Recent divorce means small apartment and tight finances...so up for sale comes my Wishnevsky "Tiki Man" upright bass. Yeah, I realize there's a double bass forum, but Wishy seems to get no love over there, and I figure this kind of unorthodox design is more suited to the "Cult of Wishbass" folk on this side.
First thing I gotta say is that despite this being a Wishnevsky product, it doesn't have any of the typical...ummm...
construction eccentricities...that you see in the electric basses
. Everything appears reasonably symmetrical and solidly put together.
{edit} Now that I look at these photos, maybe "reasonably symmetrical" in the eye of the beholder. It's obvious he was eyeballing where those soundholes went. But I gotta say, this thing has been living in my bedroom for a few years now and I've looked it in the face (literally) every day, and I never noticed that until these photos. It's not something that jumps out at you in person. {/edit}
The finish is consistent and looks very good. It's obvious that he put a lot more time and attention into this than the typical production-line Wishbass project. Sure, the wood's got knotmarks & such in it...after all we ARE talking about a piece of musical folk art here...and it's about having character, amirite?
I don't know what woods were used, I'm lucky I can tell pine from mahogany, but I bet some of y'all would know just from looking, nothing very exotic. Chrome Gotoh tuners. 34.5" scale so she uses normal bass guitar strings! Currently wearing Fender tapewounds. About 5.5 feet tall, the body's 4.5 inches deep, comes apart easily for shipping (thank god).
How does she sound? Well, I have zero experience with traditional uprights, but I have to assume they're not comparable tonewise. You're not going to impress your orchestra conductor. Much closer to what you'd expect from an acoustic bass guitar. Loud enough for jamming along with your buddy's acoustic 6-string in the living room. I used to slide a piezo "drum trigger" pickup into the bridge so I could get wild with my effects board...I would think that would enable you to play (small) shows with it. The guy I bought it from said he gigged it a few times, that's probably what he did.
And just look at her...she's SMILING at you! Makes you feel good just to look at it.
$500 shipped, CONUS only. 
Please excuse the blurry garbagey photos...ex-wife got the camera in the divorce and I just ran out to WalMart to buy a cheapo, figuring, how bad can the photos be. There's the answer, it's getting returned tomorrow.
