An elderly friend of mine has brought me an old German flatback carved bass to examine. It's a total wreck-poorly repaired cracks, repaired pegbox, automotive lacquer finish, poor maple replacement fingerboard etc. He would like to find out as much as possible about the instrument. The only markings are a Made In Germany sticker affixed to the back.
Anybody got any thoughts? Looks like a German factory bass from perhaps the 20's-30's, but I'm no expert.
As I'm sure Ken Smith will be pointing out even as I'm posting this, if it says MADE IN GERMANY in English and not some version of ARBEITEN AUF DEUTSCHLAND (MITTENWALD, MARKNEUKIRCHEN etc etc), then it was made post 1945.
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"It takes a pretty great drummer to be better than no drummer" -Chet Baker
BECAUSE AWESOME CAT IS AWESOME!!!!!
That it does, Ed-a little black sticker with gold letters "MADE IN GERMANY". I guess that timeline makes perfect sense when you think about it. The current owner bought it in '66, and said only that it was "old".
