Anyone ever seen these strings!!??

[MaryJayne]

A friend of mine gave me these Music Man Electric Bass Strings about 15+ years ago....he used to work in a music store....these have never been used...just really a collector thing at this point. I have searched and searched...even emailed Ernie Ball company....but they knew nothing about them....have to be from the 70's
Any info or other pics would be coolnes!!
Thanks

 

[hotbass57]

Try Jason at Fretnation.

 

[Linnin]

Fascinating! This set very obviously predates Leo Fender's sale of Music Man to Ernie Ball. It is hard to say who might have been the OEM string winder. The fact that the pack states plainly that these are half rounds points strongly towards D'Addario. Hopefully a Music Man historian will post.

 

[Linnin]

Music Man (company) - Wikipedia
You have to take Wikipedia articles with a grain of salt as to their trustworthiness, but I've read this through and it jives with my personal knowledge. No mention of strings.

 

[MaryJayne]

Try Jason at Fretnation.

Thank you!

 

[Jon Moody]

Here's the info I know...

GHS Strings started out as strictly an OEM company, making strings for other customers. Also, it's common knowledge that Leo Fender and Dave Holcomb (the son of the H in GHS) worked together on many projects.

One of those projects was a "half round" string that would be the original OEM string for Stingray basses. That is what the OP is holding in their hands.

That's about as specific as I can get publicly, before it can be misconstrued as violating the CUP terms of service.

But simply put, GHS made those Music Man Strings back in the 70s.

 

[MaryJayne]

Music Man (company) - Wikipedia
You have to take Wikipedia articles with a grain of salt as to their trustworthiness, but I've read this through and it jives with my personal knowledge. No mention of strings.

Oh yes...I was just researching dates, and I actually emailed your company a couple years back, but no one had any info. It's just really weird I have not even seen another set like this....maybe they came with a bass? Or a promo set?? I know I'll never use them....just too cool! Thank you for your reply!

 

[MaryJayne]

Here's the info I know...

GHS Strings started out as strictly an OEM company, making strings for other customers. Also, it's common knowledge that Leo Fender and Dave Holcomb (the son of the H in GHS) worked together on many projects.

One of those projects was a "half round" string that would be the original OEM string for Stingray basses. That is what the OP is holding in their hands.

That's about as specific as I can get publicly, before it can be misconstrued as violating the CUP terms of service.

But simply put, GHS made those Music Man Strings back in the 70s.

Thank you very much! That is so very cool to know!!! I was thinking they might have come from the fullerton shop where they made the Stingray...but, that makes sense, and were probably shipped TO the shop to put on the Stingray!!! I LOVE music history!!!

 

[michael_t]

GHS Strings started out as strictly an OEM company, making strings for other customers. Also, it's common knowledge that Leo Fender and Dave Holcomb (the son of the H in GHS) worked together on many projects.

One of those projects was a "half round" string that would be the original OEM string for Stingray basses.

Do you know if those half-rounds were Alloy 52 by any chance, which later came to be known as the Brite Flats?

I remember reading some posts where the Brite Flats were mentioned as the factory strings on Stingrays for a period of time in the past.

 

[Linnin]

Here's the info I know...

GHS Strings started out as strictly an OEM company, making strings for other customers. Also, it's common knowledge that Leo Fender and Dave Holcomb (the son of the H in GHS) worked together on many projects.

One of those projects was a "half round" string that would be the original OEM string for Stingray basses. That is what the OP is holding in their hands.

That's about as specific as I can get publicly, before it can be misconstrued as violating the CUP terms of service.

But simply put, GHS made those Music Man Strings back in the 70s.

So @Jon Moody, did GHS invent the 'half round' bass string?

 

[michael_t]

Just realized those gauges on the package in the photo are identical to the Brite Flats M3075 set, 49-62-84-108.

 

[Jon Moody]

So @Jon Moody, did GHS invent the 'half round' bass string?

That specific piece of information (whether we were the first company to make any sort of "half round" string) I do not know.

 

[No Malarky]

Ha. I believe I have several unopened packs of these same strings somewhere...somewhere.

 

[matante]

The address on the package says Anaheim, California so that alone tells you they're pre Ernie Ball.

 

[Linnin]

That specific piece of information (whether we were the first company to make any sort of "half round" string) I do not know.

That alone makes it worthy of historical investigation. Quite a feather to put in the GHS cap if true, and well worth the effort.

 

[bassbrad]

That alone makes it worthy of historical investigation. Quite a feather to put in the GHS cap if true, and well worth the effort.

This along with a lot of lore we may never really know as so many of the originating folks have shuffled off the mortal coil and honestly they were more keen at the day to day things and not really thinking that what they were doing would ever be of any anecdotal or historical significance.

 

[bassbrad]

Oh yes...I was just researching dates, and I actually emailed your company a couple years back, but no one had any info. It's just really weird I have not even seen another set like this....maybe they came with a bass? Or a promo set?? I know I'll never use them....just too cool! Thank you for your reply!

That was certainly a retail pack meant for dealers, generally sets for manufacturers would have been bulk packed most often in tubes so they could be easily pulled and installed, tubes of all E strings, A strings and so forth... this would have been both for time savings as well as to save money on wasted packaging.
Back in the late 70's and 80's most music stores were Mom & Pop shops that had limited dealerships so it was common that a Music Man dealer might also carry Music Man strings. Also at the time most bass players did not change strings very often, usually only if one broke as the need/want for bright strings had not quite taken place, yet.

There are a lot of old music brand including string labels lost to the sands and trash heaps of time as we lost all those M&P shops in the music store wars of the Nineties and 2000s.

Just as we are seeing books on guitar, basses, amp, stompbox there are untold and fascinating histories in the music string & accessory field, heroes and winners and losers. Everything from surviving companies like Dunlop, GHS and EHX, long gone companies and guys in converted vans and busses driving shop to shop selling strings, picks, harmonicas, straps and ........

 

[Linnin]

This along with a lot of lore we may never really know as so many of the originating folks have shuffled off the mortal coil and honestly they were more keen at the day to day things and not really thinking that what they were doing would ever be of any anecdotal or historical significance.

No matter how faint the trail, no matter how scant the evidence, the challenge remains. The truth is out there. Find It.

 

[LBS-bass]

Here's the info I know...

GHS Strings started out as strictly an OEM company, making strings for other customers. Also, it's common knowledge that Leo Fender and Dave Holcomb (the son of the H in GHS) worked together on many projects.

One of those projects was a "half round" string that would be the original OEM string for Stingray basses. That is what the OP is holding in their hands.

That's about as specific as I can get publicly, before it can be misconstrued as violating the CUP terms of service.

But simply put, GHS made those Music Man Strings back in the 70s.

GHS was marketing their own "Boomers" in the late seventies; I know because my guitar player loved them. Did they do that while they were also making strings for other companies?

 

[9M2E]

Cool find