Harley Benton Custom Line Manhattan-Standard Reviews

I've always wanted a guitar with this vibe, this does not disappoint.

I've been playing guitar for 30+ years and had a few guitars from the era this guitar emulates. Those always have baseball bat necks and while the vibe is there, are so difficult to play. The guitar I received has some finish issues as to be expected from a guitar in this price point, but the pickup sounds great, the body is nice and thin and the feel of the neck is amazing, it's a joy to play for any style. I recut the nut and set mine up as a baritone and play mostly blues and jazz, but however you do it, I recommend to anybody.

I am pleased

I was mildly impressed with this guitar. I have often wanted a hollowbody guitar of this style, but did not want to spend a lot of money, only to discover that I didn't like it.

This guitar is surprisingly well built, but acoustically... the tone was very thin. I upgraded the bridge to a ResoMax (by GrapgTech) bridge and the "sound" improved 100%.

The pickup that comes with guitar is 'spot-on' and the tuners are sufficient, they do not need replacing, but I upgraded to locking tuners.

Overall, I am very pleased with this guitar!

Great quality and open sound.

I particularly enjoyed the satin finish on the guitar and the feel it gives on the back on the neck when moving up and down the finger board. A very resonant sound and feeling from the large body.

Jazz Box

It's not perfect but the price is! For jazz I've found switching to a heavier gauge flat wound strings has really developed the sound, also the action is at the truss rod & bridge needs to be reset higher to 1. get a more pronounced projection 2. To get rid of most of the fret buzz. These are minor adjustments that can be done yourself or by a competent guitar shop. There is 100% no need to change the solitary bridge pickup on this model, it's perhaps one of the best parts of the guitar. I've not been disappointed with the purchase of this guitar and use it regularly for playing jazz events.

Really comfortable Manhattan

I really enjoyed the time with Manhattan. Things I enjoyed the most were the neck and the acoustic sound. Half of the times I didn’t even plucked myself to amp because I lost myself noodling acoustically.

Pros are the two things I already mentioned but two another pros are that it is really lighweight and bridge height is easily adjustable. And it's visually darn beautiful (mahagony stars really out from it)

For me there were only one con - I really hoped that pickup would be jazzy and little bit less trebly. Of course you can adjust treble with tone knob, but I really wanted it to be originally smokier and with less treble. Three words - too much treble in pickup.

Speaking in past tense because I switched from Manhattan back to stratocaster. I just realised that I’m a strat guy. If I could afford another guitar not for exchange then I would’ve kept that lovely Manhattan.

Tone pot and bridge fell to pieces after a few days

Fell for the look, ended up with a nice guitar.

For the price this guitar is pretty good. I changed to my favourite strings and it feels and plays great.

Amazing guitar for the price.

Acoustically it's quite good, and the pickups certainly arent bad either.

It plays really well after a good setup, but i think the 6th fret is a little high; my friend got one too and he's got a couple of deadspots on the neck, so keep that in mind.

The tuners and/or nut aren't the best, and you will have to carve out the string spacing on the bridge yourself.

The paint job is decently consistent, the one i got was much brighter than the one pictured, but my friend's one was basically akin to the pictures, so maybe they fixed this after i bought mine, but i'd keep that in mind.

All in all: i love this guitar and bring it everywhere, i would reccomend it to both those who want a cheap archtop, and ones (like me) who will add and modify various aftermarket parts.

One problem

The only thing on the guitar that Im not satifyed with is the freting, some buzz on 11th fret. But its a super guitar for the money

....very good instrument for its league!!

Archtop guitars in my view are the top league to compete. There are excellent instruments out there and their field is upper level to meet key standards. Well, this guitar has to be compared on price standards.

And there is really good !! Is the lowest cost archtop I ever played with. It stands good against its peers (...always in the tail but never out of it). In addition it has a very special sound unplugged which I use in some recordings. I liked it! Also the look is great.

For the price it's a nice and well made guitar. What Dacia Dokker is to minivans this is to jazz guitars.

I bought this guitar 6 months ago and have played it multiple times a week since. It was my very first guitar a) which is an electric hollow body, b) I bought over Internet from abroad.

First, I was very nicely surprised by the natural resonance of the guitar. Although its unplugged tone is nothing to write home about (it's an electric guitar after all!) it's good enough for home practice. Very focused, mid-rangy and percussive. You don't have to plug it in at all and you get sound loud enough for practicing with metronome or a not very loud backing track. Its unplugged volume is just a bit lower than a parlour acoustic guitar. If you want to practice Freddy Green style comping in the middle of a night you definitely will annoy your neighbours :) .

Plugged-in sound for me is very sweet, warm and mellow (I have flat wound strings, 12 gauge). If you are into sounding like Charlie Christian, Wes Montgomery or George Benson, this guitar will definitely help you. Although it has just one pickup, it can give you a lot of tone variety depending on your play style. I don't miss a bridge pickup at all. I had a lot of success playing jazz blues with a looper pedal and through a bass amp (Fender Bassman). The whole guitar is made of fairly thick laminated wood and the body is thin which reduces the susceptibility to feedback. However if you are used to play just solid body guitars it can catch you unprepared. It is easily manageable if you get used to it.

Speaking of its quality, it is really superb for the price. It holds tuning very well, is easy to setup and intonate, frets are level and were nicely crowned (although there were some tool marks on their edges, someone probably fixed the fret sprout hastily). Tuning machines are smooth. From the worse bits I found a bit of dust under lacquer in two places, frets were unpolished and the plastic nut was just a bit weird. The output jack hole keeps loosing itself. At first I thought I would have to replace the pickup and pots; I didn't have to - pots are fine and the pickup is nice sounding. I just replaced the nut and polished the frets. Overall, the build quality is on par with guitars at least twice the price. What I really appreciate is the satin finish. Although it does not look so "glamorous", satin finished necks feel much better to me than polished.

This guitar can be a nice addition to your collection, it definitely is the most affordable and useable jazz guitar/electric archtop on the European market. I really wish Harley Benton would add a cut-away model or a lighter colour but it's fine as it is.

Well, this an incredible gutar for an incredible price! Carious details in the manufacturing could be read, but they are not essential for the comfort while playing and the sound. I didn't find a better blues hollow body guitar for less than 500 euros. Just replaced strings with DR blues. Warmly recoomended!

lovely

lovely guitar.blues,jazz ,great

Great Jazz Box for Great Price!

great tone and good quality!

Old school glory.

This beast sounds electric even when it's not plugged in. A real blast back to the days when an amp that distorted was described as, 'Faulty.'

I love the sound acoustically, it is quite loud and electrically it does the job. The output is weaker than a modern 335 style and the pick up hums a bit. Turning down the tone control gets rid of that. The finish is 95% with just a few minor imperfections although the scratch plate has a few bare patches around the edge. In spite of having a large frontal area, its shallow depth makes it comfortable to play. A good buy.Goodbye.

Nice Archtop

Really nice sounding guitar both acoustically and through an amp. Only thing for me is that the fingerboard is a bit scratchy

Manhattan Standard

The Harley Benton Manhattan Standard Jazz Guitar was a slight risk after reading some of the previous reviews! - I decided to take the risk and was not disappointed. The reviewer's comments were actually extremely useful. One review mentioned that the bridge is not glued to the body - Glad to hear it - I intend to place a transducer underneath it to give an acoustic output. The action is a bit high - OK, so it usually is on most new guitars! - we all have our preferences. Intonation? - well that will obviously change when I remove the bridge and position the transducer, then I have the chance to lower the action and find the optimum bridge position. One big surprise! - the guitar was shipped with a thin piece of cloth underneath the bridge - not quite sure why? - perhaps a big hint that this needs to be moved around during any adjustment - action, string gauge, it almost always needs a final trim. The acoustic sound is just what I was hoping for - Rich and resonant, but not like a normal acoustic guitar. This is a fully hollow bodied archtop, with the pickup mounted on the end of the neck, not the body. That was the main reason for choosing this guitar. The pickup sound is surprisingly low level when plugged in to an amp set up for a tele or strat, especially considering that this has a humbucker. I tried using a pre-amp on the pedalboard and the level came up, but the sound didn't seem very bright to my ears. Not bad though and I don't mind messing around with electronics. It will be very nice with a simultaneous acoustic transducer. My main concern after reading the other reviews was the quality of the finish - actually this example is pretty good - no sharp fret ends, only the plastic nut on the high E side, but that will easily smooth with a file, or even trim with a scalpel. The only minus is that if you look closely - and really closely, the binding and trim looks a bit cheap and "plasticey". Another reviewer mentioned the truss rod cover looks a bit cheap/cheesy, so I ordered a black alternative with the guitar. Not yet sure if this will fit or if I really want to change it. Overall, and considering all the previous reviews, I think the Chinese manufacturers have got things a lot better. 9/10.

Update:

Having now fitted the piezo acoustic transducer under the bridge, lowered the action further than I ever imagined possible, slightly moved the bridge to get all strings perfectly in tune with the harmonic at the 12th fret, encountered no fret buzz at all, delighted with the comfortable playability, the supplied strings sound and feel excellent - I took another look at the price ! - and I just have to upgrade the rating - 9-and-a-half/10 - and 5 stars !

nice and smooth

Playin that guitar for about a 3 years, had some issues with fretwork, but overall after some craftmanship, sounds really mature and comfortable. Stays in tune very well and sits on your knee, in front of your belly really well) if you are 194cm like me)))

im playin on 12 or 13 stringsets, and guitar sounds like a wolf trough the tubie.

I can proudly bring that guitar with my fender tele or taylor ac. to any concert or activity to play.

total bang for the buck

okay, so this guitar is great.

the unplugged sound is rich and resonant, plugged in, the humbucker is very clean and bright, when playing at higher volume you can feel whole guitar vibrate against your body, also, it generates some beautiful feedback.

neck has medium thickness, but feels great, the tuners are... i would say okay, they stay in tune just fine

Pros: sound, body shape is really comfy, the pickup is mounted on the neck, not to the body which has its own unique sound, tuners are okay, you can tottaly use this guitar as an quieter acoustic. the electronics are working fine, guitar is really light, about 3 kg

Cons: the finish is not perfect everywhere, the pickguard is just a piece of wood, but you can take it off, there is a fret buzz on few places, trust rod cover also looke bit cheap

Guitar was shipped very well, strings very bit high, but intonation was really close to perfect, but as every guitar it needs a bit adjustment

another thing, the brige is not mounted or glue to the body, it just sits on the top and strings hold it in place,

overall 7/10

Perhaps the best sub-£200 guitar I've ever played

I've long been interested in arch tops, and after good experiences with other Harley Benton guitars I felt that this would be a suitable first foray into such a style, and I'm far from disappointed! An excellent, full tone for jazz ? the neck is the smoothest I've felt on a guitar at this price, and once the action is easily adjusted it plays like something four times the price. Resonates well behind the bridge and harmonics ring out likewise. The perpetual 'feedback issue' common to most semi-acoustics doesn't manifest itself unless you're playing at some serious volume, and despite its smooth acoustic qualities the full potential of the pickup is only unleashed once run through some distortion. With the action set high this guitar ironically also makes for an excellent slide-player for the dirtier side of blues.