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Who among us knows where to find this MandoBass.....?!?

#22
I sent this to a former coworker of mine who used to be a line manager at Gibson and is a pretty damn good mandolin builder. Thirty plus years building. He strongly suspects the photo is a fake. Like most here, I’ve seen the A-style mandobasses but never an F-style.

I might point out that even if this is legit, if you extrapolate from the typical price of a K5 mandocello (an instrument I have long wanted to own) that something like this will easily be well north of fifty grand. IF you can get anyone to build it for you.

Best of luck in the search. I would try the various online mandolin boards, they’ll know far more about this than a bass forum will. I hope someone really was insane enough to build something like this, but seriously doubt anyone has.

ETA: regarding the pic: no end pin in the world looks like that. And the angle is wrong. So sadly I’m going to have to agree with my buddy that this is a fake.
 
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#23
There is a dark area under her left arm that shouldn't be there. It's kind of part of the mandolin, but also you can see the grain of the wood siding in the background through it. Really looks like they didn't trim out this part of the original photo when cutting and pasting. I vote photoshop.
 
#28
The woman with the mandobass does not seem to be photoshopped to me. If it was an enlarged mandolin, there would be eight strings — no evidence of that. Check the neck width, if this were enlarged the actual size would be un-playably tight. And lastly, those are clover tuners.
 
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#34
That instrument is well known around the mandolincafe. Do a search there and you'll find the instrument, the builder, and the player. As much as those guys all nerd out about their mandolins, overall they are terrified of anything bass like so they get caught up in the "mandobass" culture. Having played many, I can confidently say there is a good reason why all of those old Gibsons faded away as an obscure novelty.....
 
#35
Big Shrek said:
Um, after a bit of digging, I'm starting to believe that's a photoshop job of an F5 into a pic
of a woman holding a Contra-bass, with the Contra-bass removed and the F5 enlarged and placed precisely.
Click to expand...

RichSnyder said:
There are three on reverb, but not that style. I also believe the first picture is photoshopped.
Click to expand...

mcarp555 said:
I agree. The lighting doesn't match the woman, the highlights on the scroll particularly. And I think the edge where it's in front of her body looks bogus. I vote photoshopped as well. Seeing it on multiple websites doesn't make it legit.
Click to expand...

aetheldrea said:
There is a dark area under her left arm that shouldn't be there. It's kind of part of the mandolin, but also you can see the grain of the wood siding in the background through it. Really looks like they didn't trim out this part of the original photo when cutting and pasting. I vote photoshop.
Click to expand...

I ran this pic past my wife (a published artist who does Photoshop, among other mediums, for a living) and she understands that the weird, blobby bit of wood under the upraised left arm can be suspect, but she and I agree, if it's a 'Shop, it's a very well done 'Shop. :bookworm:

The big "probably not fake" part is the reflections on the right (relative to us) side. You can just make out reflections of the wood siding, as well as the blueish color shift reflected from the painted cinder blocks below. I did a stint of photography back in school and those pesky, pesky reflections can make a well-composed picture turn out to be not-so-awesome. :snaphappy: :banghead:
 
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#36
james condino said:
That instrument is well known around the mandolincafe. Do a search there and you'll find the instrument, the builder, and the player. As much as those guys all nerd out about their mandolins, overall they are terrified of anything bass like so they get caught up in the "mandobass" culture. Having played many, I can confidently say there is a good reason why all of those old Gibsons faded away as an obscure novelty.....
Click to expand...
One of them faded away into my basement. :D
 
#37
james condino said:
That instrument is well known around the mandolincafe. Do a search there and you'll find the instrument, the builder, and the player. As much as those guys all nerd out about their mandolins, overall they are terrified of anything bass like so they get caught up in the "mandobass" culture. Having played many, I can confidently say there is a good reason why all of those old Gibsons faded away as an obscure novelty.....
Click to expand...

Spent close to an hour today on MandolinCafe, and the closest I could come are the links in my post above. The same image over and over, and after that, a dead end. But I was linking into MC from a Google search; never tried accessing MC first and then doing the search within MC. I'll try that, but I don't see why the result would be any different.
 
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#38
GretschWretch said:
Spent close to an hour today on MandolinCafe, and the closest I could come are the links in my post above. The same image over and over, and after that, a dead end. But I was linking into MC from a Google search; never tried accessing MC first and then doing the search within MC. I'll try that, but I don't see why the result would be any different.
Click to expand...

Ahhh…the happy-happy-fun-times of researching pre-internet stuff. Y'know, back when all we did with our free time was to sit around the fire pit and bang rocks together. :rolleyes:

giphy.gif
 
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