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80's carvin stereo basses

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plasticsturgeon

Guest
Feb 15, 2013
10
0
#1
So, in the last year, I've picked up 2 carvin stereo basses from the 80's and haven't had much luck identifying the specific model and year. The natural finish bass was turned into a fretless by a not quite professional and I've since had it cleaned up. the serial # is 4489 and the name on the headstock is a copperish pearl. The white one is a lefty fretted with a regular white pearl logo serial #14583 and obviously someone replaced one of the pickups. I'm mainly just curious if anyone else has any of these basses, and thinks they're as cool as i do. they both have a set neck and I can't believe how great they sound for around $250 each. I've had the controls on the fretless reconfigured a bit, both outputs now have 3 position PU selector, coil tap and a kill switch on the stereo output. Since my first carvin purchase I've also bought 2 amps by them, a new micro bass combo and an old 80's guitar head which is a blast running my stereo out through. I understand the high dollar stuff out there, but anyone else appreciate something like this? ImageUploadedByTalkBass1361505838.221147.jpgImageUploadedByTalkBass1361505863.730533.jpg
 
#3
Early 1980's LB-50's.


I own this one. Bought it on TB. It's an absolutely fantastic bass.

HPIM0380.jpg

HPIM0381.jpg



These basses are laughably underpriced. The quality of construction is amazing. Plays great, sounds great. I marveled at this thing when I received it. It's also, IMO, the best looking bass Carvin made.
 
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#4
Nice! I picked up the lefty simply because it was too good a deal, but now I'm really starting to realize how we'll built these basses are. The body style is very cool, and after looking at the history of carvin basses, probably my favorite style. Now I'm just trying to figure out what crazy wiring tricks I want to do to that white one. I've since found another one for around $350, which I absolutely don't need, but I'm considering buying just to pass along to a fellow bass player searching for tone...
 
#5
Wow, does looking at these ever bring back memories! :eek:

I've been on the Carvin catalog mailing list, ever since my first Carvin purchase in 1978 - a POS 125-watt solid-state bass head that I bought for club gigs (along with the 2x15 Carvin cab with stock Carvin speakers). So I've watched the evolution of Carvin guitars & bass guitars - from a mailing distance - for nearly 35 years now (although I didn't acquire my first Carvin bass guitar until about 20 years ago).

Agreed that these instruments were in some ways rather ahead of their time - not unlike Peavey bass guitars from roughly the same period. IMHO, Carvin guitars began to really hit their stride at around 1987 or so - with the introduction of neck-through construction, active electronics systems, and standard ebony fretboards. Carvin bass guitars started to really come along just a few years later - by about the early Nineties or so, give or take a year or two.

Cool... :cool:

MM
 
#6
Rarely do you see people on stage playing these. I only saw someone play an LB model once. It was a soul band from NYC with a lady singer. The bass player wore a turban and played one of these models. Right then I thought "I want one". Little did I know how affordable they were!
 
#8
We should start a vintage Carvin club.
This is my main squeeze: 83 LB50K Koa
never used the stereo yet, i think it gives each Pup its own output, I think?
found it at a flea market for $150 but i got him to come down to 100 cuz the bridge PUp was inop. and a slight crack in bottom of fretboard. didn't even know how pretty it was till i got it home and scraped 20 years of gunk off it and soaked the ebony FrtBoard in lemon oil. Since got a nice hard case, PUp rewound and installed Hipshot extender and some stainless flats. Sidelined my thunderbird eversince. Want to get some SGD humbuckers in the future and ditch the coil taps/phase switches for series/parallel circiut switches!:D
Carvin-1_zps6e58d15a.jpg
 
#9
That looks awesome in the natural finish! Yes the outputs send each pickup to a separate output, that's why I had mine rewired for some serious flexibility. I run the second channel through an '83 carvin x-100b tube head and an old legend 4x12 cabinet. Sounds amazing, and with the kill switch on the other output I can loop that channel, hit the kill and then play over the top through the "guitar" rig.
 
#10
plasticsturgeon said:
Nice! I picked up the lefty simply because it was too good a deal, but now I'm really starting to realize how we'll built these basses are. The body style is very cool, and after looking at the history of carvin basses, probably my favorite style. Now I'm just trying to figure out what crazy wiring tricks I want to do to that white one. I've since found another one for around $350, which I absolutely don't need, but I'm considering buying just to pass along to a fellow bass player searching for tone...
Click to expand...


If you decide to keep the right-handed one and sell the lefty, let me know.
 
#15
Haha, Danomite might have beat you to it, but I think the problem is I don't want to get rid of it unless someone is willing to pay me more than what I paid for it. I think I might just keep it in my collection unless someone is willing to pay $400 for it. In my opinion, I'll keep it for less than that, even though it's a lefty. It's got a great tone but can't stand up to my '79 Kramer dmz 6000. But I do like having a stereo fretted bass on hand. Anyone out there want to trade a right handed model for a lefty?
 

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