I saw the Ramones in 1981. They were touring on the album, End of the Century. They opened like the album with Do you remember rock and roll radio. Hard to believe that all four of the band members are dead. The last dying in 2014.

Johnny Ramone epitomizes what a rock guitarists can do with three power chords in a song. What he lacked in skill he more than made up for in style. I remember listening to the Ramones every lunch hour in my senior year of high school and they made playing guitar in a band seem something that was achievable by anyone.

Recently Johnny’s iconic 1965 Mosrite Ventures Il guitar sold at an auction for $937,500. That guitar has mojo. He used in almost every single show of over 2000 shows (from 77 to 1996) and on every album they recorded during the same period.

Made in Bakersfield, California from the Mosrite Ventures II (German Carve Body Type) was made from 1965 to 1966 originally. I always wanted one and will eventually get an original. In the meantime, Harley Benton makes a pretty good copy called the Harley Benton MR-Classic. I paid $220 for the guitar and a gigbag. It was another $80 in shipping.

Carved basswood body with a Bolt-on A-grade Canadian maple neck natural satin finish, Matching headstock to the color of the body.
"C" neck profile, roasted Jatoba fretboard, 12" radius with dot inlays, 22 frets, 25.5 scale length.
42 mm graphite saddle
Double action truss rod

2 x Artec P-90 Alnico-5 vintage-style pickups
1x volume & 1x tone controls
3-way toggle switch
Fixed bridge
Kluson-style Wilkinson tuners
Equipped with D'Addario EXL110 (104555) 010-046 strings.

Overview

The guitar looks great. I love the contouring on the body and the reverse offset of the top wing not extending as foreword as the bottom wing contributes to its rebel persona.

It is the whitest in color guitar I have ever owned.

It is a little heavy as my guitar comes in at 8.5 lbs.

From the headstock down, the tuners are fine, and I do not think they need to be replaced. The nut is graphite and also seems very serviceable. My primary and only complaint with the guitar is the fret leveling is poor. I own six other Harley Benton’s and have been pleasantly surprised until now with the quality of the fretwork. I found a lot of fret rocking up and down the fret board. I will have to do some work on this.

The electronics and pickups are very serviceable, and I also do not see a reason to replace them. Johnny Ramone wouldn’t. That is meant to be a joke. They are actually pretty good.

The bridge is okay. I probably will look for a more quality replacement.

The sound is very Ramones like. Not too clean and very dirty.