Koa, Darling!

A month or so, I announced my desire to commission a Carvin Bromberg Elite. The build team in San Diego got it done in rapid time and it showed up last night. I think they knocked it out of the park. More shots and a rather embarrassing sound demo after the jump.

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My B24 Elite differs from the one I was copying in the following respects:

• Figured Koa stripes instead of walnut in the maple neck

• The neck-through body is covered by the koa top instead of being exposed, to avoid that totally Eighties stripe-through look like what you get with a Aria Pro or Skylark.

• I suspect the body on the original one was alder; mine is swamp ash for tone but mostly for weight. This bass is feather light.

• Inlaid abalone Carvin headstock logo instead of gold logo

I'm a lousy photographer but you don't have to be good with a camera to pick up just how gorgeous all four wood caps are on this bass. The whole instrument appears, to use the old PRS phrase, to be "dipped in glass". It's so lovely, I'm so thrilled with it, I can't wait to have Patrick play the thing next to me at a gig.

Which reminds me. Patrick, my bass player, has been too busy with his family to come over and play the B24. Isn't that lame? I bet you that Duff McKagan never wasted any time with his family. So I decided to try a few songs out. My voice is only occasionally present here; my pneumonia is back in force and I can't both sing and play bass at the same time. Still, it just Sounds. So. Good. Imagine how it will sound when Patrick's playing it!