According to my music shop, the Grabber II should be with me "within weeks", the new Ripper "in June or July" and the BFG bass "after the other two". We'll see. This forum will be the first to know.
In the above description, the Grabber II is supposedly flat black, that could fit with non-sealed pores and even a see-thru pick guard.
As regards the "not everything old is good"-doubt, Gibson can probably say that the two most successful basses in recent years - SG and TB - are both reissues of shapes that were also the most popular (EB) or iconic (TB) in the sixties. Following these two, the next bass model family that had a larger impact on the market were the Grabber/Ripper/G-3, for Gibson standards, those were popular basses in the seventies, the Grabber quickly outselling the EB-line. So it's not exactly nuts to assume that the Grabber II might find 350 buyers today. And those 350 will scarcely be people comparing the Grabber to Yamaha and Ibanez price lists and what value for money you could get there. Rather they will be seeing this thing more like a Custom Shop instrument, Gibson's modern day homage in better quality to what was once a budget instrument.
