Harley Benton MB-4 SBK Deluxe Series

When I first seen this bass, I instantly liked the look. I bought it to be my experimental platform for flatwound strings, and intended to change the pickup straight away. But the stock pickup sounds fine to me, and an overall quality is very good, so I decided not to modify anything.
For this price it is really hard to beat.

Update - I installed a push pull for a series-parallel connection of the coils. This humbucker has 4 wires, so you could easily do it. It has the same color wires as seymour duncan, so just look for the wiring diagram on seymour duncan website, called Jazz Bass series wiring. As it seems, it was wired a parallel before, hence the output was average. Now it has also an additional "real" humbucker sound. Highly recommended and easy mode.

The HB was really well put together. It was playable straight out of the box. Almost every bass I’ve ever bought needed a few tweaks to make it right, and the HB was no exception. The main tweak was the action (string height) at the nut…each string slot needed a little file to lower the string (being careful to not go too low!). It took about 10 minutes and made a huge difference. I took it on a session together with my Status Retro Jazz…an unfair comparison as the Status cost 35 times the HB. The HB was more than adequate; it had the honky sound of a Stingray, it sat well, with no neck dive, smooth frets, a slightly fatter neck profile than the Jazz…a joy to play. A P bass sounds like a P bass, a J bass sounds like a J bass, and the HB sounds like a Stingray. It’s a great looking bass, nice and light. Un-be-f8cking-lievable at this price. Couple of negatives: the pole pieces in the pickup protrude a little more than I’d like, and the tuners feel cheap (but the bass stayed in tune all day). I’ve played £500 basses that are not as good as this. At £119 (UK price Sept 2023) I might just get a few more to match my clothes.

I've played bass for 36 years and have owned some real nice basses over the years - mainly Rickenbackers. I've always liked the look of the Stingray basses and noticed the Harley Benton MB4. To be honest, for the price, I wasn't expecting much, but having received it today I can honestly say that I'm blown away! The quality seems great! No blemishes out of the box - it's perfect. I immediately put some black round-wound strings on it (I like black strings) and tuned it up, plugged it in and gave it a blast... It's got a lovely 'growl' to it and it feels great to play. The only negative I can find is that the action is a little too high for my liking, but that's an easy fix.
If I had paid twice or three times the money for this then I would still be impressed!!

Forget the "at this price point" malarkey, this is one fine bass at any price! Astounding Harley Benton can offer such appointments, solid build quality and downright FUN playability on a such budget friendly instrument. Harley Benton's matte black finishes are something to behold, they really have it down, smooth as silk, all over darkness. Super versatile humbucking pickups and a solid hardware suite make us wonder how anyone can compete? Nice and lively unplugged, as nasty as you wanna be plugged in, simply inspirational and just plain really fun to play. Can't go wrong here.

Can’t beat Thomann music for customer service, speed of shipping and giving the consumer an incredible value. This bass arrived in about 4 days from the time I placed the order. Shipping from Germany to NJ in that time is amazing! It arrived very well packaged and safe without a single blemish. The build quality and sound rivals instruments costing ten times as much. The set up was spot on - easily playable without any buzzing or unpleasantness. Couldn’t find any sharp fret edges. The pictures on the website don’t do the mat black finish justice. Looks way way better in person. I did change the strings to flat wound’s (personal preference ) but there were nothing wrong with the included strings. Overall a very attractive, well built, easy playing, great sounding, great value bass.
Way to go Harley Benton!!