Harley Benton JB-75MN Black Vintage Series 4-stars Reviews

Very good bass for the price

Very good but heavy!

Obvious choice, I always wanted to have a jazz bass but I couldn't justify the expense, I mainly play 6 string guitars. In comes Harley Benton, I did what setup I could new strings, polished the frets, adjusted the neck with a truss rod (that actually works too!) and put hundreds of hours into playing it.

No major complaints, it's very well made, maybe too well in fact because it's really heavy. Put against a Yamaha TRBX305 that I bought after the HB, the good old HB feels like it's double the weight of the Yamaha and that could be an issue for some players. I don't mind it because I only play it at home sitting down.

If not playing it, it's always great to look at it so consider it having two functions at home

This Bass Is Sick

Try It this is bass sick ..it plays like a 70s jazz bass thats 3x times this price a tad heavy but in a good way

Great playing bass with small quality issues

I bought this bass because of many good reviews on the internet, and I don't regret the purchase. The setup was perfect put of the box aside from intonation on E and A strings. No fret buzz whatsoever, the neck was perfectly straight without any adjustment. It plays very well and sounds amazing.

What I didn't like is some quality shortcomings: the dots on the side of the neck are not round, the holes for the pickguard and control plate are out of alignment, and there is no shielding of the electronics inside, which I expected anyway. Also, be prepared for the weight of this instrument.

Overall I think this bass is a worthwhile purchase because of its great playability and sound quality, if you don't mind small quality issues and significant weight of this instrument .

Great at the price?

Having owned and moved on various Fender and Squier Jazz basses, I decided the time was right to try one of these for occasional use, mostly at home when the Jazz notion strikes.

As previous reviews have said, this is quite heavy at 5.1 kg or 11.2 lb`s but as am going to use it sitting down this should be ok. The finish on the body is flawless, the neck is fine with no sharp fret ends, I have owned basses 3 time the price that weren`t as well finished.

The pickups are fine, if I was planning on gigging this on a regular basis I would change the bridge and tuners but I would do this with a Squier that was £200 more expensive. If you just want a bass for recording or to use around the home then just keep it as it is.

If you were looking for a regular gigging Jazz bass I would go the extra and get a Sire V5 but plenty of guys gig these HB`s stock. Me, I`m happy with this bass and at the price, it`s a no brainer!

cool bass

Sound, quality and look is great. a wonderful alternative to the more expensive Fender and Squire bass . I would have given 5 stars but pick guard had scratches, looks like it has been played numerous times with a pick.

Great for the price!

Good finish, good sound. great looking bass. i wasnt expeciting that much for the price. great for gigs!

My first bass.

I'm a beginner and never had a bass in my hands, so I decided to purchase a Harley Benton JB-75MN Black as my first low-cost training bass. After very fast delivery, I unpacked the box with the tool. The set includes keys for tuning the neck and string heights.

The bass looks great, nice black lacquer and light neck. I was afraid that the neck would be a screw, but everything is in order, the quality left me satisfied, everything is smooth, the screws are spinning, the sound is fine tuned.

A few months later, when I had already learned to play several popular melodies, I was slowly mastering slap and got to know the instrument better, I can say that it is quite massive. When you play sitting for a long time, the right leg gets tired, and while standing, it pulls the shoulder, even with a wide belt. The balance is shifted towards the neck - the head falls down.

Two months later, some frets came out and I scratched my palm on the sharp edges, and out of the box the neck was just even, because of this, the sound at 1-2 frets was not very good. I had to grind down the frets and set the neck deflection and lower the strings a little, and now the bass sounds even better!

In general, what we have:

+ fast delivery

+ high-quality and beautiful instrument

+ strings D "Addario

-heavy

-a bit unbalanced

The result is a good choice for a beginner to learn to play and not feel sorry for the money spent.

An absolute winner for the money!

I was looking for a budget bass to use in my home studio. I'm not a bass player, but I know a decent bass when I hear and play one.

This has many tonal options with these particular pickups, the action was just right out of the box, the frets felt smooth and the tuning is stable!

What more could you want for the money?

Precision Instrument

Just the same this is NOT your typical value bass. the craftsmanship exceeds my expectation, to be honest. It has that "depth" of a fender but without the excessive bulk. Phat Bass Tones...pretty easy to make playable right out the box w just about an hour of tunning & adjustments. As soon as I got it - I started to look at another already!

Got the looks

I bought the Harley Benton JB-75MN bass because I wanted that 70s vibe - and it has that in spades. However, it does seem to be lacking a bit on the electronics front, so I'll be upgrading the pots before long, as the volume and tone are a bit 'on/off'. Otherwise, I can't complain too much - as for £129 it's a wonderful bass.

Really good, mindblowing for the price

I've had several Harley Benton basses. All were really amazing for the money and all had issues with the final execution. This one included.

The good is that it's a well made instrument, sounds very good and the finish is great. Neck and frets are really good. Pickups are not my favourites, but generally good. I've met players who prefer them over other (more expensive) alternatives.

The bad is that (like on other HB basses I've had) the pickup screws are driven in the wood at a bad angle, preventing lowering or raising the pickups as desired. I found this annoying, especially since it's not such a big thing to get right during the manufacturing process, and so much else on this bass is of really high quality. The also the binding is imperfect.

The weight is great, a straight 4.0kg. Light for a jazz bass, somewhat prone to neck dive, but not much.

Affordable and good option for beginners

For the price it's a great entry bass. A little on the heavy side for weight, other than that it's decent and very affordable.

Came with setup done, played well. The sound is very punchy, and works suprisingly well for the instrument of this price. Cons are fret-ends, which needed a little bit of sanding because they were a little bit sharp, and whole electronics needed grounding, but both things are easily done in few hours and now i have above-decent bass for 1.3 of the price of similar sounding instruments.

Heavy Bass

Good Bass but very heavy

Decent Bass for its price!

This Bass is pretty good for its price tag. very good playability. Good sound. Great feel of the neck. I only had a minor issue with it, one of the tuning pegs was loose and it was rattling. I changed the whole set to black ones to match the colour anyway, but then again considering its price it's a pretty decent Bass.

doubt you'll find better in this price range

Overall I'm pretty satisfied with this guitar, it would've gotten a perfect score if it wasn't for the nutslots being too small so that the strings just sit on top of the nut.

Except the nutslots being too narrow I don't have any complaints:

- this guitar is great for slapping (much better than my ibanez sr for this kind of thing).

- the pickups sound great, at first I wasn't convinced but now I don't think I'll change them.

- its pretty heavy but it won't bother you alot with a good guitar strap

- It looks great. I love the all black with maple neck and chrome.

J Bass clone

I am no Bass player but I needed one to add basic lines to my recordings. I chose this Bass and I am very happy with it. A variety of tones are simple to set up, the action of the Bass was nice and low out of the box and it looks great. The only negative thought, it is very heavy but for the occasional use it gets from me that is not really a problem.

Great affordable recording bass

I bought this for a couple of recording projects, wanting to keep my costs down. At half the price of a similar Squier, the Harley Benton is a good match on quality, with some better features! The hardware quality is decent, as far as I can tell, and the pickups sound great.

The finishing leaves something to be desired: The fret crowns feel scratchy and will need polishing, but the fret ends (which are often sharp) were totally fine. The black finish had a few hairline scratches on out of the box, I assume from less time polishing, but they're barely noticeable and fine for a recording bass.

Tuners are totally stable, despite expecting them not to be. The neck feels better than the Squier Jazz bass I played recently, although is a little dry if you're used to lacquered necks. The Harley Benton also has the added bonus of brass saddles and the block and bound fretboard, which are a nice touch on a low budget bass like this one.

I've never been a stickler for bass pickup tone, so it's hard for me to compare these pickups to other jazz bass pickups, but they sound absolutely fine, no strange noise, and have quite a wide range of tones if you use the tone and volume knobs wisely.

With a little bit of work, this will be a great bass for great value.

Very good bass, but very heavy.

I was looking to get into jazz bass territory but didn't want to pay Fender/Squier prices and opted for this as it had Wilkinson hardware that I've had good experiences with in the past.

The fit and finish on this bass was great, a deep gloss black finish, perfectly finished metal control plate and traditional style jazz bass knobs. The black block inlays were great, the tuners held very well and the pickups were a decent output with great tone.

The only downsides to the bass for me were that it was incredibly heavy (could easily just have been that one body, wood can be like that), and the neck was just too thick for my personal preference.

Overall I would recommend this bass to anyone looking for a cheap backup or an upgrade from a cheap starter bass, as it was of very good quality, but the weight of the bass and the neck profile meant that the one I received very little play time.