Help identifying this hollow body bass Bruce Thomas is playing?

[Calaverasgrande]

Came across this youtube clip of Elvis Costello and the Attractions from Top of the Pops 1977.
I was intrigued by the bass Bruce Thomas is playing. It has a different pickup placement than most hollow bodies. And a gumby headstock.
The endpin sticking out the bottom while he has it strapped on is kind of odd. But then how many basses have such a feature aside from the EB1 and handful of others?

Here is a screencap

 

[ahbass2500]

Maybe a Gretsch 6070. Headstock definitely looks Gretsch. Early versions had an endpin (internet claims the end pin was phased out in 1964).

Six Great (Extinct) Gretsch Basses – Gretsch Guitars News

 

[Bryan R. Tyler]

The endpin is crazy. It would be hilarious to see someone try to play that like an upright.

 

[mikeswals]

Top of the Pops, he would have just been miming with it, they didn't have people play live.
Quite a few bands showed up with instruments they weren't associated with... likely loaners or rentals.

 

[Matt Liebenau]

Gretsch. @GretschWretch may know the exact model.

 

[Calaverasgrande]

Top of the Pops, he would have just been miming with it, they didn't have people play live.
Quite a few bands showed up with instruments they weren't associated with... likely loaners or rentals.

Yeah you can hear Elvis Costello's vocals change with different effects on them in places. It's def a lip sync to the single.

 

[Jeff Scott]

Definitely a Gretsch. I almost bought that model back in the late '00s.

 

[Calaverasgrande]

Great now I have another bass on my wish list. I really like the single bridge pickup thing. Most hollowbodies with one pickup have near the neck.

 

[Wasnex]

The endpin is crazy. It would be hilarious to see someone try to play that like an upright.

Might look something like this:

 

[GretschWretch]

As many have pointed out, the bass in question is a model 6070 (the two-pickup 6072 did not come along until 1967 or thereabouts). The endpin was included only on the years 1962 and 1963.

 

[shojii]

As many have pointed out, the bass in question is a model 6070 (the two-pickup 6072 did not come along until 1967 or thereabouts). The endpin was included only on the years 1962 and 1963.

Username checks out : )

 

[Matt Liebenau]

As many have pointed out, the bass in question is a model 6070 (the two-pickup 6072 did not come along until 1967 or thereabouts). The endpin was included only on the years 1962 and 1963.

Thanks. I don’t usually like tagging people like that but… stuff…

 

[Chuck_G]

Probably Nick Lowe’s… see lower left hand picture on the JoC album cover. I also seem to remember another early tv appearance where Bruce is playing Nick’s blue P-Bass.

 

[2saddleslab]

Probably Nick Lowe’s… see lower left hand picture on the JoC album cover. I also seem to remember another early tv appearance where Bruce is playing Nick’s blue P-Bass.

 

[Metal Sombreros]

Gretsch Peter Tork

 

[Wood and Wire]

Gretsch Peter Tork

No that’s a different model, with a really skinny neck (the 6070 neck is like a telegraph pole), no top cutaway, and a hockey stick headstock, instead of the boat oar.

 

[Metal Sombreros]

No that’s a different model, with a really skinny neck (the 6070 neck is like a telegraph pole), no top cutaway, and a hockey stick headstock, instead of the boat oar.

My bad. It is a gretsch though

 

[nixdad]

Great now I have another bass on my wish list. I really like the single bridge pickup thing. Most hollowbodies with one pickup have near the neck.

Cool, but be careful what you wish for...

As many have pointed out, the bass in question is a model 6070 (the two-pickup 6072 did not come along until 1967 or thereabouts). The endpin was included only on the years 1962 and 1963.

@GretschWretch - is the 6070 the Gretsch model which has a neck that feels like a 2x4?

 

[GretschWretch]

Cool, but be careful what you wish for...

@GretschWretch - is the 6070 the Gretsch model which has a neck that feels like a 2x4?

Pretty much *all* the 1960s Gretsch 6070s and 6072s have the 2x4/telephone pole neck with the oar/pizza shovel headstock. The 6071/6073 "Monkees" Gretsches have the four-on-a-side headstock and the much slimmer neck (and short scale). Toward the end of the decade Baldwin somehow gained control of Gretsch and moved operations to Arkansas. I have a defretted 1971(?) 6070 whose neck, although by no means slender, is very much slimmer than the earlier necks and displays more taper than they do. The headstock also changed to what we see now on basses like the 5440LSB.

Comparing the necks of my 5440s to my 607x, visually they look quite similar: broad/wide without much taper. But the 5440s play much "faster" than the vintage basses, which I attribute to the necks being thinner/flatter.

IMO one of the great tragedies of modern bass making is that Gretsch did not take the platform of the contemporary G6072 and stuff the electronics and pickups of the vintage 6072s into it. With that slim, "speed" neck and that sound . . . OMG! what an instrument.

 

[nixdad]

Pretty much *all* the 1960s Gretsch 6070s and 6072s have the 2x4/telephone pole neck with the oar/pizza shovel headstock. The 6071/6073 "Monkees" Gretsches have the four-on-a-side headstock and the much slimmer neck (and short scale). Toward the end of the decade Baldwin somehow gained control of Gretsch and moved operations to Arkansas. I have a defretted 1971(?) 6070 whose neck, although by no means slender, is very much slimmer than the earlier necks and displays more taper than they do. The headstock also changed to what we see now on basses like the 5440LSB.

Comparing the necks of my 5440s to my 607x, visually they look quite similar: broad/wide without much taper. But the 5440s play much "faster" than the vintage basses, which I attribute to the necks being thinner/flatter.

IMO one of the great tragedies of modern bass making is that Gretsch did not take the platform of the contemporary G6072 and stuff the electronics and pickups of the vintage 6072s into it. With that slim, "speed" neck and that sound . . . OMG! what an instrument.

Thanks for the education!
Yeah, it's too bad they didn't see your last suggestion through. Another example of "shoulda, coulda, woulda!"