So, my wife started playing bass and has been taking lessons on and off for the last couple of years. She was using mostly my 5 string Musicmans, yet I thought it'd be nice for her to have her own proper 4 stringer. So for her last B-day (April) I looked for stuff in the sub 200€ range from thomann (#1 source for online purchasing here in Europe). They happen to have this nice Harley Benton brand. My only previous experience with their instruments was a P-style kit which is great in fact (now I also own a uke bass from them which is great too). So first I got the B450 model (148€, twin big pole humbuckers, active 2 band EQ). It sucked big time, poor resonance, generic sounding (some call this "modern"), individual string bridges (which I hate and no matter the brand find they deaden the sound), terrible electronics. Swapped it for a MM84 model (177€, twin Musicman style pickups, active 3 band EQ), which sucked way beyond, an unplayable peace of crap neck (don't see a reason why anyone would like, much less build a thick neck in the CNC era, period), had to rewire the 5 position switch as it was unusable stock (too many series connections made for abominable mismatches both in EQ and volume), also had to rewire the output jack as it wouldn't cut the battery when unplugged (in fact it came with a dead battery, rookie stuff at best), also had the worst filed frets I've ever touched in my life, terrible to the point of cutting my girl's fingers often. So, I recently put that m/f for sale and hopefully today somebody will take it away before I smash it against a wall or put fire on it and watch it burn with a BIG smile.
I was remorseful for not being able to gift my girl with the right bass for her to progress so I kept looking and last week an Epiphone Toby Deluxe caught my attention and pulled. After reading some reviews and listening to some samples I pulled the trigger. 175€ new. It made it home yesterday. Just WOW! Didn't even have to set it up. Straight and low (and believe me, I like and setup my basses LOW and SOFT, but I didn't even have to touch a thing on this). This thing's neck is so comfortable (THIN!) and fast, even better than my Maruszczyk's, it's THAT good. It's light but feels solid and resonates so nicely, great sustain. If anyone gave me this bass and said 500€ I'd still consider it GREAT value. Pickups and electronics are just OK, I'd prefer the usual bass+treble control with center detent instead of the treble cut+tone expressor thingy (bass boost/cut with no detent), yet it does nice in achieving a great variety of tones. I can notice the hiss many people mention in reviews but it's definitely not that big a deal and would probably be solved with some higher gain pickups.
All in all the best thing I've ever played under 200€, so much value for the money. And most important thing (moreso being for a beginner) VERY INVITING TO PLAY. Below, the only (mobile) pic I have of it, for I know the POIDH rule and am not willing to breach such seminal law...
I was remorseful for not being able to gift my girl with the right bass for her to progress so I kept looking and last week an Epiphone Toby Deluxe caught my attention and pulled. After reading some reviews and listening to some samples I pulled the trigger. 175€ new. It made it home yesterday. Just WOW! Didn't even have to set it up. Straight and low (and believe me, I like and setup my basses LOW and SOFT, but I didn't even have to touch a thing on this). This thing's neck is so comfortable (THIN!) and fast, even better than my Maruszczyk's, it's THAT good. It's light but feels solid and resonates so nicely, great sustain. If anyone gave me this bass and said 500€ I'd still consider it GREAT value. Pickups and electronics are just OK, I'd prefer the usual bass+treble control with center detent instead of the treble cut+tone expressor thingy (bass boost/cut with no detent), yet it does nice in achieving a great variety of tones. I can notice the hiss many people mention in reviews but it's definitely not that big a deal and would probably be solved with some higher gain pickups.
All in all the best thing I've ever played under 200€, so much value for the money. And most important thing (moreso being for a beginner) VERY INVITING TO PLAY. Below, the only (mobile) pic I have of it, for I know the POIDH rule and am not willing to breach such seminal law...
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