2024 Vintage Guitars VSA500B | An affordable take on the Gibson 335... with Bigsby! Review & Demo

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This is the Vintage VSA500B: the brand's affordable take on the Gibson 335 semi-acoustic style of guitar with added Bigsby!

Vintage VSA500B ReIssued Semi Acoustic Guitar w/Bigsby in Gun Hill Blue:

Well, I say affordable, but this is actually one of the more expensive Vintage guitars in their 2024 catalogue, with an RRP of £699. However, you get an awful lot for your money, like the B70 officially licencsed Bigsby, a pair of Wilkinson WOCHB vintage-voiced humbuckers, Grover tuners and a Graph Tech nut.

The VSA500's sizeable semi-hollow body is maple - finsihed in a lovely Gun Hill Blue - and the neck is a one-piece mahogany affair with a 12" radius rosewood fingerboard and 22 medium jumbo frets.

All this said, what we should have here is a great alternative to a Gibson or Epiphone 335 guitar... but how does the VSA500B stack up? That’s what we’re about to find out! In the video, I put the guitar through its paces in as many different genres and styles as I can, from country, folk and indie, to pop, rock, punk, metal and more, and I also give the Bigsby a bit of a whirl. And yes, you'll hear that I am a total beginner when it comes to the Bigsby ;)

Here are some links to the various playing samples and info bits:

00:00 Hello!
00:18 Introduction to the Vintage VSA500B
02:01 Specs and info
04:04 Today’s rig and plan

Clean Sounds
05:05 Clean tone reference chords on all pickup settings
05:21 Country ballad arpeggios
05:35 Country lead sound
05:41 Country strummed chords
06:02 Blues progression
06:15 Neo soul pop riff
06:28 Funk rhythms
06:42 Grunge pop droning chords
07:01 Cowboy chords/tone control test
08:02 Ascending droning indie chords

Clean Sounds with added reverb: Bigsby testing!
08:16 Soul pop riff
08:32 Duane Eddy riff
08:47 Atmospheric indie pop riff
09:03 Bigsby w/harmonics
09:25 Modern blues riff
09:44 Single string Bigsby bends

Overdriven Sounds
10:06 Kings Of Leon inspired riff
10:12 Fat indie rock rhythm chords
10:44 Garage rock riff
11:00 Droning indie open string riff
11:12 Southern rock picked arpeggios
11:23 Upbeat indie barre chords
11:47 Volume control roll off test
12:09 Anthemic indie riff
12:24 Choppy barre chords
12:33 Stadium filling indie pop chords
12:54 Indie octave chords
13:12 Edgy indie barre chords
13:26 AC/DC inspired riff
13:42 Driving rock riff
13:56 Airbourne inspired rock riff
14:08 Hendrix inspired riff
14:26 Groovy classic rock riff
14:44 Quacky rock riff
14:54 Van Halen inspired rock riff

Higher gain drive sounds
15:12 Classic hard rock riff
15:29 80s rock riff
15:51 ZZ Top inspired riff
16:02 Glam rock riff
16:23 Alternative rock riff
16:47 Green Day inspired punk rock riff
17:01 Pop punk melodic lead riff
17:17 Pop punk riff
17:30 Punk rock power chords
17:57 Modern pop metal riff
18:07 Progressive rock riff (Drop D tuning)
18:23 Modern rock palm-muted chords (Drop D)
18:47 Rage Against The Machine inspired groovy riff (Drop D)

Heavy Distortion sounds (all in Drop D)
19:04 Metal chugging riff
19:20 Mastodon inspired metal riff with country twang
19:33 Hardcore punk riff
19:47 Heavy metal lead sound
20:03 Rammstein inspired industrial metal riff
20:17 More hardcore punk
20:31 Classic heavy metal/sludge riff

21:12 My thoughts
21:42 First impressions and looks
22:07 Weight and balance
22:43 Build quality and hardware
23:30 Playability and neck
24:21 Sounds and pickups discussion
27:14 Bigsby discussion
28:14 What other similar guitars are out there?
29:44 My conclusions on the Vintage VSA500 and why you should buy it

My setup was as follows: I ran the VSA500B into my Hughes & Kettner Black Spirit 200 head, also using my Greer Lightspeed and my Revv G3 pedals for overdrive and heavy distortion sounds. The amp went from the Red Box DI straight into my Focusrite Scarlett 2i4, which went into Logic Pro X.

Here’s some gear links:

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H&K Black Spirit 200 at Thomann: ...
At Sweetwater:

Greer Lightspeed: ...

Revv G3 at Thomann: ...
At Sweetwater:

Focusrite 4i4 (the new 2i4) at Thomann: ...
At Sweetwater:
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Backing music from the YouTube Audio Library: Duck In The Alley – TrackTribe.

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