Late EB-3s ...

[uwe]

Not often do you see post 1972-74 seventies EBs:

This one is real late (1978), white and rare, but steeply priced:



http://cgi.ebay.com/1978-GIBSON-EB-3-BASS-w-ORIGINAL-CASE-RARE-WHITE-EB3_W0QQitemZ290335012522QQcmdZViewItemQQptZGuitar?hash=item439950b6aa&_trksid=p3286.c0.m14


Pricewise, this is more like it, a 1976 model, with an attractive BIN:



http://cgi.ebay.com/1976-GIBSON-EB-3-SG-LES-PAUL-BASS-GUITAR-EBO-EB-3L-EB3_W0QQitemZ330347939177QQcmdZViewItemQQptZGuitar?hash=item4cea458569&_trksid=p3286.c0.m14


Anybody here that would like to pull the trigger on the cherry one? You'd relieve me of temptation.

[Dave W]

$2800 is just plain crazy.

The cherry one is at least within reason but I wouldn't even pay that much for a late EB-3.

[Basvarken]

Saw those too. Both of them beautiful!

Speaking of EB-3s.
In the 27 years that Gibson made them there were many different versions.
(Headstock shapes, mudbucker position, shape of the horns, controls layout etc.)

Which ones would be most desirable?

[uwe]

Other than that they are older, I don't quite see the rage over sixties EB-3s and the scorn for seventies ones. The seventies ones have real advantages such as a sturdier construction, better balance, greater clarity due to changed pups and that maple neck and a varitone set-up with usable sounds (and no hilarious volume differences). Only if you are a mahogany purist is a sixties model the preferable must-have.

[Dave W]

You know it's not just the mahogany. They just don't look right with the lack of body beveling and the changed pickup location. And for better or worse, they don't sound the same.

[uwe]

Saw those too. Both of them beautiful!

Speaking of EB-3s.
In the 27 years that Gibson made them there were many different versions.
(Headstock shapes, mudbucker position, shape of the horns, controls layout etc.)

Which ones would be most desirable?

early sixties to 1967: classic Jack Bruce tone and look

late sixties/slothead: mudbuckermoooomphmania beckons

early seventies: mudbucker moves to middle position, maple neck introduced, body thicker, models prevalent on ebay, but not popular with collectors

73/74 to end of the line 1978: three post bridge and somewhere in that time span the mudbucker seems to have been revisited for greater clarity as well. I've never heard a late EB-3 so I cannot say whether it sounds different to its early seventies maple neck & muddie in the middle siblings or not.

I know that together with I think Scott I'm pretty much a hopeless minority here in waving the seventies flag for EB-3s.

[patman]

There's an Epi ELITE eb3 at Bass Northwest...but they're asking $900 for it...seems way too high to me.

I remember having played ones in the early seventies that woofed too much for me...I actually heard a later one in Black Oak Arkansas back in the late seventies, and I remember being amazed at it's clarity...I didn't expect to like them when I saw them, but they were actually pretty good, and the EB3 sounded killer.

[ramone57]

I love my '72 but I don't have anything earlier to compare it to

[uwe]

You know it's not just the mahogany. They just don't look right with the lack of body beveling and the changed pickup location. And for better or worse, they don't sound the same.

May I interject that they look and feel more "manly" to me than the guitarish sixties models, that the phatter body sits better when playing and that the change in pup location made real sense? They were/are still bassy enough, but you hear a couple of other frequencies too. Try getting that Radar Love sound with a sixties EB-3!

[Dave W]

You can interject all you want, it's not going to convince collectors. Besides you, I mean. 

[ramone57]

obtaining mud has never been a problem but with the tone set at 4 or 5, the note definition is vastly improved.  although to the uninitiated, any mudbucker is guilty as charged.

[Barklessdog]

They just dont look as cool. Maybe they are better ergonamically, but I want my mudbucker EXTRA muddy, why bother getting one that tames it?

Just get a different bass.

You buy a mudbucker to play in the mud, period.

Next you will tell me you eat fat free Ice Cream or drink decaf coffee or alcohol free beer?

Very cool


Not so much-

[Barklessdog]

Saw those too. Both of them beautiful!

Speaking of EB-3s.
In the 27 years that Gibson made them there were many different versions.
(Headstock shapes, mudbucker position, shape of the horns, controls layout etc.)

Which ones would be most desirable?

It has to be very early 60's ones with black plastic/ plastic covered mudbuckers. They are the rarest (aside from the Fuzzbuster)

[uwe]

You all are and always will be a bunch of hopeless reactionaries. I feel like preaching gun control at an NRA Convention!


And to add injury to insult: I like that South Park or whatever it is string-thru greeny-whitey EB-3!  

Provoke me further and I'm gonna BIN that sucker!

[Basvarken]

Next you will tell me you drink alcohol free beer?

I do, sometimes. When I need to drive back home.
I can't stand to drink cola all night. Alcohol free beer tastes better than any soda pop.
The only problem is that it is not pilsner.