Harley Benton DC-Custom II | Incredible tones and quality for the money! Review & Demo

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This is the Harley Benton DC-Custom II in White: a new, affordable evolution of the brand’s take on the Gibson/Epiphone SG style of guitar!

Get the DC-Custom II here:

At €299, the DC-Custom II is definitely in the ‘cheap guitar’ domain, especially for a new guitar released in 2024 – but a quick look at the spec sheet shows you that, as usual, Harley Benton is really pushing the value for money boundaries.

You get a meranti body and neck here (meranti being a mahogany-esque tonewood, apparently), and a roasted jatoba fingerboard. The neck’s made to a Gibson 628 mm scale length with a fingerboard radius of 350 mm and a 42 mm graphite nut, and you get Grover tuners and 24 Blacksmith stainless steel frets. Yep, stainless steel frets for €299!

The body is a more offset, metal looking take on the SG – it reminds me a lot of an ESP/LTD Viper 256 – and the white finish and gold hardware make for a really elegant look. Pickups are a pair of Tesla TM VR-Nitro humbuckers, with a coil split too, which should make this guitar extra versatile.

All things considered, this is a lot of guitar for the money, but how does the DC-Custom II compare to the competition from the likes of Epiphone? That’s what we’re about to find out! Here, I put the guitar through its paces in as many different musical styles as I can, from country, folk and indie, to pop, rock, punk, metal, and more.

Let me know your thoughts on the DC-Custom II in the comments!

Here are some links to the various playing samples and info bits:

00:00 Hello!
00:20 Introduction to the DC-Custom II
01:26 Specs and info
05:04 Today’s rig and plan

Clean Sounds
05:37 Clean tone reference chords on all pickup settings
06:07 Country ballad arpeggios
06:19 Grungey droning open string riff
06:36 Blues progression
06:48 Country twang lead sound
07:02 Funky rhythms
07:15 Strummed country chords
07:34 Ringing open indie pop chords
07:47 Wolfmother inspired riff
07:57 Ascending droning indie chords
08:11 Tone control test
09:09 Atmospheric arpeggios

Light and Medium Overdrive Sounds
09:27 Fat indie rock rhythm chords
09:58 Choppy barre chords
10:16 Kings Of Leon inspired riff
10:31 Droning open string indie riff
10:44 Garage rock riff
11:00 Indie octave chords
11:26 Upbeat indie barre chords
11:50 Volume control roll off test
12:10 Another KoL riff
12:17 Groovy classic rock riff
12:32 AC/DC inspired riff
12:50 Classic rock riff
13:05 Hendrix inspired riff
13:22 Airbourne inspired rock riff
13:33 Quacky rock riff

Heavy Overdrive Sounds
13:42 Glam rock riff
13:53 Van Halen inspired riff
14:13 80s rock riff
14:33 Single note NWOBHM riff
14:54 Hard rock lead sound (w/ extra delay)
15:05 Chunky alt rock chords
15:28 Alternative rock riff
15:42 Pop punk riff
15:54 Punk rock power chords
16:09 Green Day inspired punk rock riff
16:22 Thrash riff
16:32 Progressive rock riff (Drop D tuning)
16:48 Modern rock palm-muted chords (Drop D)
17:13 Rage Against The Machine inspired groovy riff (Drop D)

Heavy Distortion Sounds (all in Drop D)
17:29 Metal chugging riff
17:46 Pop metal riff
17:57 Heavy metal lead sound
18:12 Mastodon inspired metal riff with country twang
18:24 Rammstein inspired industrial metal riff
18:37 Hardcore punk riff
18:49 Thrash metal riffs
19:08 Hardcore punk breakdown
19:23 Classic heavy metal/sludge riff

20:02 My thoughts
20:47 First impressions and looks
21:27 Weight
21:51 Build quality and hardware
22:37 Playability and neck
23:53 Sounds and pickups
27:26 What other similar SG-type guitars are out there?
29:03 My conclusions on the DC-Custom II and why you should buy it

My setup was as follows: I ran the guitar into my Hughes & Kettner Black Spirit 200 head, also using my Greer Lightspeed and my Revv G3 pedals for overdrive and heavy distortion sounds (and a cheeky TC Triple Delay for the lead sound!). The amp went from the Red Box DI straight into my Focusrite Scarlett 2i4, which went into Logic Pro X. That's it. No post-processing on the sounds was done.

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Backing music from the YouTube Audio Library: Duck In The Alley – TrackTribe.

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