Bill Wyman has debuted his astonishing Bill Wyman Signature bass that faithfully captures the spirit of Bill’s homemade fretless bass. The result – the Bill Wyman Signature bass – follows months of R&D, and has a short-scale neck and features Bill’s own unique headstock design.
The Bass Centre’s Barry Moorhouse originally approached Bass legend Bill Wyman in 2010 reference the possibility of producing a Bill Wyman Signature bass under the ‘Bass Centre’ brand label.
Originally Moorhouse suggested a design shadowing the ‘Fender Mustang’ Bass – an instrument loosely associated with Bill during his career. However Bill wanted his Signature model to reflect Bill’s own unique ‘custom-made’ Bass which he’d used to great effect during 100’s of live shows and recordings throughout his tenure in the Rolling Stones, including the ‘Exile On Main Street’ sessions.
With this as a starting point, Barry Moorhouse and long-time Bass Centre guitar technician Chris Ward paid a visit to Bill’s ‘Sticky Fingers’ restaurant in Kensington, with tools and tapes abundant, to faithfully record the specifications and sizes of the original Wyman Bass, which now resides in a glass case on the restaurant’s wall.
In 1961 Bill custom made his own home made fretless Bass and the brief was to produce a Bass ‘similar in spirit’ to the original instrument.
Fast forward and, after a couple of prototypes, and months of R&D, the new ‘Wyman’ Bass comes into production in Spring 2011.
The new instrument boasts a lightweight, custom shaped Alder body, finished in black (a la Henry Ford) with one-piece crimson scratchplate. The tone is supplied by a pair of ‘Baldwin’ type pick-ups hooked up to a classic passive tone and volume circuit. The ‘Wyman Bass’ has a short-scale neck, topped with a fretted rosewood fingerboard and features Bill’s own unique headstock design.
Tuners are 2-a-side Gotoh style and the Bass is strung with Elites flatwounds which all contribute to a stunning feel with a fast, low action.
The ‘Wyman Bass’ has an RRP of £595 including a custom padded gig bag.
Available through all good music stores and exclusively worldwide via:
House Music in the UK Tel: 00 44 (0) 20 7357 7703
For more details visit the Bass Centre online