Hondo II - S. D. Curlee Standard 1 Bass, HD800N

Hvor tit ser man en bashals med 24 bånd? Jeg har ikke før set en Hondo der var bygget af så gedigne materialer og dele. Pickuppen med ekstra lange Alnicomagneter er fra DiMarzio USA - Hondo var vist det første asiatiske guitarfirma der monterede amerikanske pickupper i deres instrumenter.  Lakken har nogle naturlige misfarvninger på siderne.
Bassen er på flere måder konstrueret unikt. Feks er halsen (med 24 bånd) gennemgående helt ned til stolen, så træet under strengene hele vejen er uden samlinger. Curlee var amerikansk og ret populær i 70'erne, hvor de to store firmaers instrumenter ikke altid var imponerende. Min er en officiel licens udgave af Curlees dyrere amerikanskbyggede basser.

Her er lidt fra wiki:

S.D. Curlee was a guitar manufacturer from Matteson, Illinois, in the late 1970s and early 1980s before going out of business. For a while its electric basses were popular, much more so than their guitars. They were especially popular in Belgium during the late 1970s and early 1980s because of the poor products then coming from Fender.

This small enterprise was founded by Randy Curlee around 1975 in Matteson. The name S.D Curlee came from the three original designers, Sonny Storbeck, Randy Dritz and Randy Curlee. According to Michael Wright (Guitar Stories), this independent entrepreneur built and sold around 15,000 handcrafted instruments, including 12,000 bass guitars, between 1975 and 1982. Curlee wanted to offer a quality built instrument at an affordable price. Advertising campaigns were rather scarce: only a handful of ads exist. A rather classy 8 page color affair from 1979 and a few black-and-white flyers were distributed.

During these years, the Curlee brand was also licensed to Hondo. S.D. Curlee was one of the first instrument manufacturers to use this approach to the issue of unlicenced copies of premium brands. Many other instrument companies subsequently followed its lead.

During the early 1980s, the climate for these 'all natural' instruments changed drastically. New composite materials such as carbon resin (used on Steinberger, Status, Modulus and other instruments) became the state of the art. Headless designs, flashy colors and an altogether different approach forced Curlee and his contemporary contenders into new grounds. He went to work for Yamaha instruments and died in 2005.