Harley Benton GuitarBass VS Vintage Series 4-stars Reviews

An amazing value and great guitar

Bought the GuitarBass VS after seeing other videos and reviews. The guitar body and build is amazing. I love the fact that it is a Hardtail and Not a Trem system.

When I got mine there was some setup needed as there is with any guitar. The neck had a bow in it and had to be adjusted.

Overall this is an outstanding Bass VI and I can't wait to see the next generation!

Love to see on in Delphine Blue with white binding!!!

You get way more than you pay for with this

I play metal but not a big fan of playing 7-8 string guitars to get lower tunings like (drop E ). And I usually get stuck on bass in manny bands so my play style has adapted. This guitar is not a bass but it plays like one on that low E string. It will take a few days to get use to it and I will say fingering the frets is a bit of a battle but it’s manageable. Your picking arm is what’s gonna get tired this thing plays like a 9 string it’s work out. A lot of cool voicing with the pickups if you’re into doom surf or Shoegaze even blues. I think it’s my favorite guitar I have rn. I am modding it a bit with some P90s and locking tuners.. 9/10 it has some things I would change but that’s more my personal preference.

Budget Bass VI

Bought this to replicate tic-tac bass and some other Bass VI niche stuff on recordings. Also an interesting solo instrument. For the price, it surpassed my expectations. Needed only a new set of strings (low E too floppy as most say) - bought Ernie Ball 6 string bass strings and those work well for me — and a minor setup to my preferences. Very well made. Wish it had the strangle switch like Fender but what you gonna do? For the price I am happy, but it’s probably not as nice as a squire bass vi. But for dabbling in either Bass VI or baritone territory (just a different set of strings) it’s pretty nice to have this option at this price point.

The Cure for your needs

Pros: Excellent value for money. Covers both guitar and bass sounds, everything from Surf to Goth Rock. Again, cheap. It was set-up perfect out of the box, no sharp frets, no buzzing on the frets, nice chunky neck (almost as chunky as a 50's Les Paul). Great starter guitar.

Cons: Pickups are muddy, noisy, and the cavity needs shielding and proper grounding with is issues since this thing needs to be played loud. E string needs to be a higher gauge, around 100 so it isn't 'flabby'. No strangle switch or seperate switch for each pickup as it is with a traditional VI.

Nice product

Wanted to try one, superb finish and neck /frets super level. Only disappointment is the string set supplied and the lack of volume.

Tone range is virtually nil. A good platform for upgrading - start with strings....

Awesome instrument

It's the third HB electric guitar that I bought, it's a good construction and I prefer the hard tail bridge over the tremolo of the original design

Great but a few caveats

This guitar...wow. This guitar. I literally (no joke) dreamed about buying one of these and I finally did. It was such a cool looking guitar/bass/baritone that I HAD to have one.

First thing off, the sound: pickups are okay-ish! At least in the bridge. The neck pickup is nice and warm but the one that stands out the most is the middle! It's actually a wonderful tone for cleans and I love it. I replaced the bridge pickup with a Seymour Duncan and was very happy with it. There were a few things I did notice however. First off, this is my personal experience and not everyone will receive a guitar like this; The nut was cut poorly and had some shavings hanging off it (no biggie, just cleaned that up) but I also had lots of markings and weird blemishes around the binding on the fretboard. Also, my low E string was a bit too close to the A. Hard to explain but I think the string spacing was messed up when the nut was installed. Other than that, setting up was easy and the bridge intonated just fine! (which, if you know how bass VI-like guitars are, intonation is a big issue but not here!)

Anyway, I love this thing now. It plays pretty darn well and sounds massive. Yes, I do use it for metal/rock stuff but as a clean guitar it sounds just as good too. I love recording both guitar parts and bass parts with it. Such a cool instrument. I also recommend this!

Excellent value, high-quality instrument

The Bass VI fills a unique musical niche... bought this for my son (primarily a guitar player) and myself (primarily a bass player) to expand our repertoires a bit...

Was very pleased with the quality and playability right out of the box. Solid instrument, hardware tightly mounted and functional, electronics crisp and responsive. The supplied strings were a little tinny for my taste, but an easy swap with Ernie Balls and we're in business. There may be another one of these in our future, since my son and I keep fighting over who gets to play it...

Awesome Little Bass

This is my first Harley Benton purchase and I have to say Im absolutely astonished at what a great instrument you can get for such little money. Ive been playing music for 20 years, have built several guitar and basses from scratch, modded and played pretty much most brands and styles of guitars/basses and I can in all honesty say that this absolutely stands up along side the many other decently built, well playing guitars that Ive used. This is without doubt a very usable bass 6 copy with and without the added benefit of its low cost.

Out of the box it was set up well which implies it has gone through a QC process. Finish was fine, picks sounded like decent single coils to my ears and the neck albeit being a bit chunky for my liking is easy to navigate and without sharp edged that I hear is common with these guitars.

The guitar industry sells guitars with snake oil, mojo and ideals. You will not get any of those things with this or any other low budget brand guitar, but I most definitely got a vey usable tool to make music with.

Oh and delivery was extremely fast. 8 odd days from Germany to Australia!

In conclusion , VERY PLEASED with this purchase.

Bass VI Clone Does What It Says On The Tin

It's pretty much perfect. frets are all level. action is low, tiny bit of fret buzz so i'll try raising the saddles a mm or 2. it has good tone, frets feel a bit rough so a quick polish should sort that. The top string isn't as bad as i was expecting after Cory Mura's video and some reviews I've read, it's loose but workable. The back of the guitar has some blemishes but nothing of relevance. The strings are aligned correctly over the pick-ups. The bridge is in the correct position and the neck sits perfectly on the body. The machine heads do feel a bit weak having to adjust much larger strings. The Volume pot is fine, feels cheap but it works just fine. The tone pot fell off straight away but that an easy fix and its the only real fault. I was expecting that i may have to take the GuitarBass to a shop for set up but i was surprised to find it played very well out of the box. It was even in tune. All in all I'm happy with my purchase and would recommend the instrument to anyone thinking of buying one.

Nice hardtail bass vi

Really nice bass vi copy. Pickups give great range of tone down from nice deep bass to quite twangy highs if you wanted. A bit noisey but they are single coils...You can do cords (just carefull of low e), bass lines,leads and riffs on it.

I like the hardtail brigde (keeps intonation better then original tremolo) and easier to find baritone strings to fit it (to tune a-a or b-b instead of e-e).

Takes chorus and delays wonderfully for curelike riffs. Takes fuzzes well for postrock,doomlike styles as well. Neck and frets are quite nice and smooth (no sharp edges on it).

Even though I?m not into the 60s sunburst finish it is very well done, no bubbles/stains/etc in laquer. And nicely put togther.

Only reason why it?s 4 stars and not 5 is the nut is ok (could be better), electronics aren?t too well soldered (but thats a five minute job to fix if you know what your doing. and for the price I?ve seen ALOT worse), and the strings it ships with. Low E is a 0.084 (i think) way too thin, and even after setup it?s too loose causing fretbuzz (you could fix with shim, but too much bother). If you fit a 0.095 string that does solve the floppines though (or alternativly tune down to a-a or b-b with thinner strings).

Apart for those little niggles (that can be fixed quickly and cheaply), a very nice and versatile instrument (and very nicely priced compared to competicion).