First of all the service one gets from Thomann is second to none. The Gretsch wasn’t in stock when I ordered it and the communication from Thomann customer service was spot on. The guitar arrived ahead of the date anticipated and was perfectly packaged, detuned by half a step and had perfect intonation. The action was a little high for me but adjustment on the G5222 is simple so not an issue.
The guitar itself is not perfect, but for the price it is remarkably good value.
I found that the G string tuner was not as tight as the others, the tuners are ok, but not top quality, so I found that with some string bending the G string would fall out of tune quite quickly. Hence the 4*.
I elected to replace all the tuners for some locking tuners, which has totally cured the problem. Now it holds it’s tune not just through a gig but for weeks. Intonation has never been a problem and it’s been spot on since it came out of the box, even with the height adjustment and tuner swap.
The only other issue is the ‘nose dive’ that this style of guitar suffers from. I have fitted an additional strap lug to the base of the neck. Which does sort the issue, but out of the box this caused some discomfort when playing stood up. Hence the 4*.
The only other thing I’ve had to do is a slight fret dress to the ends of a couple of frets which were a bit rough, but not really an issue, just me being fussy. The frets got a polish when the strings got changed out and the fret board was given a wax to help with string bending, but this can be said for guitars three times this price. So not an issue.
The pickups and potentiometers are bloody brilliant. Something I would have expected on a much more expensive model. So top marks there. There nothing else but positive comment for the G5222. It sounds brilliant, the pickups can be pushed really hard to give a real rock sound (ala AC/DC) or kept very clean, enough to rival almost all single coils.
The guitar looks the part and sounds the part. It has that great Gretsch sound and versatility, so you can sound like George Harrison or Malcolm Young and everything in between if you want.
Worth the money? Hell Yeah. Worth a lot more money to be fair.
It’s a brilliant guitar and at this price it’s a no brainer. Getting it from Thomann just makes sense.