Harley Benton BM-75 Trans Red Deluxe Series 5-stars Reviews

Red Beauty

This is the real win/win: it looks, sound, and quality on the one side, and the more than fair price on the other.

This sound and material is very good considering the price. I recommended if you are not able to buy the BMG atm.

Well worth the $$

This my second HB guitar of my 20 electric guitars. Mine range from 60s, 70s vintage to great CV Squiers. This little guitar is awesome! I didn’t want to spend a lot and was curious about BM look. I play it a lot, especially unplugged. I love the chimey unique sounding pickups ups. That’s 2 for 2 HB. I have the Prince Tele copy.

I upgraded the saddles and nut on the BM 75 and got a bit more sustain out of it. Color me happy!

Not a Red Special, unless...

Quite smaller than an actual Red Special faithful replica, fits better for those who are not as tall and long-handed as Brian May (faithful replicas have a very thick neck). Besides that, the wiring system is different from the original, which allows for series pickups configuration (i.e. humbuckerish sound). Harley Benton's model has the typical configuration of a stratocaster, plus the in-phase/out-of-phase selectors. Now comes the tip: if you have the pick-up selector changed with a Freeway switch (strat model: 5B5-01), you get series combinations as well, and you get to keep the strat combinations too (parallel)! With the in-phase/out-of-phase switches, that makes a total of 19 different pick-up combinations. Not bad! I'm enjoying mine quite a lot.

I had the nut replaced as well, with a bone nut; the original is just plastic. I also installed locking tuners, but using the tremolo bar still makes the guitar immediately out of tune. I might have to replace the saddles as well, maybe with some graphtechs. We'll see about that.

Bm-75

Amazing quality guitar very well built and sounds delightful. Really happy to be a owner of this guitar. I would highly recommend this to anyone who is thinking about getting one you will not regret it TRUST ME.

Brian "May" have a more expensive one, but this one's BRILLIANT too!

This Harley Benton BM-75 trans red delux isn't quite the "Red Special" but for me it's a very close second. I love it's easy playability, it has a lovely neck and fretboard with not a sharp fret in sight anywhere. Plugged in it has some amazing sounds, and even using the trem bar rather a lot doesn't put it out of tune, which is great. It's a really good quality guitar with a nice fit and finish, and if you want the feel of the "Red Special" but only have a limited budget, you won't go far wrong with this guitar. I love mine and it's one of my favourites for relaxed playing on.

Eddie Mercury

The reason why Brian may me calls me that. We have met Brian May. Wearing a Freddie Mercury costume.

BM-75

This is a great guitar. It looks sensational and sounds just like you would expect. I can make it sound like Queen. Amazing value.

Stunning guitar

This may be budget priced, but it is definitely premium quality. The fit and finish is way above its price level. It may not be a one to one tribute to the original “red special”, it most certainly pays a very respectable homage to it.

Fantastic guitar and not just for Queen fans

As usual with Harley Benton, the quality is amazing with a near flawless Finnish. Played perfectly out of the box with very little adjustment needed. An array of sounds can be had making it capable of most genres. Can’t believe how they do it for the money, would highly recommend to anyone looking for a guitar that’s a little bit different from the usual choices!

not what i wanted, but happily surprised

i was looking for a strat sounding guitar that didnt look like a strat, had a set in neck, and ideally, ebony fretboard. this checked enough boxes from looking at it that i thought itd be exactly what i wanted. well, it doesnt sound anything like a strat, and thats fine. its a lovely instrument, with a lot of tonal options.

Best allrounder I own

To be honest, at first sight this guitar looks quite scary. It has many buttons, the accessible neck makes it seem like you need to shred on it and even its general looks create some expectations. But rest assured you don't have to be Brian May on this one.

It is the most versatile guitar I have ever played. It is basically a Stratocaster for Les Paul lovers. It has all the functionalities you would find on a stratocaster and, with it's 3 fase switches, even more than that. And as an extra benefit it doesn't look like a stratocaster.

I use it mainly as a back-up for my Les Paul and Telecaster and actually it is able to do more than replace one of those when a string breaks. At home or when I want to travel light it's my go to guitar because all the pick-up and fase combination give you all the sounds you need.

Because of its relatively small body it's also the shortest guitar I own which for a not so super tall person is also kinda nice. Yet its small form-factor does not take anything away from the sound it produces. It is true that its pickups are not as loud as a humbucker but then again that makes sense as it is not a humbucker pick-up, so you shouldn't expect that. It can easily blow everyone away on a stage or be used practising at home; I haven't any issues on higher or lower volumes yet.

Its neck is slightly thicker than you would expect if you are used to Stratocasters but it doesn't feel as if that will ever be a problem.

I can easily tell you all day about this guitar. While my other guitars allow me to play, this one inspires me to play. I don't know if you can do anything with that info but here it is anyway.

If you are looking for a great allrounder, a great guitar for practising at home or even for your first electric guitar, look no further. This guitar has all you need and even more. It's not too heavy, it's not too big, yet they still managed to cram a huge deal of potential in this guitar.

Quality is so good as any epiphone top seeded or fender midium budgett

Excellent sound , excellent performance with it!

Brian may

I was surprised how good it looked when I opened the box and surprised it sounds like his guitar (if you have a good setup) .

Awesome Guitar

I have been a big fan of Queen and Brian May for over 40 years and thought I'd get this not really caring how it sounded. I figured it would be fine but when I got it and plugged it in I was pleasantly surprised! I love the phase switches to alter the sound of the pickups and as for the guitar itself, all the 24 frets are easily reachable and it plays like butter!! I am amazed at the quality of this guitar. Intonation was perfect out of the box and action was almost where I like it. Very solid guitar too. Get one you won't be sorry!!

Great guitar for the money

Sounds and feels way more expensive than it is.

The out of phase switches are cool but the pickups are in parallel and not in series like in the Red Special, as well as the Volume and Tone reversed.

Had to tighten the input Jack a bit and stays in tune pretty well.

Would definitely recommend.

Amazing guitar!

Such a fun guitar to play!

I will NEVER buy another Harley Benton guitar. Here's why...

I own 6 and don't have anymore room! 2 DC customs, BM, 335, RB Bass and a TE-90. All great instruments, if they were 4 times the cost. YOU CANNOT go wrong. For you US buyers, the shipping cost from Germany is $75, for one instrument or 2. If you buy 2 guitars instead of one, you are essentially getting it for half price. Order them now, You won't regret it!

Amazing quality and finish

Just wonderful overall.

It made it to FL,US packaged proper and in perfect condition.

Near-perfect

I have owned 4 or 5 real BMG Special LEs over the past several years. I have tried so hard to like them, but I’ve never been able to get past 3 issues: 24” scale length, serial pickup wiring (though I have performed the serial/parallel switch mod on a couple of them), and the closeness of the pickups to the strings (interferes with my picking style).

This BM-75 solves all of those issues for me, while also being a ridiculously well-built and great-sounding guitar for the money. The 25” scale length is perfect. The parallel wiring is far more pleasant than series, to my ears. And the pickup(s) height is more like a Strat, leaving plenty of room for digging in without hitting a pickup with the pick.

Regarding the pickup options, I lose neck+bridge, with corresponding two out-of-phase options for it. And I lose neck+middle+bridge option with all the out-of-phase options for it. I don’t mind, though. This still gives me plenty of whacky out-of-phase tones to play with and use.

Regarding the middle out-of-phase switch: some have implied that it is redundant. It is not redundant. Sonically, it matters which pickup is out-of-phase. This guitar, in particular, produces a distinctly different tone depending on which is used in (especially) neck+middle or (less noticeably) middle+bridge. This is true on a real BMG, too. It’s true on any guitar that provides a per-pickup phase-switching option. But it is slightly more pronounced on the BM-75 than on the BMG Special LEs I’ve owned.

Anyway, great guitar. After I tested it through the AFX3 for a half hour, I said to myself, “Perfect.” Just a great value. Built well, plays well, sounds great, feels great.