"Tommy - Can You Hear Me?"

This super rare 1967 Fireglo 4005 bass weighs just 8.70 lbs. and has a nut width of just under 1 11/16 inches and a standard Rickenbacker bass scale length of 33 1/2 inches. This semi-hollow body bass features offset cutaways and a "slash" soundhole. Maple body with sculpted top and with checkerboard binding on the back, laminated maple and mahogany neck, and bound rosewood fretboard with 20 frets and triangular inlaid crushed-pearl position markers extending completely across the fretboard. Headstock with hooked "cresting wave" top and white opaque plastic logo plate lettered in black. Individual open-back tuners with cloverleaf metal buttons. Two chrome bar "toaster" pickups with outputs of 6.97k and 8.52k. White plastic pickguard with five screws and with original clear plastic thumb rest with two screws. Five controls (two volume, two tone, and a master "blender" control) plus three-way selector switch, all on pickguard. Seven-sided black plastic knobs with metal tops with black lettering. Four-saddle bridge and "R" tailpiece. Jack input on a metal plate (with the serial number "GE [May 1967] 2326") on the lower treble bout. The pots are dated "137 6646" (CTS November 1966) and "137 6708" (CTS February 1967). The neck pickup coil was expertly rewound by Lindy Fralin some four years ago when we originally sold this guitar. The only other part that has been touched, is a replacement gear retaining screw on the "D" tuning peg. This wonderful bass guitar is in exceptionally fine condition (9.00). There is only a light trace of belt buckle wear on the back, one tiny surface chip (about the size of a match head) on the back of the neck behind the second fret and another (the same size) on the top edge near the jack input, a few small surface chips on the edges of the headstock, and one other small surface chip on the back of the headstock just above the "D" tuning peg. There are a few other very small and insignificant marks, none of which penetrate the surface finish. Housed in a modern custom-made Cedar Creek black hardshell case with black plush lining (9.50).

Introduced in 1965, "the Model 4005 and Model 4005/6 were Rickenbacker's thin-line hollow body electric basses. Rickenbacker created these models at a time when other companies were having success with this type of bass. The British invasion groups helped to start this trend with their interest in hollow body models; before the 4005 was available, the company received many requests for hollow body basses from England. The company even took an order for a violin shaped six string bass with a natural finish in 1965, but there is no evidence the factory made it. The body shape of the Model 4005 basses followed the styling of the 1965 Models 306-375 standard guitars: they had a rounded top edge and double cutaways. The 4005 basses had two pickups and Deluxe features. Like the solid body basses, they had string mutes, twenty-one [sic] frets, rosewood fingerboards, and full scales. The first ones were available in either Fireglo or natural maple finishes. In the 1970s they were available in any of the standard Colorglo finishes. These models had slash soundholes and R tailpieces" (Richard R. Smith, The History of Rickenbacker Guitars, p. 207).

Among the great "sixties" bassists who used a 4005, were Nick St. Nicholas of the Steppenwolf, and John Entwistle of The Who, who used a similar '67 (serial no. GE 2208) in the studio between 1969 and 1970.