Martin

In 1976 I casually mentioned to a coworker that since I was a child I had always wanted a Hofner Beatle bass, the violin shaped bass that Paul McCartney played and he said, "I have one at the house I'll sell you for $50. I bought it and it stayed mostly in it's case until I sold it last year for almost $1500 to buy a Martin acoustic electric that I play all of the time. I have a photograph of the Hofner that I intend on glueing into the soundhole of the Martin. The story of the Hofner is so long and complicated that I will not have the time to go into it at any length for now so I think I'll just thread its story into the following blogs until the story is finally told but this enty isn't about the Hofner ... it's about the Martin. The story of the Martin is complicated too so I'll weave that one in as well. I really never thought of the fact that the stories of both the Hofner and the Martin are both long and complicated until I began this entry. I will say that the Martin guitar is one of my favorite things because it is a top notch quality product. The Hofner bass isn't really what you could call top notch quality. It's a beautiful instrument. It's fine and delicate. It's the guitar my all time musical hero played in the first half of his career but even he will tell you he bought it for two reasons. I was affordable and symetrical. I like affordable and I like symetrical but that's not what an electric bass needs to be. I've been playing bass for over thirty-five years and I know that a bass needs to be solid and dependable. The Martin isn't a bass but it's solid and dependable.
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http://www.hofners.co.uk/viewforum.php?f=6&sid=30d3ca446b000fafb0f13078b0c5d6e8