Squier Sonic Telecaster vs Harley Benton TE-62CC | Finding the best Tele under $200! Guitar Shootout

Today, we’re trying to find the best Telecaster for under $200/€200 by comparing the Squier Sonic Telecaster and the Harley Benton TE-62CC!

Squier Sonic Tele at Thomann: https://thmn.to/thoprod/561023?offid=...
Squier Sonic Tele at Sweetwater: https://sweetwater.sjv.io/PyWDJj
Harley Benton TE-62CC LPB at Thomann: https://thmn.to/thoprod/502822?offid=...

The Sonic Tele (mine is in the beautiful California Blue finish) is part of Squier’s 2023 Sonic Series, and it replaces the Bullet Series as Squier and Fender’s most affordable lineup. The Tele costs around $200/€179, so it’s very much aimed at students and beginners, but Fender say the Sonic Series also offers great guitars for players at any stage on their guitar journey.

The Sonic Tele features a poplar body and a C-shape satin finish maple neck with an Indian laurel fingerboard with a 9.5” radius. The bridge is top loading, the hardware is chrome, and you get a pair of Squier-designed single coil Tele pickups too. In short, quite a lot for your money!

The Harley Benton TE-62CC, however, is even cheaper, coming in at around €149 – and, as usual for the brand, it has excellent specs on paper. Here we have a basswood body finished in Lake Placid Blue, two Roswell T-style pickups, and chrome hardware. The neck is where the two guitars also differ greatly: the TE-62CC features a roasted maple neck and fingerboard, which features a 12” radius, and the neck’s profile is a sleek to slim D shape.

So we can expect significantly different playing experiences from the two guitars, but which is the best choice? Which sounds better? Which plays better? And which is best value for money? That’s what we’re going to find out today, so join me in this Harley Benton vs Squier guitar shootout as I test them in as many different musical styles as I can, from country, folk and indie, to pop, rock, blues, punk, metal and more. Let me know which guitar you think is best in the comments!

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

00:00 Hello!
00:15 Introduction and what we’re doing today
01:35 Squier specs and info
04:26 Harley Benton specs and info
06:36 Today’s rig and plan

Clean Sounds
07:40 Clean tone reference chords
08:15 Ringing open indie pop chords
08:41 Funk rhythm chords
08:55 Country ballad arpeggios
09:08 Country lead sound
09:22 Ascending droning indie chords
09:35 Blues progression
09:58 Strummed folk pop chords

Overdrive Sounds
10:15 Droning indie riff
10:30 Edgy indie barre chords
10:44 Mellow indie rock chords
11:01 Indie rock barre chords
11:25 Garage rock riff
11:41 Kings Of Leon inspired riff
11:56 AC/DC inspired classic rock riff
12:11 Airbourne inspired rock riff
12:34 Groovy rock riff
12:48 Quacky classic rock riff
12:57 Classic rock riff
13:14 Hendrix inspired riff

Heavy Overdrive Sounds
13:31 Classic hard rock riff
13:48 Hard rock riff
14:05 Hard rock melodic lead
14:27 80s rock riff
14:47 Glam rock rhythm riff
15:14 Alternative rock riff
15:38 Pop punk riff
16:04 Pop punk melodic lead riff
16:20 Green Day inspired punk rock riff
16:47 Punk rock power chords
17:00 Progressive rock riff (Drop D tuning)
17:16 Modern rock palm-muted power chords (Drop D)
17:42 Rage Against The Machine inspired groovy riff (Drop D)

Metal sounds (all in Drop D)
17:59 Metal chugging riff
18:17 Mastodon inspired metal riff with country twang
18:41 Heavy metal lead sound
18:58 Rammstein inspired industrial metal riff
19:11 Hardcore punk riff
19:39 Classic metal/sludge riff

20:15 My thoughts
21:01 Price
21:34 Looks/aesthetics
22:27 Build quality/feel
24:03 Weight
24:43 Feel and the HB’s roasted maple neck
25:00 Playability and necks
26:19 Sounds and pickups discussion
29:23 Which guitar is better? Which should you buy?
31:41 Final conclusions

My setup was as follows: I ran the guitars into my Hughes & Kettner Black Spirit 200 head, also using my Revv G3 pedal for heavy distortion sounds. 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.

Here’s some links to those bits of gear:

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H&K Black Spirit 200 head: https://thmn.to/thoprod/447827?offid=...
Revv G3: https://thmn.to/thoprod/437353?offid=...
Focusrite 4i4 (the new 2i4): https://thmn.to/thoprod/467952?offid=...
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Enjoy!


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

#Squier #HarleyBenton #SquierGuitars #SquierTelecaster #Telecaster #SquierSonic #HarleyBentonGuitar #Telecaster


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