Withdrawn Tobias Signature 5 fretless PRE gibson! £3000 Åmot, Norway

[Torbass]

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Edited October 12, 2021 by Torbass
Withdrawn

[Jus Lukin]

Nice!

[basspirate]

❤

[White Cloud]

Wow!

[Acebassmusic]

❤️ Phew! Gorgeous bass. Thank goodness this is a fretless or I would be in trouble 🤣 GLWTS

[Torbass]

9 minutes ago, Acebassmusic said:

❤️ Phew! Gorgeous bass. Thank goodness this is a fretless or I would be in trouble 🤣 GLWTS

Frets in a fretless is an easy fix 🤣

[Acebassmusic]

1 hour ago, Torbass said:

Frets in a fretless is an easy fix 🤣

 

But coming up with the suitable excuse for my better half isn't 😳 (I must stress that she is usually VERY supportive and I haven't quite found her limit......yet! 🙂 )

[Lender]

Insane collection Tor! Impressive condition these basses seems hardly played! Good luck with the sale from a fellow Nowegian.

[itu]

Unlined beauty!

[albinokiller]

I think this is classic, not signature, but it is beautiful bass

[Torbass]

7 minutes ago, albinokiller said:

I think this is classic, not signature, but it is beautiful bass

You might very well be correct about that.

[Hellzero]

It's not a pre Gibson series as the first Gibson serial number is 1094...

 

Check this from Michael Tobias himself :

 

"After several attempts to move the business to larger, better equipped facilities, I sold Tobias Guitars to Gibson on 1/1/90. The first Tobias Gibson serial number was 1094. At that point, Gibson was instrumental in moving us to a bigger shop in Burbank and setting us up with a great spray booth and dust collection system. We finally met So. Cal safety codes. Basses built during the 1990-1992 era were built initially by the same crew that had helped establish Tobias Basses as one of the most sought after basses on the planet. We added several people during 1990, and ended up with a great ten-man shop.

Business was still very good. We were not able to make anywhere near enough basses to fill the orders. Instead of trying to jack up production, we tried to get outside vendors to build for us. We had 110 Model T basses made for us by a very fine builder in New England, and then we got the Terada factory in Nagoya, Japan to make the Standard bass for us. This was and is a great bass, but the dollar-to-yen ratio killed the project. There were about 400 Standards.

Late in 1992, it was decided that in best corporate interests Tobias Guitars would move to Nashville. After much deliberation, no one from the original Tobias Guitars crew went to Nashville. The final LA Tobias/Gibson serial number is 2044. Despite Gibson's ownership of Tobias, all of the basses made up to 2044 were built by my regular crew. We also built about 60 basses that were not numbered or finished by us. Those would be the first production from Tobias/Nashville.

I left the company in December of 1992, and was a consultant for Gibson as they set up operations in Nashville. They had some trouble at first, but have since done a fairly good job making Tobias basses."

 

To be complete, this is also important :

By contractual agreement, Michael's consulting agreement with Gibson had a one year non competition term. That ended in December of 1993.

[Torbass]

6 minutes ago, Hellzero said:

It's not a pre Gibson series as the first Gibson serial number is 1094...

 

Check this from Michael Tobias himself :

 

"After several attempts to move the business to larger, better equipped facilities, I sold Tobias Guitars to Gibson on 1/1/90. The first Tobias Gibson serial number was 1094. At that point, Gibson was instrumental in moving us to a bigger shop in Burbank and setting us up with a great spray booth and dust collection system. We finally met So. Cal safety codes. Basses built during the 1990-1992 era were built initially by the same crew that had helped establish Tobias Basses as one of the most sought after basses on the planet. We added several people during 1990, and ended up with a great ten-man shop.

Business was still very good. We were not able to make anywhere near enough basses to fill the orders. Instead of trying to jack up production, we tried to get outside vendors to build for us. We had 110 Model T basses made for us by a very fine builder in New England, and then we got the Terada factory in Nagoya, Japan to make the Standard bass for us. This was and is a great bass, but the dollar-to-yen ratio killed the project. There were about 400 Standards.

Late in 1992, it was decided that in best corporate interests Tobias Guitars would move to Nashville. After much deliberation, no one from the original Tobias Guitars crew went to Nashville. The final LA Tobias/Gibson serial number is 2044. Despite Gibson's ownership of Tobias, all of the basses made up to 2044 were built by my regular crew. We also built about 60 basses that were not numbered or finished by us. Those would be the first production from Tobias/Nashville.

I left the company in December of 1992, and was a consultant for Gibson as they set up operations in Nashville. They had some trouble at first, but have since done a fairly good job making Tobias basses."

 

To be complete, this is also important :

By contractual agreement, Michael's consulting agreement with Gibson had a one year non competition term. That ended in December of 1993.

Yes, I know. The important part here is "The final LA Tobias/Gibson serial number is 2044. Despite Gibson's ownership of Tobias, all of the basses made up to 2044 were built by my regular crew. ". So it's not pre gibson ownership, but it is pre gibson manufacturing. And that is where the big difference is.

[Hellzero]

Indeed, and it was still made by Michael Tobias himself, but it's a bit tricky, even if Michael says these were his golden days with a dream team in a dream facility and certainly the best Tobias basses ever made.

 

If I were you I would change the title and description accordingly, so nobody could "sue" you, even if we are all very reasonable and well educated Europeans. 😉