At this price point, the Harley Benton is incredibly competitive. The visual aesthetic is very cool (if gold is your thing), the feel is nice, frets are smooth, and there were no visual defects that I could see. It absolutely beats every Bullet Strat I've played, and those go for a similar price.
When played through high gain, there is a strange ringing sound that's almost like fret buzz. It's not though (setting the action ridiculously high and the buzzing still remained). I then thought it might have been the springs, but applying the foam mod to deaden the springs didn't help either. It's not a problem for recording, as I can slap on Soothe2 before the amp sim and cut down on most of the sound.
Using the tremolo bar will throw the guitar out of tune. No amount of string stretching or changing of string gauge helped this - not even throwing on a set of locking tuners (though this did make string changing more convenient, but then again, how often do I change strings?). I'd recommend modding the bridge to work as a hardtail.
The guitar needed a little intonation adjustment out of the box.
All that aside, the sound is good, the feel is great, and there is much less single coil hum compared to my Bullet Strat which makes it much more fun to play with high gain. For the price, this Harley Benton could be an excellent modding platform too.
Overall, for around £150, this Harley Benton Strat has been the perfect budget replacement for my Bullet Strat.
