Harley Benton Beatbass VS Vintage Series 5-stars Reviews

A fitting stand-in for the Hoff

As basses go, this is kind of iconic, if less than completely practical. The hollow body gives a neck heavy feel to the instrument, but that's not really the point, is it ?

As Violin basses go, this is a very competent and very affordable instrument. There is a kind of satisfying thud to every note as it resonates in the body but it also makes it a little unforgiving if you mis-fret as that resonates too.

Plug it in and you are thrown back to the early sixties in both tone and style.

The controls are identical to a certain famous brand with pickup on/off, tone and volume.

As with all guitars with character, you change your playing style to be at one with them. This is no exception.

It has a specific character all of its own and does an admirable job of reproducing the character of the instrument upon which it is based.

If you wish to play like Jaco, then this is not the bass for you, but if you want to feel early Macca coming out in your playing, then it's just the job.

I brought this for backup and more laid back gigs and it does them very nicely. You will have to watch the gain level on the amp, too much and it will feedback enough to have dogs barking 25 miles away! Use your volume and not your gain and you should be fine.

There is a slight problem with the bridge, as it is not fixed and can move about, maybe I'll use some tape to fix this. The frets were better than most guitars 5 times the price and the finish is as good as anything else you can buy.

The only thing that let's it down are the strings. For an extra 10 Euros a better set could be put on?

Fantastic instrument

This bass is incredible value -- it plays well, sounds great, and looks cool. These instruments have a surprising range of sounds, though admittedly in a fairly old-fashioned genre.

The pickups could be improved (try Seymour Duncan SM-1N & SM-3B), as could the contols. But the tuning machines are excellent.

And for the money, you just can't go wrong.

Great Value!

This beatbass guitar is very light, and easy to play on. Especially if you have smaller hands ( the neck is very slim).

The chambered body gives a very warm sound and you can easily create overtones if one wishes.

The pickups is humbucking so no noise if you add some distortion.

You have big possibility to mix the pickup configuration, a switch to alter between solo and rytm is great.

If I start to travel and play live I´ll get one more for backup..

Sincerely.. jbk

Yep, it's awesome

If you're ummming and aahhhing about getting this and thinking it's a bit cheap, just buy it. I record with it all the time. No amp sims, just a nice bit of comp and eq to taste. Voila, Perfect bass :)

Amazing Bargain

I'm a guitar player who also likes to play bass from time to and prefer short scale bass guitars so this neat little Beatbass looked like a great buy to me. Like all guitars I've purchased from Thormann the guitar was shipped very quickly and was remarkably well packed. On unpacking the Bass I was impressed by the quality of the finish, hardware and set up, after removing the strip of protective paper from under the bridge and the plastic sheet from the tops of the pickups the guitar was ready to tune and play. I am really amazed at how good this little bass sounds, like the Hofner original there are no tone controls but a huge range of tones can be found by using the two volume controls and three switches on the neat vintage looking control plate. If you're thinking of buying a violin style bass guitar give this one some serious consideration. Although I've only had this instrument for a couple of days I've hardly been able to put it down, the strings sounded a bit harsh to start with but after a few hours playing they have lost that new string edge and sound great, I almost feel guilty about paying such a low price for this wonderful bass.

Great bass for guitar players

As it is short scale guitar players could step in as a bass player :)

I love the hollow body and I feel like mc cartney when rocking out on this Bass - and I can do all the runs on this bass haha

Oliver Sean

Beautiful and really light

As a guitar player, who occasionally plays bass, and with a neck injury, I was looking for a short scale bass that has a good neck, light weight and does the job.

This certainly looks the part, for the price it's incredible, and it plays well, balances reasonably on a strap, and the neck is really nice, once you adjust to the slightly unconventional proportions.

Most bass guitars have quite wide string spacing at the bridge end, but this neck stays narrow all the way down.

The only criticism I have, is that the dot markers on the side of the neck - to my eyes - are very difficult to see in poor lighting. They could do with being a touch bigger / brighter and not covered in dark lacquer.

But, overall, it's infeasibly light, compared to my normal scale Vox White Shadow Bass - which is quite light, anyway - and two humbucking pickups, good controls, have not had a problem with tuning either in rehearsals or gigs, and for the price it is stunning, visually as well as in playability.

Beatbass

Love it, will be even better with flatwound, I like the simplicity of switching between pickups & no tone control is no issue for me, lovely action

lovely guitar

this is identical to the epiphone as far as i can tell from research

it's hard to imagine how hofner could improve on this other than cosmetically

er - edit - the top is ply, not solid maple as the description might lead one to believe, still not much to moan about in an electric

the components are all very good quality, the volume controls are great and can be used to modify the tone by blending the two pickups

edit 2 - used finest wire wool lightly, to take the shine off every part, including machine heads - massive improvement in tone - i think i learnt where the terms 'bright' and 'dull' come from in terms of timbre

used wax to bring back a little sheen

all my instruments are now refinished this way, the most dramatic being my irish d whistle all black and shiny plastic, now sounds very close to wood

Beattles Bass.

Good action, good sound, excellent copy!