Phil Lesh's Early SG Bass?

[bassman10096]

That EBO (if not mistaken) was Phil's first bass guitar. It was originally an EBO, so of course he hated it (read "Searching for the Sound" if you want to know a little more - unfortunately, Phil's not a gearhead). That EBO or another modified EBO was featured on "Skull and Roses" (or "Skull f*ck" as it's sometimes called).

Listen to Bertha, Wharf Rat, Not Fade Way, or any other cut on the album to hear what a semi-Alembicized solid-body bass sounds like. As I understand it, that bass was probably the first active bass in history, as it combined rewound passive Hagstrom Bisonic pickups with an elementary "follower" circuit that boosted the signal from the already very hot Bisonics. The bass sound on the Skull and Roses Album is superb. Bear in mind, it was produced live - not in the studio.

Further (as they tend to say), the bass on the Skull album is very easy to distinguish from the Alembicized Guild Starfire bass on Europe '72 or the later all-Alembic Series One bass on Wake of the Flood, Mars Hotel, Blues for Allah. After that time, Phil got into a lot of other basses, moving through Doug Irwin, G&L, Seinberger and, finally Modulus basses.

 

[bbarthol2003]

It was a late 60s 30.5" scale Gibson EB3. You can tell by the bridge anchored with those 2 small hex screws and the 4 individual saddles. The guys at Alembic added the anchor part of the bridge. The pickups were changed for Hagstrom Bisonics and had some type of tinfoil-like material to the top for shielding purposes. The bass also had some of the Alembic preamp stuff in the controls as well. This bass was kinda the fill in bass for Phil while he was waiting for Alembic to finish up his "Godfather" Guild Starfire bass.

Believe it was stolen from Phil while on tour around '71. He's said he like the pear shaped tone of it and it worked well when recording.

 

[Fly Guitars]

I'm fairly sure, in early pics i've seen him with an EB0F - ie an EB0 with built-in fuzz