The Dean Backwoods 2 is a five-string resonator banjo with a magnetic pickup sitting on the head at the neck end and a volume knob on the rim. Dean lists it at $549, which puts it against decent acoustic banjos that have no electronics at all. That trade — a pickup you get for free, a banjo that costs a hundred and fifty dollars less than it looks — is the whole question about this instrument.
The answer is that it is the wrong trade, and Dean’s own specification sheet says why before you get anywhere near the sound. The nut is 1 1/8 inches wide. Every other five-string banjo in this bracket is between 1 3/16 and 1 1/4. That is a couple of millimeters, and on a banjo neck a couple of millimeters decides whether your fingers fit.
Ortega Falcon OBJE400
The same idea done properly: a quilted maple resonator over a maple ply rim with a brass tone ring, a passive pickup with volume control, a maple neck, 22 frets, an armrest and a deluxe gig bag. The nut is 31 mm, so there is room to fret cleanly. About a hundred dollars more than the Dean listed for, and a materially better banjo before you plug anything in.
What Dean actually built
The pot is eastern mahogany with a clear Remo head, so you look through the drum head to the wood underneath — the one genuinely distinctive thing about the instrument, and the reason it photographs better than it plays. Twenty-four brackets pull the head down, which is generous; budget banjos often use sixteen.
There is no tone ring. Dean’s description of the dearer Backwoods 2 Pro says it adds a brass tone ring and a thicker pot to the standard model, which tells you what the standard model does not have. A resonator with no tone ring is a specific sound: plenty of volume, very little of the metallic crack that carries a banjo over a fiddle and a mandolin. It will not front a bluegrass band acoustically, which matters here because the pickup does not fix that either.
The neck is nyatoh, with a flat black walnut fingerboard, pearloid dots and 21 frets on a 26 1/2 inch scale. It bolts on through a four-bolt plate like an electric guitar neck rather than sitting on coordinator rods, so there is no rod to turn when the action creeps up — a truss rod adjustment and a taller or shorter bridge are the only levers you have. The nut is PPS plastic, the bridge is rosewood rather than the usual maple with an ebony cap, and the tuners are sealed die-cast.
| Dean Backwoods 2 | Ortega Falcon OBJE400 | Gold Tone EBM-5 | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Pot | Eastern mahogany resonator | Maple ply rim, quilted maple resonator | Hollow mahogany F-style body |
| Tone ring | None | Brass | 8″ aluminum |
| Head | 11″ clear Remo | Remo Fiberskin style | 8″ Remo MC smooth |
| Neck | Nyatoh, bolt-on | Maple | Maple |
| Fingerboard | Black walnut, flat | Maple | Ebony, snowflake inlay |
| Frets | 21 | 22 | 21 |
| Scale | 26 1/2″ | 26 3/8″ (670 mm) | 26 3/8″ |
| Nut width | 1 1/8″ (29 mm) | 1 7/32″ (31 mm) | 1 3/16″ |
| Pickup | Magnetic, neck position | Passive, with volume control | Neck humbucker plus SMP+ under the head |
| In the box | Banjo | Deluxe gig bag | Hard case |
| Price | Listed at $549 | ~$650 | ~$1,400 |
The neck is the thing that decides it
A 1 1/8 inch nut is narrow for a five-string. Deering cuts the Goodtime at 1 1/4. Gold Tone cuts theirs at 1 3/16. Ortega cuts the Falcon at 31 mm, a shade over 1 7/32. The Backwoods 2 is between one and a half and three millimeters tighter than any of them, and it has a flat fingerboard radius on top of that.
Three-finger banjo picking asks you to plant two fingers and a thumb on the head and fret cleanly with the other hand while a drone string sits right where your first finger wants to go. Take two millimeters out of the spacing and adult fingers start touching the neighboring string on pull-offs. One owner put it flatly: the neck is skinny enough that they could not get a pull-off out without muting something. That is not a setup complaint and no amount of adjustment fixes it.
The flip side is real and worth stating. If you have small hands, or you are coming from a mandolin, a narrow neck is easier rather than harder. This is the one specification on the instrument that genuinely suits somebody — it just is not the general beginner the marketing points at.
What the pickup does, and what it does not
Dean’s DMT humbucker sits on the head between the neck and the bridge, sensing the steel strings directly rather than listening to the drum head. That is the right kind of pickup for a loud stage: magnetic units ignore the room, so they do not howl the way a microphone or an under-head transducer will once the monitors come up. Plugged in, the Backwoods 2 does exactly what it says on the box, and the owners who gig it say so.
The catch is string balance. A five-string set runs from a .010 plain steel first to a .024 wound fourth, which is a huge spread of steel for one pickup to read evenly, and getting it level depends entirely on how the unit is positioned over the strings. Better banjo pickups solve this with pole pieces set for banjo gauges. Owners of this one report fighting it — one describing the third string coming through so much louder than the rest that a roll sounded like a mistake, another simply saying the pickup was hard to set and adjust. Budget an evening with the height screws.
The wider point is the one that should decide your purchase. A banjo pickup is a $150 to $190 part that mounts in an afternoon and comes off again just as easily. The banjo underneath it is neither cheap nor removable. Letting the pickup choose the instrument is backward.
What owners report
It arrives with the bridge loose in the box. That is normal for every banjo ever made — the bridge is held on by string tension alone and has to be positioned by ear — but nobody tells first-time buyers, and it is the single most common source of panic on delivery.
Beyond that the reports split the way they usually do on an import at this money: some arrive fine, some do not. Paint blemishes and a nut filed too deep both turn up, and one owner found the strings sitting off-center over the fingerboard, which is a neck alignment problem and not something a bridge move corrects. The ones that arrive right get warm reviews, particularly from people using it in country and rock bands rather than for bluegrass.
Dean publishes no weight for it, and any figure quoted in a retail listing is a shipping weight that counts the carton. The closest banjo anyone does publish a real figure for — an eleven-inch resonator with no tone ring — is six pounds, and nothing without a tone ring gets much past that. What catches people out is not the mass but the shape: a resonator has a rounded back that wants to roll off a lap, which is why a strap is not optional on one of these. What a banjo actually weighs, model by model has the published figures.
One thing worth knowing about the maker rather than the instrument: Dean’s parent company, Armadillo Enterprises, filed for Chapter 11 restructuring in June 2026. Armadillo have said Dean continues and that existing orders and dealer commitments will be honored. It is not a reason to panic, but on a $549 instrument it is a reason to think about who services a warranty claim.
What to buy instead
Ortega Falcon OBJE400
- Quilted maple resonator, maple ply rim
- Brass tone ring
- Passive pickup with volume control
- Maple neck and maple fingerboard, 22 frets
- 670 mm scale, 31 mm nut, adjustable truss rod
- 24 brackets, brushed nickel hardware, armrest
- Remo Fiberskin-style head
- Deluxe gig bag included, ~$650
This is what the Backwoods 2 wanted to be. The brass tone ring is the difference that matters — it is the part that gives a resonator banjo its bark, it cannot be retrofitted for less than the price gap, and the Dean simply does not have one. The nut is wide enough to play properly, the armrest and the gig bag are in the box rather than on the accessories list, and the maple rim is a real one.
The honest caveat is that the built-in pickup is a passive transducer rather than a magnetic unit, so it amplifies the banjo’s own voice rather than producing an electric tone of its own, and it is more prone to feedback at volume than a magnetic pickup would be. For most players that is the right compromise. For a loud stage it is not, and a magnetic pickup is what solves that.
- Brass tone ring where the Dean has none
- 31 mm nut and a maple neck
- Armrest and deluxe gig bag included
- 22 frets rather than 21
- Around a hundred dollars more
- Passive transducer, not a magnetic pickup
- Maple fingerboard divides opinion on feel
Gold Tone SMP+ Sliding Magnetic Pickup
- Magnetic humbucker, the same principle as the Dean’s
- Mounts on the coordinator rods — no soldering, no drilling
- Slides anywhere between the neck and the bridge
- Kit includes the output jack, mounting plate, wire clamps and hex wrench
- Fits five-string banjos with single or dual coordinator rods
- ~$150, against a $169.99 list
This is the argument of the whole page in one part. For about a quarter of what the Backwoods 2 listed at, the banjo you already own becomes the banjo that plugs in — and unlike a factory-fitted unit, you can slide this one toward the neck for a fatter tone or back toward the bridge for more attack, then take it off entirely when you sell the instrument.
Gold Tone builds it well enough to use it themselves — the EBM-5 carries one hidden under its head. The one requirement is coordinator rods, the steel rods running across the inside of the pot. Bluegrass and resonator banjos have them. Most open backs, and the Backwoods 2 with its bolt-on neck plate, do not — for those the answer is a bridge pickup.
- Magnetic, so it holds up on a loud stage
- Sliding mount, so you can tune the tone by position
- No soldering and no holes drilled in the rim
- Comes off again with a hex wrench
- Needs coordinator rods, so it will not fit every banjo
- Adds an external jack and a cable to manage
- Sounds like an electric banjo, which is not always what you want
L.R. Baggs Banjo Pickup
- Vibration sensor molded into a 5/8″ maple bridge
- Fits any five-string banjo — you change the bridge
- Custom jack and mounting system included
- Sounds like the banjo, amplified
- ~$190, which is L.R. Baggs’ own price
The neatest solution on the page. Rather than mounting a pickup inside the pot, L.R. Baggs molded their sensor into the bridge itself, so fitting it is the same job as changing a bridge — no rods to clamp to, no rim to drill, nothing that cares whether your banjo has a resonator. That makes it the only option here for an open back.
Because it reads the bridge rather than the strings, it amplifies the instrument’s own voice, head and all — closer to a microphone than to the Dean’s magnetic unit. That is the better sound in a listening room and the harder one to control in front of a loud drummer. Pick on the basis of the room, not the price.
- Fits any banjo, open back included
- Nothing drilled and nothing clamped
- Amplifies the banjo’s real voice
- Sold at the maker’s own price
- Dearer than the Gold Tone
- More feedback-prone at high volume
- You are committed to their bridge height
Gold Tone EBM-5
- Hollow F-style mahogany body, 8″ Remo head
- 8″ aluminum tone ring
- Humbucker at the neck plus an SMP+ under the head
- Maple neck, ebony board, snowflake inlays, 21 frets
- 26 3/8″ scale, 1 3/16″ nut, GT planetary tuners
- 8.3 lb, GDGBD, hard case included
- Set up in Titusville, Florida — ~$1,400
An entirely different proposition, and what a good many people looking for an acoustic-electric banjo actually want. Two pickups feeding separate knobs, an eight-inch pot that is quiet enough to practice on unamplified, and a body shaped like a mandolin so it hangs on a strap without a rim digging into your forearm.
It is three times the money, so it is not a Backwoods 2 alternative for most people. It is the honest answer to the question the Backwoods 2 was asking, and it is built by a company that puts a weight on its spec sheet and sets every instrument up before it ships.
- Two pickups, properly voiced for banjo
- Aluminum tone ring and an ebony board
- Quiet acoustically, which is a feature on an electric
- Hard case included
- Around three times the price
- An 8″ pot is not a bluegrass banjo
- 8.3 lb
Who the Backwoods 2 does suit
Small hands. That narrow nut and flat board are a genuine advantage if the standard banjo neck feels like a plank, and there is very little else built that way. Guitarists moving across will also find the four-bolt neck and the 26 1/2 inch scale familiar in a way a traditional pot assembly is not.
It also suits a band that is amplified anyway. Without a tone ring the Backwoods 2 has no acoustic cut, but through a PA that stops mattering, and the clear head is a genuinely striking thing on a stage. If you play country or rock rather than bluegrass, and everything you do goes through a mixing desk, the missing tone ring costs you far less than it would a bluegrass player.
What it will not do is bluegrass acoustically, and that is worth being clear about before you buy any resonator banjo — the difference between an open back and a resonator is about the pot and the tone ring together, not the resonator alone.
Common questions
Is the Dean Backwoods 2 a good beginner banjo?
Only if you have small hands. The narrow nut is the deciding factor and it is not adjustable. A beginner with average hands will make faster progress on a wider neck, and at this money there are several — the banjos worth starting on sets out the range.
What is the difference between the Backwoods 2 and the Backwoods 2 Pro?
The Pro adds a brass tone ring, a thicker pot and two extra frets — 23 rather than 21 — for $250 more at list. The tone ring is the substantive one; it is what turns a loud banjo into a cutting one. Everything else about the two instruments, including the 1 1/8 inch nut, is the same.
Do you need an amp to play it?
No. It is a complete acoustic banjo with a pickup added, and it plays unplugged like any other resonator banjo without a tone ring: loud, warm, not especially cutting. The jack is there when you want it.
Can you fit a better pickup to it?
Not the Gold Tone SMP+, which clamps to coordinator rods this banjo does not have. The L.R. Baggs bridge pickup will fit, because it fits anything. In practice, if you are replacing the pickup on a $549 banjo you have answered the question about whether it was the right banjo.
Is there a six-string version?
Yes — the Backwoods 6, which is a guitar-tuned banjo with a 25 1/2 inch scale and a 1 11/16 inch nut, so it plays like a guitar rather than a banjo. That is a different instrument for a different player, and the six-string banjos worth buying sets out the options.
Verdict
The Backwoods 2 is a competent budget resonator banjo with a good idea attached to it. The clear head looks superb, twenty-four brackets is more than the price suggests, and the magnetic pickup is the right sort for a stage. But the money went into the electronics and the finish rather than the two things that decide how a banjo plays and sounds — the neck width and the tone ring — and neither can be added later.
Which is the argument against buying any banjo for its pickup. A pickup is a part; it costs $150 to $190, it goes on in an afternoon, and it comes off again. Buy the best banjo you can hold comfortably, then plug it in when you need to. If you are still weighing the instrument itself, the banjos worth stepping up to and what a banjo actually costs are the places to look next.