I was web-surfing, trying once again to find additional information on the Multivox Marvel bass, and once again fell down the rabbit hole of interrelated musical instrument jobbers in the NY/NJ area in the 1940s and '50s. And then what to my wondering eyes should appear but THIS! A Peter Sorkin catalog from 1959.
View attachment upload_2023-12-14_21-42-43.webp
This is the only bass in the catalog, and the print is so tiny about all I can make out is that the price appears to be $119.00 (or thereabouts), and the available finishes were blonde and sunburst.
I think this is a transition phase model, which @godofthunder59 s bass strongly resembles. Note the pickguard, the cutaway horns, and the mandolin tailpiece with the stick bridge. So the catalog confirms that these were around by 1959.
Which suggests that this one
might actually have been around as early as 1955, as some have claimed. The cutaway horns appear to be identical with those on Scott's bass and the catalog bass, but look at the pickguard/control cover and the bridge/tailpiece.
Except for the cutaway horns, this is very like my Marvels. Except for the top horn on one of my Marvels (a black four-on-a-side), all the cutaway horns on my basses are stubby. The bottom horn is not even long enough to begin a curve back towards the neck. Mine lokely belong to an earlier, more primitive design.
So apparently there was some generational transition from the Multivox basses to the scroll-cutaway Premiers, although it was much more gradual and subtle than the changes on the guitars.
View attachment upload_2023-12-14_21-42-43.webp
This is the only bass in the catalog, and the print is so tiny about all I can make out is that the price appears to be $119.00 (or thereabouts), and the available finishes were blonde and sunburst.
I think this is a transition phase model, which @godofthunder59 s bass strongly resembles. Note the pickguard, the cutaway horns, and the mandolin tailpiece with the stick bridge. So the catalog confirms that these were around by 1959.
Which suggests that this one
might actually have been around as early as 1955, as some have claimed. The cutaway horns appear to be identical with those on Scott's bass and the catalog bass, but look at the pickguard/control cover and the bridge/tailpiece.
Except for the cutaway horns, this is very like my Marvels. Except for the top horn on one of my Marvels (a black four-on-a-side), all the cutaway horns on my basses are stubby. The bottom horn is not even long enough to begin a curve back towards the neck. Mine lokely belong to an earlier, more primitive design.
So apparently there was some generational transition from the Multivox basses to the scroll-cutaway Premiers, although it was much more gradual and subtle than the changes on the guitars.
