HB-35 BK Vintage Series : Great budget 335 emulation

I purchased this HB-35 BK to try to replace a (very) old Harmony hollow body that I decided to sell. I loved the style and tones of the Harmony, but didn't love the feedback, so I decided to try a semi-hollow instead. I've never had one, so I wasn't sure what to expect.

Disclaimer: This doesn't sound anything at all like the hollow body it was supposed to replace, but it has its own unique tones that will cover anything from jazz to (almost) metal. Very, very nice sound that cooperates very nicely with my amp set up as clean or crunch.

I'm disappointed that I'll still need to chase the tones I was originally looking for, but completely happy with the result that I got. This guitar is gorgeous and plays very nice.

The guitar gets 5 stars. Customer Service gets 5 stars. Shipping, not so much. I purchased this guitar with a case in a combo package, and also bought a SC-550 singlecut - again chasing tones. The two guitar boxes were packaged in another box with just enough paper padding on the top to fill the top portion of the outer box. No padding on the sides, and just a layer of paper at the bottom. The HB-35 arrived with the neck completely broken at the body. The only thing holding it together was the strings. The SC-550 had a crack all the way across the headstock. The case for the HB35 combo arrived about a week later. I'm not sure what happened there, or why the combo wasn't shipped together and the other guitar shipped separately.

Customer Service was great. I took pictures of the damage and sent them in. Within about a day they had a replacement HB35 ready to ship to me. ( The SC-550 was handled separately )

The replacement came in with not a great deal more packaging material, but it arrived in perfect condition.

It was set up well and like I mentioned above, the tones are incredible for a guitar at this price point.

At this price point, anyone looking to buy this model guitar will not be disappointed at all - assuming it arrives intact.