NGD Tribute S-500

Picked this up off Reverb, apparently a 2015 model in sunburst with a rosewood fretboard (well, it's dark, anyway).

This is to replace (or so I thought) my Squier Standard HSS Strat which I bought on a whim for $200 last year.

The Squier is significantly lighter than the S-500 and the Squier neck slightly thinner and satin rather than gloss finish. I tend to prefer satin finish necks and I'll be honest, the Reverb listing didn't say and I didn't ask, so mea culpa there.

I just tried the S-500 with my amp on a clean setting and it makes some nice sounds. It doesn't scream "Strat" like the Strat does (duh) which along with the neck, make me think that maybe I won't part with the Strat immediately. It will come down to who gets played more.

On the plus side, the G&L certainly looks way nicer than the plastic mirrored pick guard on the Squier, and the electronics layout (global V & T) and p/u switching options are more to my taste than the Strat. Also I hate the play in the Strat vibrato arm - that may be the cheesiest thing about it. It's possible the Strat will stay in the living room for casual unplugged twanging. We shall see.

Cool- Enjoy it. Squier Standards are actually nice nowadays but the papery feeling satin/rough necks are actually something that bugs me with most Squiers; just personal preference. The MFD pickups are def. a different animal vs. traditional single coils too. Play with the PTB controls till you find your setting

I've come to realize over 35 years of playing that relationships with musical instruments can become very special, or one can become disillusioned, even hostile sometimes! It is hard to predict in advance when, how and with whom. My favorite electric is a Yamaha AES-800. If I'd been who I am today when I bought it, I would have sprung (ha-ha) for the Bigsby version, but alas it is a hard tail.

I wrote my first impressions of the S-500 Tribute about an hour after opening the box. Now, a full day later, I am pretty confident the Squier is not going to remain in my collection. I have already sold something like 5 or 6 guitars this year, at least one more is pending. The only concern about the Squier is that it's so damn cheap it's hardly worth the effort to sell it. I could probably get $75 for it at Starving Musician. I had the Squier hanging in the living room to grab at will (I work from home most of the time on the computer). It's light weight and I'm not too worried about it getting a bump. I like its Stratty sound - when I played it through my amp, I had a big ah-ha moment, all those Stevie Ray, Hendrix, Zappa, Gilmour, Trower (etc.) tones!!!! I had not had one before last year.

The S-500 doesn't get those exact tones easily. Which doesn't mean I couldn't if I tried really hard, but most of the vague marketing references by G&L about (cough) "classic designs" or however they put it in their videos talk about getting "glassy" tones with the 2 extra settings and bass roll off, not necessarily 2-4 quackies.

And I'll also admit that maybe it's just quacking in its own way. Comments about the quackiness of S-500 positions 2 and 4 are welcome.

The G&L is not gonna take its place in the living room. It's way too nice for that. That one moves into 1st position for recording loops in my 36 square foot "studio". My Yamaha will move back upstairs to the living room.

Last edited by Digital Larry on Fri Jul 20, 2018 10:46 am, edited 1 time in total.

I don't own an S500 , but I have a late 80s SC3 that's pretty damn close. I actually find it has a lot of quack, but as you notice, less glass/twang than a traditional Strat.