 10

UKULELE VIDEO REVIEW

© Barry Maz

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