Sunburst RD with one day to go...

Highlander · August 08, 2012, 04:19:35 PM

http://www.ebay.com/itm/VINTAGE-1978-GIBSON-ARTIST-RD-BASS-W-MOOG-ELECTRONICS-730-/110929271748?pt=Guitar&hash=item19d3e65bc4

Don't see this selling at this price...

Highlander · August 08, 2012, 04:28:46 PM

There's another one for sale in East London at an even more expensive price...

Dave W · August 08, 2012, 07:10:13 PM

Don't they typically sell for about half his opening bid?

uwe · August 08, 2012, 07:35:38 PM

I've noticed a decided rise in prices for Gibson basses on Ebay during the last year - it can't be "on account of the economy" (as Herr Springsteen put it so succinctly in The River), either supplies are getting rarer or there are more buyers, stuff you couldn't get arrested with like Flying Vs, RDs, Explorers, Rippers/Grabbers/G-3s in the past have now hiked prices by 25% at least or more. Not just the models from the sixties that were always expensive. I am not saying that you can no longer get these cheaper but you see them too often at high prices from different sellers to not wonder whether the market has moved considerably.

It would be ironic if my Gibsons, which I never collected with value in mind, would prove to be my most successful investment. Something for my heirs to worry about ...

Highlander · August 09, 2012, 03:53:45 PM

Time to review the insurance...

Aussie Mark · August 09, 2012, 05:14:37 PM

Quote from: Dave W on August 08, 2012, 07:10:13 PM
Don't they typically sell for about half his opening bid?

Not sunburst artists. $2000 is around the money.

uwe · August 10, 2012, 03:08:33 PM

2000 bucks is steep unless it were either a factory fretless or an antique burst or a CMT. Regular sunburst wasn't that rare.

Highlander · August 10, 2012, 04:25:06 PM

How many RD's were built...? approx...

Of those, how many were fretless...?

uwe · August 11, 2012, 03:01:43 AM

In the lower thousands maybe? There was a time when they were pushed as Gibson's new future of bass and you did see them - unlike many other Gibson models - in the shops in the late seventies. And people who had never touched a Gibson before played them.

The fretless versions are rare, I've only seen a couple in the last ten years and I was outbid on a fretless tobacco burst RD Artist I had bid $ 2,200 on which I thought was a sure win when most RDs were selling at something like $ 900-1,200 on ebay. $:-\$ I'd say less than a hundred were built.

Highlander · August 12, 2012, 06:45:07 AM

Does that mean an item still on the (ultimate) wants list...?

uwe · August 13, 2012, 03:43:08 PM

Sure, ze Kolleckshün is reasonably representative as Gibson bass collections go, but there are, alas!, gaps ... fretless RD, fretless TBird (a few crept out in the nineties), Rebel Victory (corny if you don't play in Lynyrd Skynyrd tribute, but a must-have), ebony board Grabber, fretless G-3, fretless Victory Artist and 5-String LP Standard. Not to mention the Holy Grail, ze Continental V ...

Highlander · August 13, 2012, 05:22:36 PM

Quote from: uwe on August 13, 2012, 03:43:08 PM
Rebel Victory ...

I thought you were in Norway, not FINland... I know it's awfully close to Norway but they are not FIN's...

(okay, I know you're gonna tell us that there is some tweak in the build that will justify membership...)

uwe · August 13, 2012, 06:04:25 PM

No, indeed, to speak with Rob Halsford, I'd be Brrrreaking the wot? Brrrrreaaaaaaaaking the laaaaaaaaaaaw on that one. You don't know what it's liiiiiiiihiiiiike ...