So I ordered a Harley Benton MB-5 3-Tone Sunburst on Oct. 6th from Thomann and It arrived at my door on Oct. 14th. Not bad from Europe to NY.
It came double boxed but the outer box was torn open so of course I was worried about it's condition. I made the mail guy wait before I signed off on it. If it was damaged in any way I was going to refuse delivery.
After opening the inner box and inspecting the bass it turned out it was flawless. I was actually surprised. I thought for sure it was gonna be messed up after seeing the condition of the outer box. I guess the outer box did it's job.
The bass itself, like I said, was flawless. Fit and finish are remarkable for a cheapo bass. The bass feels substantial and well put together.
The hardware is what it is. It is on par with the Douglas stuff Rondo puts out. Not great but usable. The tuners hold tune well. The plastic nut seems well cut. The knobs work great with no noise or scratchiness.
The neck takes some getting used to. I have been playing 4 string Jazz necks up until this point. The nut width is 45mm. I am not to sure of the string spacing but it is tighter than I am used to. Front to back the neck feels a bit chunky in my hand. The frets are level which I find surprising for such a cheap bass. The only real problem I have is that there is a lot of fret sprout. No biggie as it is nothing I can't fix myself.
I brought the bass to band practice to give it a work out. Going from a four to five is a lot harder than I thought LOL. The bass has a passive humbucker that comes with 2 separate volumes (one for each coil) and a single tone knob. I just used the bass with both volumes and tone wide open. The output of the bass is really low compared to the Fender 4 string PJ I also brought to practice with me. I had to raise the input gain and volume on my amp to get the bass to the same levels as my other bass. No biggie I guess. That being said, it sounds surprisingly good. It has a growl to it that I was not expecting. The bass sat good in the mix and the lows were pretty defined. The B string wasn't as sloppy as I thought it was going to be. I didn't go below D on the B string and found fretting the E came in handy as opposed to playing it open on the E string. The only thing the bass really lacked was high end spank (could be do the the crappy strings it came with). I am a Fender P and/or J guy so honestly I am not sure what MM style basses are capable of.
All in all it is a fantastic bass at $160 shipped. For my first five string I think I made a good decision getting this thing and have no regrets at all. I am glad I made the purchase.
It came double boxed but the outer box was torn open so of course I was worried about it's condition. I made the mail guy wait before I signed off on it. If it was damaged in any way I was going to refuse delivery.
After opening the inner box and inspecting the bass it turned out it was flawless. I was actually surprised. I thought for sure it was gonna be messed up after seeing the condition of the outer box. I guess the outer box did it's job.
The bass itself, like I said, was flawless. Fit and finish are remarkable for a cheapo bass. The bass feels substantial and well put together.
The hardware is what it is. It is on par with the Douglas stuff Rondo puts out. Not great but usable. The tuners hold tune well. The plastic nut seems well cut. The knobs work great with no noise or scratchiness.
The neck takes some getting used to. I have been playing 4 string Jazz necks up until this point. The nut width is 45mm. I am not to sure of the string spacing but it is tighter than I am used to. Front to back the neck feels a bit chunky in my hand. The frets are level which I find surprising for such a cheap bass. The only real problem I have is that there is a lot of fret sprout. No biggie as it is nothing I can't fix myself.
I brought the bass to band practice to give it a work out. Going from a four to five is a lot harder than I thought LOL. The bass has a passive humbucker that comes with 2 separate volumes (one for each coil) and a single tone knob. I just used the bass with both volumes and tone wide open. The output of the bass is really low compared to the Fender 4 string PJ I also brought to practice with me. I had to raise the input gain and volume on my amp to get the bass to the same levels as my other bass. No biggie I guess. That being said, it sounds surprisingly good. It has a growl to it that I was not expecting. The bass sat good in the mix and the lows were pretty defined. The B string wasn't as sloppy as I thought it was going to be. I didn't go below D on the B string and found fretting the E came in handy as opposed to playing it open on the E string. The only thing the bass really lacked was high end spank (could be do the the crappy strings it came with). I am a Fender P and/or J guy so honestly I am not sure what MM style basses are capable of.
All in all it is a fantastic bass at $160 shipped. For my first five string I think I made a good decision getting this thing and have no regrets at all. I am glad I made the purchase.
