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Paul Simonon Tribute Bass
- Thread starter topper
- Start date
I'll post some pictures on the weekend. At this point it's really not anything more than an off white, maple neck P bass with a black pickguard and a skull and crossbones sticker.
Aww man, would love to. We're based down in Virginia though and I don't imagine we'll be going on tour anytime soon. We're just getting started really. But you can catch some videos and stuff here: Facebook
My Clash tribute band, Car in the Fridge, broke up decades ago. I would have loved this bass. AWESOME!!!!
- Dec 20, 2024
- 76
- 374
- Disclosures
- Owner of SoCal Bass and Fx
Sure, but why? It's just a p-bass. What makes it special is what happened, what Paul did to it, and the photo that captured the moment. The bass is only special because of the story. Fixing it would ruin it.
I'd encourage you to at least paint the pickguard. I was worried about that part. I had two pickguards just in case I messed up the first one or hated it. But I was super happy with the first attempt. I used "FolkArt Multi-Surface Acrylic Paint" off Amazon.
You always hurt the one you love? Nah, I think smashing it was wrong. I'm more in the John Hiatt "Perfectly Good Guitar" camp.
Sorry if this is hijacking topper's thread too much, but there is a long story behind this bass, it was my first one.
OK, here are some pictures. This is not my bass, I've had it since 1984 and never took any pictures of it before I painted it, but it looked like this. The Goya GX23 had a gorgeous stained mahogany body, which my stupid 16 year old 1984 self almost immediately painted with spray paint.
It came with Dimarzio Model P pickups, I removed the one in the bridge because I never used it, hand carved a straight slot to put a J pickup at the bridge, and painted it a horrific '80s spray can splatter paint job. In 1987 I got 1980 Fender P, took the other Model P out and put it in the Fender and the Goya bass sat unused for the next 37 years until 2024 I decided to revive it just because it was my first ever bass. I have sold all of my other gear, this is the only bass I have, so I wanted to make it playable again.
I sanded down the "Rad" '80s paint and matched a standard P pickguard over the routs to see what I had to do to put the pickup on the correct P position. As you can see, its off a bit, but since the pickguard will cover the neck rout, I just routed enough to put the pickup in the standard position and filled in all the mess I made at the bridge pickup position.
I still had not decided what color I would paint the body, my '78 Fender P was painted (by me) in mint/surf green and I thought about doing the same, but no brand that I am aware of makes a color close enough to what my old one was, so its at this point I decided to make a Simonon inspired sort-of tribute since he was such a big influence on me when I first started playing. Paul had three white P basses, the famous "Palladium" bass that got smashed, the "Paul/checkerboard" bass, which is the one he still has now with a rosewood fretboard Jazz fretless neck that he had frets added, and a 3rd "spare" bass. I decided I didnt want to base mine on the famous "Palladium" bass, I decided to base mine on the "Paul" bass, but from when it had its original maple neck. I didnt do the pickguard paint stripes because this one didnt have any at the time period I am basing it off. Also, note that his skull and crossbones decal is not in the more well known position on the body above volume and tone knobs, its on the pickguard itself, which is where I put mine.
I kept the string through body setup even though the Fender Am Standard bridge will do either way. At first I was going to keep the original Goya neck, and after fret leveling, heat treating the warped neck (which did help, but not enough) I decided I'd just get a new neck. I found a basically brand new Allparts maple Jazz neck on Facebook marketplace where the screw holes had been drilled slightly wrong. I fixed the holes, re drilled new correct holes and its a fantastic playing bass.
I like the EMG Geezer pickups and I know why people rave about them, but they are not what I was looking for. I wanted the snarling Model P tone, so to make this look even more correct to the "Paul" bass, I'm going to get a cream color Model P to put in this. I am for sure going to tint the neck, its even brighter than the pictures show, and I may or may not do some distressing/relicing, but I probably wont. I'm undecided about putting some kind of name and number on the headstock.
OK, here are some pictures. This is not my bass, I've had it since 1984 and never took any pictures of it before I painted it, but it looked like this. The Goya GX23 had a gorgeous stained mahogany body, which my stupid 16 year old 1984 self almost immediately painted with spray paint.
It came with Dimarzio Model P pickups, I removed the one in the bridge because I never used it, hand carved a straight slot to put a J pickup at the bridge, and painted it a horrific '80s spray can splatter paint job. In 1987 I got 1980 Fender P, took the other Model P out and put it in the Fender and the Goya bass sat unused for the next 37 years until 2024 I decided to revive it just because it was my first ever bass. I have sold all of my other gear, this is the only bass I have, so I wanted to make it playable again.
I sanded down the "Rad" '80s paint and matched a standard P pickguard over the routs to see what I had to do to put the pickup on the correct P position. As you can see, its off a bit, but since the pickguard will cover the neck rout, I just routed enough to put the pickup in the standard position and filled in all the mess I made at the bridge pickup position.
I still had not decided what color I would paint the body, my '78 Fender P was painted (by me) in mint/surf green and I thought about doing the same, but no brand that I am aware of makes a color close enough to what my old one was, so its at this point I decided to make a Simonon inspired sort-of tribute since he was such a big influence on me when I first started playing. Paul had three white P basses, the famous "Palladium" bass that got smashed, the "Paul/checkerboard" bass, which is the one he still has now with a rosewood fretboard Jazz fretless neck that he had frets added, and a 3rd "spare" bass. I decided I didnt want to base mine on the famous "Palladium" bass, I decided to base mine on the "Paul" bass, but from when it had its original maple neck. I didnt do the pickguard paint stripes because this one didnt have any at the time period I am basing it off. Also, note that his skull and crossbones decal is not in the more well known position on the body above volume and tone knobs, its on the pickguard itself, which is where I put mine.
I kept the string through body setup even though the Fender Am Standard bridge will do either way. At first I was going to keep the original Goya neck, and after fret leveling, heat treating the warped neck (which did help, but not enough) I decided I'd just get a new neck. I found a basically brand new Allparts maple Jazz neck on Facebook marketplace where the screw holes had been drilled slightly wrong. I fixed the holes, re drilled new correct holes and its a fantastic playing bass.
I like the EMG Geezer pickups and I know why people rave about them, but they are not what I was looking for. I wanted the snarling Model P tone, so to make this look even more correct to the "Paul" bass, I'm going to get a cream color Model P to put in this. I am for sure going to tint the neck, its even brighter than the pictures show, and I may or may not do some distressing/relicing, but I probably wont. I'm undecided about putting some kind of name and number on the headstock.
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You did a great job with the tribute and I respect your move to go medium scale. These projects don’t always need to be exact replicas, hence: tributes.
I was the Mick Jones in a Boston based Clash tribute for years, broke up shortly after the Covid nonsense made gigging weird. I had more fun in that band than almost any other. The Clash were the band that gave me my musical awakening and when I joined this band I went deep into their history.
There was a local Who tribute we would occasionally play with and on those gigs I would look up the setlist the Clash used when they opened for The Who on the same date of our show and repeat it.
When I saw you used the date of the bass smashing for your serial number it reminded me of a rabbit hole I went down some years ago. Apparently there is a little controversy regarding if that photo actually was taken on that date. Have you run into this yourself? There’s a lot of good evidence supporting the controversy. I had to make myself walk away from it because I was losing focus on the music. Pretty much forgot about it until I was your post.
I hope your bass sounds good and plays the way you want and good luck with the band!
I was the Mick Jones in a Boston based Clash tribute for years, broke up shortly after the Covid nonsense made gigging weird. I had more fun in that band than almost any other. The Clash were the band that gave me my musical awakening and when I joined this band I went deep into their history.
There was a local Who tribute we would occasionally play with and on those gigs I would look up the setlist the Clash used when they opened for The Who on the same date of our show and repeat it.
When I saw you used the date of the bass smashing for your serial number it reminded me of a rabbit hole I went down some years ago. Apparently there is a little controversy regarding if that photo actually was taken on that date. Have you run into this yourself? There’s a lot of good evidence supporting the controversy. I had to make myself walk away from it because I was losing focus on the music. Pretty much forgot about it until I was your post.
I hope your bass sounds good and plays the way you want and good luck with the band!
I can’t remember all the details and need to chase down the links I saved somewhere, but it has something to do with they were playing two nights in a row at the Palladium, Paul was documented wearing different clothes each night by Pennie, white shirt on the 20th and black on the 21st. The claim was he smashed it on the 20th but she and other photographers have him playing the P and wearing black on the 21st. His backup was the Rickenbacker and there are no pics of him playing it from the Palladium on either night.
I could be way off on all this without my notes but I recall Paul being interviewed about it and he wouldn’t confirm anything because Pennie is very adamant about her timeline and chuffed at having BS called on her.
He did not use the Rick beyond early 78 and by the time of the smashing of the Palladium bass the Paul bass was his backup. There was indeed some question about what night he smashed the Palladium bass, but I believe there are pictures of the 21st showing him playing the Paul bass.
Interesting. I had no idea. A quick google search indicates that the correct date is largely believed to have been Sept. 20 but that it was listed in the liner notes of London Calling incorrectly as Sept. 21. I guess I'll choose to view the headstock as true to the London Calling album more than the actual date.
Good call. Either way it doesn’t really matter. It’s the sentiment, thought and effort you put into this bass that’s paramount. And it shows. I think the headstock is very cool and very unique, and the neck plate is a sweet touch.
I have the Fender Joe Strummer tribute telecaster from the original run. They did the photo flame finish on the body to make it look like his beat up original and it’s the one thing I don’t like about it. Looks great 10’ away but then you get closer and it’s pretty meh. If they put half the effort in as you did on the body then I’d be impressed with Fender. Their “road worn” models are better than this and yours is better than theirs.
I have the Fender Joe Strummer tribute telecaster from the original run. They did the photo flame finish on the body to make it look like his beat up original and it’s the one thing I don’t like about it. Looks great 10’ away but then you get closer and it’s pretty meh. If they put half the effort in as you did on the body then I’d be impressed with Fender. Their “road worn” models are better than this and yours is better than theirs.
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