"The Budget Beatle"
by Mick -
4/24/2009 12:14:42 PM
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| Musical Experience: |
Style of Music: |
Hometown: |
| former professional |
rock |
Nashville, TN |
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In February of 1964 I was 10 years old. Like just about every other kid in America on February 9th, I planted myself that evening in front of our black-and-white RCA TV to see the much anticipated appearance of the Beatles on Ed Sullivan. "I Want to Hold Your Hand" had gone to Number 1 just in time for their first large-scale performance in the U.S. And then it happened: Ed said, "Here they are - THE BEATLES!" Cut to The Beatles on stage. The boys swung into "All My Loving." In the next five minutes a nation fell in love with four lads from Liverpool. I was already into music at the time. I sang and I'd played viola and ukulele and was already playing a tenor guitar. But that night, of many memorable moments, one of the things that was burned indelibly into my consciousness was Paul's bass. I'd never seen anything like it, of course. That violin shape. Awesome! I HAD to have one. Unfortunately, they weren't available in Baltimore in 1964 (maybe nowhere in the U.S.), and wouldn't be for a very long time. And anyway, I was ten. If they’d cost $50.00, they might as well be $5000.00. By the time I was buying my first bass about 10 years later (I'd been playing guitar), I'd been told by many that the Beatle Basses weren’t really very good. They had hot spots and dead spots on the neck. In fact, Paul himself wasn’t playing the Hofner anymore. So I opted to get something with a bit less, um, character. I got the blond Rickenbacker Paul was playing at the time. “I’ll get the Hofner later,” I told myself. When “later” came, and I had the wherewithal to own more than one bass, the Hofner’s prices had been adjusted to reflect its iconic status in the rock guitar pantheon. I couldn’t justify the expenditure. So I got a G&L. “I’ll get the Hofner later,” I told myself. Over the ensuing years, I even toyed a couple times with the idea of buying a copycat. It wouldn’t be a Hofner, but at least I’d have a violin-bass. You never forget your first love, though, and I never stopped wanting to fulfill what had been an unrequited love. Then I saw the ad for the Hofner Icon B series. That was it! The OFFICIAL Beatle bass (sorta). I was on Music123 in the proverbial New York minute! About a month later, it arrived (it’d been on back-order). I opened the box, and pulled the guitar out of the plastic bag. I have to tell you, I welled up a little. Ask yourself: How many things can you name that you would say you’ve wanted for forty-six years? Not abstract stuff like success or love (we all want that), but a particular thing. There was only one item on my list – and now it’s hanging on my wall. It gives me pride and joy just looking at it. May your dreams, too, be fulfilled.
By the way, the action on the Icon is very fast. I was struck by how slender the neck is. It’s narrower at the twelfth fret than the nut width on my Yamaha five-string. Because it’s hollow, the Icon is very light, which makes you think it’s insubstantial. In much the same way, the Icon is ill-equipped for certain things. You can’t slap it , but the things it does it does very, very well: It sounds like a Hofner Beatle Bass, and it looks like February 9th, 1964.
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