TVM for this Scott. Really good to see a thorough shake down of modestly priced kit. Great production values and solid, no waffle content. Learned plenty from this series, especially from Phil. We all need a Phil :-). For what it’s worth I’ve a HB banjo (a lefty) and uke - both easily outclass the more expensive competition with ease. Cheers Andy.
Absolutely Andy, I didn’t realise they made banjos and uke’s too, what a great option for people who need one for a project or just want to learn. Phill is amazing - we certainly all need a Phill 👍😎
@@ScottPoleyMusic Hey Scott. I had the chance to work with you at Barbara B Mann Arena in Ft. Myers Florida. It was a great show. Fleetwood Mac will always be one of the best bands ever. Missing Christine McVie
@@josephhughes9490 JOSEPH!! I remember you, we met last time out didn't we?! So great to have you as a subscriber and I look forward to seeing you again in Ft Myers.
Great to look back on some of the session Scott, the HB and you did a great job. The album "Provenance" drops on 14th April, so keep a look out. Happy trails my friend. ps also good to see that my little Gretch Jim Dandy in such good hands.
seems that HB are great candidates for practicing b bender installs on - they are close to what a customer might bring in to have an install and they're super affordable.
I took picked up a cheap Cort strat copy ... weak pickups and all ... as a on and off player in public I was happy .... black strat and I put white polka dots on it to simulate a blues player .... sold it and made $50 ... all is well ... thanks for you time on these videos ...
I saw Rumors of FleetwoodMac last year and noticed someone with a Strat that had a Harley Benton shaped headstock. I thought surely not! Good to see a pro pointing out you don't have to have top of the range guitars. I have a Pre-CBS Strat and a Yamaha from near the bottom of the RGX range. The RGX plays pretty well (seems a bit generic) although I did swap out the pickups because they were dark sounding and block the trem. To be fair I blocked the trem on the Strat too! I should add the band gave an excellent performance.
I have a Harley Benton Telecaster Style with Roswell PUs and I love it. I also have an original Fender Stratocaster and I love that one too. I like playing both very much. Your video showed me that you don't have to hide with an HB. :)
Love the videos Scott and only just finding out you were playing this guitar when we saw you on tour with Rumours. I have not long started to learn uttar at 50! My gear is cheaper stuff while I learn but good to know I don't have to fork out loads oce I start to play better. Gonna check pit your Project stuff now.
I have just learned from dear wife that you had told her about these videos but the message was not passed on :) Great work Scott, glad to see the old HB is making some lovely music.
Another great testament to the Deoxit f5 fader lube. MEVER CLEAN POTS AND FADERS WITH CONTACT CLEANER!!!! My tech always makes fun of techs who do. F5 for pots and faders, f4 for I/O contacts. Mess this up and wreck your outboard & instruments
Must say that I'm impressed with the HB guitars, affordable platforms for beginners and with some tweaks even for guys like you making a living out of playing them. Sure, I understand that there are better ones for long time use and touring but your experiment really shows that you don't have to get a 4 figure custom shop instrument to record.
Great project! Thank you! Just thinking to add guitar lessons to my son's piano education. Maybe cheap guitar like this would be just enough to check his abilities :)
I have thought this SCAM is dead. I have bougt this POS of a guitar and it was TOTALLY UNPLAYABLE out of the box. Reviewers get perfectly set up on off guitars, customers get shit. Some of the HONEST reviewers even apologized for giving positive reviews. This is one of the BIGGEST scams I've encountered in my life. Remember: THERE IS NO free lunch in this world.
I'm a newcomer to your channel Scott... really loving the HB strat story. Gratifying also as - as I get older and more 'experienced' - I find myself turning away from some more 'high end' guitars in favour of more reasonably priced (suprisingly good and consistent) 'cheaper' alternatives! Very interesting and enjoyable posts sir 😌
That’s cool too, I love my expensive guitars. For people without the budget to invest in expensive guitars, it’s good to know that there’s so many budget friendly alternatives. More people playing music is surely the ultimate goal.
Love this series! I love my Harley Bentons. Nice change of pace from reviewers who tend to end with: "Good value for the money, but of course you wouldn't use it for anything real (studio, tour, etc)"
Great stuff as always Scott! - I managed to get hold of a Harley Benton HB35 Plus guitar myself, they're really amazing quality for the price. Mine is also second-hand, so I got it even cheaper. I have played a few now, including a rather nice bass and can honestly say that with a quick set-up and maybe a fret polish they're faultless straight out of the box and would make an ideal project that you could gradually improve upon e.g. upgrading electrics, tuners etc. I have a set of Seymour Duncan Seth Lover pickups that I may install in my guitar, along with some upgraded caps and pots, but to be honest, I am happy with it as it is. Amazing guitars though and would make an ideal back-up or even main guitar for those with a strict budget... 👊😉🎸
I own several Fenders, and I have actually gotten onstage, and that damn jack failed me in the same way. It's a problem, the guy who invents a better jack is going to make zillions from Fender players. Now, Harley Bentons: My two pence/cents: I got a HB TE 70 BP about ten months ago, put a Duncan "Hot Tele" pickup set in, it stands toe to toe with any of my Fenders, and I own a couple that are thirty-plus years old. HB are fantastic quality for the money; but, caveat emptor, as you pointed out, weak pickups. So a ~100 USD mod, and you've got yourself a fine guitar to gig or record with. Cheers, great video, informative & entertaining.
Really enjoyed watching the guitars journey so far with all the setup videos and now this one.. Very impressive for such an affordable instrument. I would love to win it!
Fantastic work brother, the guitar (and particularly the playing) sounds amazing, loving the studio set up and stripped back amount of pedals you were using in your rig, all killer no filler 🤘🏻, really let's the guitar shine through. Fantastic as always 🔥
@@ScottPoleyMusic Scott we are always looking forward to your return. You sell out our venue and the music is legendary. Look forward to working with you again hopefully soon
Just come across your vids, which are really interesting. Those Harly B's look really good for the price - I realise thart you only paid a small amout for it, but it looks ggreat - cover the headstock and you'd never , or hardly, know it wasn't a real strat. Having watched a couple of the set-up vids I just wondered what the average cost of the luthier work would be to do that amount of work on it - just ball park as I realise the actual figure might be a bit confidential. Sorry if you've previously been asked this question as part of another comment. Keep the vids coming if you can!
I’d say maybe £80-90 all in, but that’s only because I took it back to be set up for the tour / changed string gauge etc. The bulk of the setup was around £50 including strings.
@@ScottPoleyMusic That's what you great value for money! Thanks very much for replying, Scott. Your guitar work on the Rumours of Fleetwood Mac vids sounded amazing btw. Cheers!
My only question for you is did you have to do any fret or neck work to make it more playable? I bought an HB Tele and it was a joke. It took about two years of it just sitting around before the neck finally 'settled in'... I'd also done some fret work and adjusted the truss rod to pull the weirdness out of the neck.
I like HB guitars but the majic is in the players fingers. Check out Jack Pearson formerly of the Allman Brothers and considered a Pro's Pro. He plays a Squier Strat on Tour, in clubs and recoding. It's completely bone stock and sounds amazing so I'm not surprised that the HB sounds great too. Think I'm gonna buy a HB35 myself. BTW You can check Jack Pearson out on you tube just type in his name !
Hi Barry, I know Jack, we’ve met a couple of times. Jack is one of my favourite players, one of the very best - he makes a Squier Strat sound better than virtually any other guitarist playing a custom shop Fender. The guitarist from Genesis was also using a Squier strat on a recent tour. Thanks for your comment 🙏
Exactly Michael, the reason behind this whole experiment was a kid I taught said to me, “I’d play that song so much better on a better guitar”, he was playing a high end Squier Classic Vibe strat - a great guitar. It’s currently 70+ tour dates in this year, incredible performance from a budget instrument.
pick-ups are a bit weak? my 73 strats pickups are only about 5 ohms thing is SHOCK HORROR NEWS FLASH,,,amps have got a volume knob on them,,,who would have believed it,,a volume knob that makes shit louder,,,,erm yeah.
I don’t think it’s that simple. As I said in the video, I like the sound of these pickups. They have a fantastic clean, glassy sound, probably similar to the pickups on your Strat. However, in the context of a studio session or touring gig with multiple guitars and quick changes, this guitar’s pickups are pretty quiet. Yes, you can use a boost pedal to bring up the signal, but that increases noise. In my experience, they’re also more prone to interference noise than better quality pickups (although that could be the electronics). I would suggest to people buying these guitars to stick with the pickups for a while. Replacement pickups (even basic ones) are more money than I payed for this guitar. Also, a lot of people replaced the pickups on early 70’s Strat’s for higher powered Dimarzio’s / EMG’s / Seymour Duncan’s etc….
@@ScottPoleyMusic yep i agree, pain in the arse changing volume when you swap guitars but just like i said thats why amps have volume knobs. i have a jem with evo's in it and one with joe paf's in it jacksons with duncans in them and an old harley benton "one of the first i think" single coils and my strat and an old tele, tele i use for country and strat for dire straits and chris rea, each guitar to its own really, i have to change the volume on the amps or desk whenever i change from humbucker in ya face screamin wall of sound, to subtle nice calming jangly honky strat tones, but there you are really,,, different guitars for different styles, if you want raw power go with your dimarzio's/duncans, if you want sultans of swing, stick with the strats weaker single coil pickups, simple
It's amazing what can be achieved these days on a tight budget. Great video 👍
Absolutely! Thanks Graeme
Really interesting series of videos about this guitar, thanks Scott. 😎
Thanks Pete 🤘
TVM for this Scott. Really good to see a thorough shake down of modestly priced kit. Great production values and solid, no waffle content. Learned plenty from this series, especially from Phil. We all need a Phil :-). For what it’s worth I’ve a HB banjo (a lefty) and uke - both easily outclass the more expensive competition with ease. Cheers Andy.
Absolutely Andy, I didn’t realise they made banjos and uke’s too, what a great option for people who need one for a project or just want to learn. Phill is amazing - we certainly all need a Phill 👍😎
@@ScottPoleyMusic
Hey Scott. I had the chance to work with you at Barbara B Mann Arena in Ft. Myers Florida. It was a great show. Fleetwood Mac will always be one of the best bands ever. Missing Christine McVie
@@josephhughes9490 JOSEPH!! I remember you, we met last time out didn't we?! So great to have you as a subscriber and I look forward to seeing you again in Ft Myers.
Great to look back on some of the session Scott, the HB and you did a great job. The album "Provenance" drops on 14th April, so keep a look out. Happy trails my friend. ps also good to see that my little Gretch Jim Dandy in such good hands.
Amazing, looking forward to hearing it!
Cheap guitars are no longer bad guitars like they used to be. They have some rough edges but overall they are as good as guitars 3 times their price.
Oh absolutely, compared to cheap guitars even when I was growing up in the early 90’s (let alone the 50’s / 60’s, they’re incredible.
seems that HB are great candidates for practicing b bender installs on - they are close to what a customer might bring in to have an install and they're super affordable.
Now you’re talking Russell!! I love B Benders
Great vid. Scott. Nice to brave the session with a budget guitar.
Love the Benton's as mod-platforms.
Have a good weekend 👋
Thanks, you too!
Hi Scott, it was a great day! The guitar sounded really nice on the session. Hope to see you back here soon.
Oh man I’d love that so much. Can’t wait to see the new studio, hope it’s all going well?
I took picked up a cheap Cort strat copy ... weak pickups and all ... as a on and off player in public I was happy .... black strat and I put white polka dots on it to simulate a blues player .... sold it and made $50 ... all is well ... thanks for you time on these videos ...
Cory guitars are great, as is Buddy Guy 😎👍 and you made $50! That’s a win in my book.
I saw Rumors of FleetwoodMac last year and noticed someone with a Strat that had a Harley Benton shaped headstock. I thought surely not! Good to see a pro pointing out you don't have to have top of the range guitars. I have a Pre-CBS Strat and a Yamaha from near the bottom of the RGX range. The RGX plays pretty well (seems a bit generic) although I did swap out the pickups because they were dark sounding and block the trem. To be fair I blocked the trem on the Strat too!
I should add the band gave an excellent performance.
That’s amazing Russ, I’d love to own a pre CBS strat for sure!
I have a Harley Benton Telecaster Style with Roswell PUs and I love it. I also have an original Fender Stratocaster and I love that one too. I like playing both very much.
Your video showed me that you don't have to hide with an HB. :)
Absolutely not!! No shame here!
Love the videos Scott and only just finding out you were playing this guitar when we saw you on tour with Rumours. I have not long started to learn uttar at 50! My gear is cheaper stuff while I learn but good to know I don't have to fork out loads oce I start to play better. Gonna check pit your Project stuff now.
Thanks so much!!
Great videos, you made a good point about the HB pickups, I hate when I hear hard clipping over chorus effects and these keep it on the safe zone.
Oh me too Pablo, I quite often turn down a guitar’s volume control a bit on the rare occasions I use chorus.
Bought a Benton jazzmaster kit to build just for fun.Got a neck like a telegraph pole but plays well enough
I’ve not looked at their kits but I’d sure love a Jazzmaster!! Nice one Don 👍
I want to see that tour!
Come on! 36 dates across the USA and Canada starting in a few weeks.
I have just learned from dear wife that you had told her about these videos but the message was not passed on :) Great work Scott, glad to see the old HB is making some lovely music.
Amazing Mike, it’s a great instrument 👍
Another great testament to the Deoxit f5 fader lube. MEVER CLEAN POTS AND FADERS WITH CONTACT CLEANER!!!! My tech always makes fun of techs who do. F5 for pots and faders, f4 for I/O contacts. Mess this up and wreck your outboard & instruments
Preach!
Must say that I'm impressed with the HB guitars, affordable platforms for beginners and with some tweaks even for guys like you making a living out of playing them.
Sure, I understand that there are better ones for long time use and touring but your experiment really shows that you don't have to get a 4 figure custom shop instrument to record.
That’s exactly it Peter
Great project! Thank you! Just thinking to add guitar lessons to my son's piano education. Maybe cheap guitar like this would be just enough to check his abilities :)
There are loads of great cheap guitars out there. Squier are definitely worth a look, great instruments.
A great series of videos about getting the best out of an inexpensive instrument. Keep up the great work.
I pity the fool who doesn’t like a great series… sorry, had to be done 🤦♂️ I’ll see myself out. Thanks Mr T!!
I have thought this SCAM is dead. I have bougt this POS of a guitar and it was TOTALLY UNPLAYABLE out of the box. Reviewers get perfectly set up on off guitars, customers get shit.
Some of the HONEST reviewers even apologized for giving positive reviews.
This is one of the BIGGEST scams I've encountered in my life.
Remember: THERE IS NO free lunch in this world.
Great vibe and tasty licks, Scott! Enjoyed the studio tour and the HB experience. Keep ‘em coming..
Thanks Bob 🙏
I'm a newcomer to your channel Scott... really loving the HB strat story. Gratifying also as - as I get older and more 'experienced' - I find myself turning away from some more 'high end' guitars in favour of more reasonably priced (suprisingly good and consistent) 'cheaper' alternatives! Very interesting and enjoyable posts sir 😌
That’s cool too, I love my expensive guitars. For people without the budget to invest in expensive guitars, it’s good to know that there’s so many budget friendly alternatives. More people playing music is surely the ultimate goal.
Love this series!
I love my Harley Bentons.
Nice change of pace from reviewers who tend to end with: "Good value for the money, but of course you wouldn't use it for anything real (studio, tour, etc)"
Yeah, bollocks to that, let’s do it properly 👍
Thank you so much Scott! Sounds amazing!
Thank you!! Love that pedal
Great stuff as always Scott! - I managed to get hold of a Harley Benton HB35 Plus guitar myself, they're really amazing quality for the price. Mine is also second-hand, so I got it even cheaper. I have played a few now, including a rather nice bass and can honestly say that with a quick set-up and maybe a fret polish they're faultless straight out of the box and would make an ideal project that you could gradually improve upon e.g. upgrading electrics, tuners etc. I have a set of Seymour Duncan Seth Lover pickups that I may install in my guitar, along with some upgraded caps and pots, but to be honest, I am happy with it as it is. Amazing guitars though and would make an ideal back-up or even main guitar for those with a strict budget... 👊😉🎸
Fantastic stuff Ian, totally agree, glad you found a good one.
I own several Fenders, and I have actually gotten onstage, and that damn jack failed me in the same way. It's a problem, the guy who invents a better jack is going to make zillions from Fender players. Now, Harley Bentons: My two pence/cents: I got a HB TE 70 BP about ten months ago, put a Duncan "Hot Tele" pickup set in, it stands toe to toe with any of my Fenders, and I own a couple that are thirty-plus years old. HB are fantastic quality for the money; but, caveat emptor, as you pointed out, weak pickups. So a ~100 USD mod, and you've got yourself a fine guitar to gig or record with. Cheers, great video, informative & entertaining.
That’s amazing and great that you’re making music with a HB. Thanks for your comment 🙏🎸
Slide sounds lovely on this. Quiet but really nice tone with your boosts.
Thanks so much 🙏
The journey continues with this guitar. Who would have thought
Absolutely Robin, it’s a remarkable guitar - so far at least!
Really enjoyed watching the guitars journey so far with all the setup videos and now this one.. Very impressive for such an affordable instrument. I would love to win it!
That’s awesome Steve, so glad you’ve enjoyed the series.
Sounds great to me
👍
Fantastic work brother, the guitar (and particularly the playing) sounds amazing, loving the studio set up and stripped back amount of pedals you were using in your rig, all killer no filler 🤘🏻, really let's the guitar shine through. Fantastic as always 🔥
Thanks my man 🙏
@@ScottPoleyMusic
Enjoyed having the opportunity to work with you in Florida. Come back to BBMANN soon
@@josephhughes9490 Would love to!! That's such a great venue, some of the best staff in the business!
@@ScottPoleyMusic
Scott we are always looking forward to your return. You sell out our venue and the music is legendary. Look forward to working with you again hopefully soon
Just come across your vids, which are really interesting. Those Harly B's look really good for the price - I realise thart you only paid a small amout for it, but it looks ggreat - cover the headstock and you'd never , or hardly, know it wasn't a real strat. Having watched a couple of the set-up vids I just wondered what the average cost of the luthier work would be to do that amount of work on it - just ball park as I realise the actual figure might be a bit confidential. Sorry if you've previously been asked this question as part of another comment. Keep the vids coming if you can!
I’d say maybe £80-90 all in, but that’s only because I took it back to be set up for the tour / changed string gauge etc. The bulk of the setup was around £50 including strings.
@@ScottPoleyMusic That's what you great value for money! Thanks very much for replying, Scott. Your guitar work on the Rumours of Fleetwood Mac vids sounded amazing btw. Cheers!
Thanks so much 👍
G'day Scott , always lurking mate . Lol Peace ✌
🤣🙏
As soon as I hit record my brain thinks I'm in front of a crowd and I get nervous and mess up ....stage fright by proxy haha . ✌
Oh man, it happens to the best of us David.
My only question for you is did you have to do any fret or neck work to make it more playable? I bought an HB Tele and it was a joke. It took about two years of it just sitting around before the neck finally 'settled in'... I'd also done some fret work and adjusted the truss rod to pull the weirdness out of the neck.
There’s a load of videos on my channel about the set up process to get to this point Jim.
I have a benton. For the price it's incredible
That’s awesome 👏
I like HB guitars but the majic is in the players fingers. Check out Jack Pearson formerly of the Allman Brothers and considered a Pro's Pro. He plays a Squier Strat on Tour, in clubs and recoding. It's completely bone stock and sounds amazing so I'm not surprised that the HB sounds great too. Think I'm gonna buy a HB35 myself. BTW You can check Jack Pearson out on you tube just type in his name !
Hi Barry, I know Jack, we’ve met a couple of times. Jack is one of my favourite players, one of the very best - he makes a Squier Strat sound better than virtually any other guitarist playing a custom shop Fender.
The guitarist from Genesis was also using a Squier strat on a recent tour.
Thanks for your comment 🙏
I hope to win so I can do a studio recording video with it! Liked sub'd Instagram followed!
Proves you don’t need to spend thousands on a Guitar
Exactly Michael, the reason behind this whole experiment was a kid I taught said to me, “I’d play that song so much better on a better guitar”, he was playing a high end Squier Classic Vibe strat - a great guitar. It’s currently 70+ tour dates in this year, incredible performance from a budget instrument.
pick-ups are a bit weak? my 73 strats pickups are only about 5 ohms thing is SHOCK HORROR NEWS FLASH,,,amps have got a volume knob on them,,,who would have believed it,,a volume knob that makes shit louder,,,,erm yeah.
I don’t think it’s that simple. As I said in the video, I like the sound of these pickups. They have a fantastic clean, glassy sound, probably similar to the pickups on your Strat. However, in the context of a studio session or touring gig with multiple guitars and quick changes, this guitar’s pickups are pretty quiet. Yes, you can use a boost pedal to bring up the signal, but that increases noise. In my experience, they’re also more prone to interference noise than better quality pickups (although that could be the electronics).
I would suggest to people buying these guitars to stick with the pickups for a while. Replacement pickups (even basic ones) are more money than I payed for this guitar. Also, a lot of people replaced the pickups on early 70’s Strat’s for higher powered Dimarzio’s / EMG’s / Seymour Duncan’s etc….
@@ScottPoleyMusic yep i agree, pain in the arse changing volume when you swap guitars but just like i said thats why amps have volume knobs. i have a jem with evo's in it and one with joe paf's in it jacksons with duncans in them and an old harley benton "one of the first i think" single coils and my strat and an old tele, tele i use for country and strat for dire straits and chris rea, each guitar to its own really, i have to change the volume on the amps or desk whenever i change from humbucker in ya face screamin wall of sound, to subtle nice calming jangly honky strat tones, but there you are really,,, different guitars for different styles, if you want raw power go with your dimarzio's/duncans, if you want sultans of swing, stick with the strats weaker single coil pickups, simple