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Post subject: Tom "T-Bone" Wolk's modified 1964 Precision bass
Posted: Wed May 26, 2010 12:27 pm
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Ton "T-Bone" Wolk played a heavily modified 1964 Precision bass. The Fender Custom Shop had a replica for him off the original 1964 P-bass he used. I wanted to know how it was modified? Why don't they market this? The guy was an icon for tone and studio grooves.


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Posted: Wed May 26, 2010 5:05 pm
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T-Bone played a variety of basses depending on what was required but he is mainly remembered with his sunburst '64 P-bass. This was the bass he played most of the time on Saturday Night Live from the mid 80's through early 90's. The most obvious mod to it was an added a DiMarzio white covered Jazz Bass pickup at the bridge, the jack was relocated to the lower bout in the same spot as 51 P-Bass/Telecaster guitar and of course the electronics had to be modified to make it all work. As I recall he went with a stacked pot setup similar to the '61 Jazz on it for volume. There were two tone controls.

He also used an 81 Gibson Ripper a lot along with various Hofners and other P-basses including a black on black one, but the '64 P was his number 1 bass. Todd Krause was the Fender Custom Shop Master Builder who replicated the '64 Precision which T-Bone immediately started using. While best remembered as a pop/rock bassist, he was classically trained and was proficient on several other instruments besides bass including piano, accordion, Hammond B-3, banjo and both electric and acoustic guitar.

The Custom Shop bass got the heavy relic treatment. It looked even more road worn than the original. The reason there may never be an Artist Series bass based on his '64 #1 is possibly because it was not an especially pretty bass looking a bit odd with the mixed color pickups.

Besides mixing pickups on his '64 P-bass, T-Bone was also known to mix strings from different sets on his instruments. It was not unusual for him to mix roundwound G & D with flatwound A & E strings. He was an original for sure. Besides being a fun guy, he was very in-demand as studio player not just on bass but on many instruments. He also was a producer. It was a real loss to pop music in general and the NYC music scene in particular when he passed late this past February. Personally, I always enjoyed his bassline on Hall & Oates "MANEATER" a lot. Very clean, very steady, very perfect, very pro. While T-Bone always said he looked upon James Jamerson as the "God of bass" T-Bone played bass with a pick a large part of the time.


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Posted: Wed May 26, 2010 11:07 pm
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Thanks for the info; great history involved.


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Post subject: Re: Tom "T-Bone" Wolk's modified 1964 Precision bass
Posted: Wed Jan 26, 2011 9:56 am
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Joined: Tue Jan 25, 2011 3:51 pm
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Location: Marion, IL
Cutchan,

was actually looking around on Ebay recently for replicas of the modified Precision and it was such a joke to see what kind of junk people were trying to sell, for a high price none the less. T-Bone was such a beast I eventually gave up on the search because my dreams were kind of shattered by all of the scams going on... oh well I'll let the thing rest in peace.

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