The relevance of mentioning these is that I've never acquired an electric guitar, new or second hand that felt remotely as quality as the 590. Put simply it feels like home. The neck is so easy to play and incredibly comfortable, intonation is set perfectly and the guitar's looks are spot on. I'm a big fan of the Elliott Smith/John Lennon sound and the 590 does this in style. It's everything I would have expected from either an Epiphone Casino or Gibson 330 and after some research the 590 certainly has a couple of tricks up it's sleeve in comparison. The 'Wilkinson' P90's sound fantastic. The Grover machine heads offer excellent tuning stability and I'd take them everyday over the style used on the Casino. The 590 also has a wooden block running through the body (unlike most p90 equipped semi's) which helps feedback issues especially when using some drive on stage and comes in an attractive black hard case.
Sonically the guitar has such a warm rich rhythm sound which I've never been able to totally achieve with other electrics and toggling to the bridge pick up provides a slightly hotter lead sound. On top of all this, jhs and the Vintage brand are a very supportive and approachable company and come across as very committed to producing high quality instruments for musicians who do not yet have rock star bank budgets. I am now the owner of a Vintage acoustic and electric and will continue to sing the praises of these great instruments and look forward to using my new addition on my next album and sharing the stage with it.
These guitars are like hens teeth and long since discontinued. Looks to me like you have version 2 with the extra block inlay at the first fret. I have version 1 from 2010 which doesn't have that and mine has the earlier flower inlay design on the headstock. The reissue of this guitar was a travesty (but also now discontinued) as are all of Vintages current semi acoustics ES style guitars with the offset horns and extended lower bout. JHS were forced to make the changes following the Gibson court case they lost in 2017 in the US. Even though they could have carried on selling the straight copies every where else except the US since that defeat they have decided to now make all their ES style guitars with the changes to the body shape because the US is their biggest expanding market. The biggest loser is the customer because the original VSA590 was cheaper than the Chinese made Epiphone Casino and a better guitar.
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