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Anyone know what this is?

Its short scale (65cm?), fretless with fret lines painted on, amazing shiny quilted finish. The writing on the body looks like it was done with a permanent marker and a stencil. The ‘Jay Dee’ on the headstock is decals. Haven’t taken the back plate off but no serial numbers or anything obvious anywhere else. Can’t find anything similar online but looks like cheap old 60s bass to me from the flat body and hardware so maybe somebody ‘upgraded’ it to be a Jay Dee?

It plays pretty good!

 

Any info on this curiosity would be much appreciated!

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It looks like it's been painted with Hammerite and the only references I can find to MLX are a Martin Audio sub and Digital car dials made by Dakota.

 

I thought all Jaydees had proper names like Calibas, Celeste etc rather than acronyms

 

The headstock looks like an old Aria something

Edited by Delberthot
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26 minutes ago, BassApprentice said:

Don't think its a Jay Dee, a quick Google Image search and it looks like a Teisco Satellite, or possibly an Aria.

 

https://reverb.com/au/item/70439480-teisco-satellite-mini-lespaul-bass-24-1960s-black

 

I think @Bassassin is fairly knowledgeable about all things weird and wonderful in vintage basses

 

Thanks! I can help, but be warned: you have just kicked open the door to some paralysingly dull pedantry. :P

 

This bass is the same thing as the Satellite, and it was made in Korea (possibly by Cort) around 1980-ish. I've seen a few names on these, and I've got an idea there's a Hohner-branded version. Satellite was the budget brand of UK importer/distributor FCN Music, dates are unclear but they seemed to appear mid/late 70s & all appear to be Korean-made - at least, I've never seen an MIJ one.

 

To clear things up, there's no such thing as a 'Teisco Satellite'. Sellers like to call anything a bit old, far-eastern, & cheap/wonky-looking a Teisco, but not many of them are - there were dozens, possibly hundreds of small guitar manufacturers in Japan during the 60s 'guitar boom' (nearly every backstreet wood shop/furniture manufacturer jumped on the bandwagon), most of which were gone by 1970 - including Teisco, which was bought over by Kawai in 1967 & absorbed in to its parent company.

 

Budget guitar manufacture moved to Korea & Taiwan during the 70s, as most of the big Japanese manufacturers focused on better quality & ultimately, original designs. The starter-level Korean stuff coming from Samick & Cort in the 70s & 80s used the designs & hardware types common on 60s MIJ stuff - hence slightly weird crossovers like this Satellite, with its 80s body/headstock but bedecked with tinny, barely functional hardware.

 

If there's a takeaway from this it's that your old 60s Japanese guitar probably isn't Japanese, or anything like as old as you thing it is.

 

Quote

...paralysingly dull pedantry...

 

Told you, didn't I?

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