Harley Benton Nashville-Steel

Let’s get the bad out of the way first. The flame top is bad, really bad. It’s almost invisible unless in direct sunlight. I wish it was just a normal top. Next, the blend pot is backwards. When pointing at the neck pickup it voiced the piezo and vice versa. Finally, the “lipstick” pickup is clearly a Tele neck pickup in a tube.

The good is that it plays superbly, is well fitted and finished and sounds completely unique. It really is a voice not much else can offer. I like the mix about 70/30 in favour of the piezo through a Fender Twin model on a Helix with bit of reverb. Really lovely and addictive!

Just got this guitar. Waited three months for it to be restocked and after not much more than a week I see it?s out of stock again. Very popular or made in small batches?

I?m an amateur guitarist, songwriter and singer. I?ve been playing guitar and recording music for over 40 years and I cross between light rock, country, folk roots, blues and jazz. I have 14 other guitars. I even made my first guitars back in the 60s. I have four other Harley Bentons including a Ganjo all of which I?m very happy with (see below). I play folk clubs, open mics and also busk. So maybe you can understand why I bought this ?hybrid? guitar.

The guitar arrived with the top E string broken at around the bridge position? a bit odd?so not a good start? OK , it can happen but quality control ? After I put on a spare string my overall impression was of a very nice looking and well-made guitar with a good action, intonation and well finished frets.

The word ?solid? mahogany in the instrument description is a bit misleading? In fact it?s a quite light thin-line entirely hollow-body guitar made from solid rather than veneered mahogany apart from the veneer flame top and the Roseacre finger board (heat-treated maple). The images on the site suggest the back and neck are lacquered completely black. But in fact you can see the mahogany grain through the back. This reveals that the back is made from three edge-joined pieces and the neck from 2 longitudinally joined pieces. The bridge could be finished better where the strings emerge from the anchoring points. It?s just a bit rough but wouldn?t take much too much to smooth these on first change of strings.

But all this is a preamble. What does it sound like? Well without amplification, it?s what you?d expect for a thin-line guitar. Of course this all depends on the string choice but with what it?s fitted the tone is quite high end and bright and the volume is low but fine for practising and noodling around. I put this through a Marshall amp and a QTX-15 busking PA. I?m looking here for the range of tones on clean because quite frankly you can use pedals and effects boxes to get any almost sound off almost any electric guitar. With all the guitar tone settings on middle, the blend set all the way to the bridge piezo setting, it?s trebly and very bright with a pick but also when finger picking. This is of course what you?d expect but it?s way brighter than other electro acoustics I have with piezo pickups and similar strings. Move it all the way down to the lipstick single-coil neck pickup and the tone is much more muted and jazzy. It?s a typical single coil sound. A bit like a Strat neck pickup? Now the test of the blend? The treble end comes in very quickly as you move from lipstick to piezo. So I?d say to get the intermediate blend is not in the middle position but more like 85% to the lipstick side. The output is quite high too so it can easily drives a crunch sound when set on the amp or through a pedal. Just a thought : if fitted with a humbucker at the neck end then like my Epiphone EJ-160E/VS (not a hybrid) it could be much more distinctly bluesy and jazzy on the neck pickup and the blend range could be much more distinctive.

All in all this is a very nice guitar and as another reviewer has said you can?t buy a hybrid like a Godin or the Taylor without paying a lot lot more. This is a keeper for me and I?ll gig it around. Well done Thomann?.again!

My other Harley Benton?s are SC-550 Faded Tobacco, ST-62MN and the CLJ-503 CE NT (an electro acoustic). I also have the Ganjo (fitted with treble strings on 5 and 6...nice sound!

Ever since I saw a Taylor t5z, I wanted one. Is this it? No, but for someone on my budget, it works really well.

Considering I am still very new to guitar, take my review with a grain of salt.
The unplugged sound is perfect for me. I live in an apartment with kids, upstairs neighbors, and side neighbors who just had a baby. It is just loud and acoustic enough for me, and I honestly love it.

Plugged in, the electric pick up alone lacks in volume compared to the piezo, but its manageable since you can blend them. I do get a bit of hum on the lipstick alone if I am too close to my amp, but again, manageable.

The piezo pick up is nice. It actually handle mild distortion well, is very clear on cleans, and just overall fits the sound of this guitar.

During my lessons, I have been working on blues types of riffs, scales, and songs like Layla and Cocaine. It works very well for this genre.

The neck fits me perfectly. I have sent so many guitars back to amazon, and spent hours trying out different guitars at guitar center. This neck was it. I am coming from starting on acoustic guitar. This neck is the perfect in between for me. It's not as chunky as my acoustic, but its got a little more meat to it than say a 9.5 squire.

Thats all I can really say, I don't have any qualms. It came in tune, the intonation was already set, and strings seemed to be new. I haven't had an issue with them.

It's a nice looking guitar, and for the price it sounds ok. The pickups are good and the preamp offers quite a lot of options; piezo, magnetic, mix, phase reverse and some tone controls. It's possible to play it even with high gain/ distortion. Not the best option, it has some feedback, but it's on the manageable size.
Flame top looks very nice.
My main problem is with the bridge. The guitar body is arched, but the bridge is made for flat tops, leaving some areas where the bridge is not touching the guitar. Isn't that the point where string vibrations are transferred to the body?
There are also some minor quality flaws (glue spots under the lacquer, sharp frets), but from distance are not noticeable.