Kalamazoo Bass, White

FINISH. The white has aged to cream and the lacquer is checked over the whole instrument, front and back, in a fine dense web. This is old lacquer crazing rather than damage, but it is heavy and it is everywhere.

BACK OF BODY, UPPER BASS SIDE. Over an area about the size of a palm the top coat has flaked away, with lighter streaks running below it toward the middle of the back. What is exposed underneath is a brighter white layer rather than bare wood, so the area reads as patches of fresh white against the aged cream. This is the largest piece of wear on the instrument.

STRING FERRULES. Three of the four are in place on the back, with the string ball ends and their coloured silks visible through them. The fourth position is an open hole with no ferrule, showing bare wood, and the finish is chipped around its rim.

PICKGUARD AND PICKUP ROUTE. The guard is cracked at the upper corner of the pickup route. The cut edge is torn and lifted: heavily and continuously down the treble side of the pickup cutout, along the top of the cutout on both sides of the fingerboard, in smaller patches down the bass side, and chipped through to bare wood where the guard meets the treble edge of the fingerboard. Two vacant screw holes with a faint ghost outline around them sit between the pickup and the volume knob, so something was mounted there and taken off, and a second pair of vacant holes sits on the bass side of the strings.

NECK POCKET. A chip down to bare wood where the body meets the neck on the treble side, roughly half an inch.

CONTROLS AND JACK. The finish is chipped and worn in a ring around both knob shafts and around the output jack, with brown grime built up in those rings.

NECK PLATE. Chrome, four screws in place, and a fifth hole, vacant, at the top centre between the upper pair.

EDGES AND SURFACE. Dings along the body perimeter, heaviest on the lower bout and both horns, plus scratches across the back.

NECK AND HEADSTOCK. Natural maple worn to a dull sheen with light marks, and no break, repair or plugged hole anywhere on it. Rosewood board with dot inlays, doubled at the twelfth. Headstock face and script logo clean. There is faint impressed lettering on the back of the headstock that does not resolve.

HARDWARE. All four tuners present in matching chrome housings, plating variously tarnished. Both strap buttons in place. Bridge cover, pickup and both knobs present. Black truss rod cover at the nut, black finger rest above the strings on the treble side.

PLAYS AND WORKS. We have played it. It plays clean, the pickup works through an amp, and both controls do what they should.

CASE. Black chipboard, worn through to the board at every corner and along the edges, latches rusted but present, handle intact. Brown lining with a large pale stain inside the lid, and inked lettering on the lid: a name, an arrow, and THE WILD BUNC drawn in big curling capitals with a swash beneath.

The bass and the black chipboard case it is photographed with. No strap, no cable, no paperwork, no tools.

Kalamazoo was the name Gibson put on its cheapest instruments in the second half of the 1960s. Same Michigan plant as the expensive ones, plainer materials, a bolt on maple neck, and a single chrome covered pickup set right at the end of the fingerboard. A pickup that close to the neck gives a thick, dark sound with very little bite. The body is small and the neck joins it high up, and the whole instrument was built to a price rather than to a spec sheet.

We have played it. It plays, the pickup works through an amp, and both controls do what they should.

This one was played and it shows. The white has gone to cream, and the lacquer is checked front and back in a fine dense web that covers every surface. On the back, on the upper bass side, the top coat has flaked away over an area about the size of a palm, with lighter streaks running below it toward the middle. What is under it is a brighter white layer rather than bare wood, so the flaking reads as patches of fresh white against the aged cream. The pickguard is cracked at the corner of the pickup route. One of the four string ferrules on the back is gone and its hole is open. There is a chip down to bare wood where the body meets the neck on the treble side.

The parts that carry an instrument are sound. The neck is natural maple worn to a dull sheen, with no break, no repair and no plugged holes anywhere on it. The headstock face and the script logo are clean. All four tuners are present in matching housings, both strap buttons are on, and the bridge cover is in place. Nothing reads as refinished or as a parts assembly, and checking this heavy and this even is what an old lacquer does on its own.

It comes with a black chipboard case, worn through to the board at every corner, latches rusted but present, handle intact, brown lining with a large pale stain inside the lid. Somebody inked that lid with their name, then an arrow across to what they were better known as: THE WILD BUNC, drawn in big curling capitals with a swash underneath. We do not know who they were.

Pickup only. We are not shipping instruments yet, so this one is bought here: 215 East Lewis Street, third floor, Livingston, by appointment.

This is for somebody who already owns a bass that covers the ordinary ground and wants a second one built on a different idea. One pickup at the neck, two controls, a small body, and nothing on it to get in the way. It is the cheap end of what came out of the Gibson plant, which is where a fair amount of interesting design happened, and it costs a fraction of what the Gibson badged instruments from the same years cost.

Buy something else if you want an instrument that looks tidy. The checking is on every surface, the flaked area on the back is the first thing anybody notices, and none of that is going to improve. Buy something else if you want a bridge pickup, a tone stack, or a modern bass voice, because there is one pickup at the neck and two knobs and that is the whole instrument. The case carries it and closes, but it is worn out as a case and it is not what you would trust this to in the back of a van. If scale length matters to you, ask us before you come in and we will measure it.