I feel very fortunate to have owned/played a Rickenbacker bass for many years. It played great, sounded superb, excellent craftsmanship and built rock solid. Truly I fine instrument.
Paul McCartney’s Rickenbacker 4001S:
Paul received his Rickenbacker 4001S during the Hollywood Bowl concert in August 1964. The bass had been shown to him in February of the same year, but Paul was not particularly interested. The fact that noone at RIC had noticed that Paul was Left-handed may explain his previous lack of enthusiasm. The Rickenbacker bass was also heavier than his light-weight Hofner which may have added to his reluctance to accept the bass earlier.
In 1964, Paul McCartney could have bought any bass guitar he wanted. The Beatles had come to America. They were pulling in almost $50,000 for a show, which was not bad money in the days when minimum wage was only around $1.00 an hour in the United States.
McCartney seemed content to play his lightweight Hofner bass, which had become a trademark by now. But the owner of Rickenbacker Guitars had other ideas.
A couple of years back, Paul explained that he was presented with the bass in February 1964, but didn’t accept the offer until it was presented to him for free. Apparently Rickenbacker had asked for a small fee during this initial meeting with. He said in the article that the only reason he took the bass was because he was always on the look out for ‘freebies’.
In another interview from May 1980 he said:
“…. – Back in the midsixties Mr Rickenbacker gave me a special left-handed bass. It was the first left-handed bass I´d ever had, ´cause the Hofner was a converted right-hand. It was a freebie and I loved it; I started getting into it on “Sgt Pepper”.
Let’s start from the beginning:
According to the people at Rickenbacker the S/N of Paul’s 4001S starts with a DA indicating that it was built in January of 1964, or at least started by then. Paul’s 4001S is only one of two lefties made in 1964. Seeing as his was made or started in Jan. ’64 it is most likely that his was the first one made that year.
The bass was a very dark Fireglo (almost Autumnglo) model 4001S LH that was given to Paul in August 1964, probably during the Hollywood Bowl concerts.
There are no pictures (at least that I know of) of Paul with the 4001S until 1965 when work on Rubber Soul began. George Harrison has said that Paul played his 4001S on the song ‘Think For Yourself’, but other than that, there’s no documentation of his Rickenbacker being used on the album.
At the end of 1965 and the beginning of 1966, the 4001S was used as a back up bass at live performances. (Paul was seen with it backstage during the Beatles Japanese tour in spring/summer 1966.
Paul continued to use his Rickenbacker as a backup bass for the last Beatles tour in ’66.
The first time a real presence of the Rickenbacker bass is felt is during the recording of “Paperback Writer” and Rain, the first two songs recorded for their upcoming album “Revolver”. According the book “Revolution in the Head”, he played the bass through a compressor for the two songs.
He picked up the bass again in November of ’66 and used it on the recordings of ‘Penny Lane’ and ‘Strawberry Fields’. There is a picture of him using the bass during these sessions in the book “The Summer Of Love: 1967”. He continued to use the bass through the Sgt. Pepper recordings. In the TV special, “The making of Sgt. Pepper” he said that he would usually play the bass last as an overdub so that he could think of a good bass line, or at least more complex ones than he had initially used.
At this point changes in the appearance of his Rickenbacker bass become evident.
Why did Paul painted up his Rickenbacker? It seems that there was a get together for the four Beatles to celebrate the completion of The Sgt. Pepper album and they brought their instruments. Paul said that they would see performers at the “Bag O’Nails” Club in London who had painted up their guitars to fit the psychedelic era and wanted to do the same. George brought his Fender Strat, John his Gibson J-160, Paul his Rickenbacker 4001S and Ringo brought his bass drum. Now I’m quoting Paul:
” – We got together at George’s place, had some beers, smoked a couple of joints, then came out the aerosols and that’s it”. That’s how his bass got the way it did.
For the next while he used his Rickenbacker bass incessantly in videos and in the studio, until the end of 1968.
The Rickenbacker 4001S bass doesn’t show up again until the Beatles move into there new studio at Apple Corp. It can be seen in the background of the ‘Two Of Us’ video looking exactly as it did when he got it but in mapleglo now. There seems to be no photographic or video evidence of Paul using this bass during the “Let It Be” sessions.
No one can say if he used this bass during the recording of “Abbey Road”.
In late ’68 (shortly after Paul got his Fender Jazz) before the filming of “Let It Be” Paul had decided that the Beatles had outgrown the psychedelic phase and sent it back to the Ric factory to get the paint stripped off and the handrest removed.
His Rickenbacker bass pretty much stayed the same until he started to work on the “Red Rose Speedway” album. One, but clearly visible, change was that Paul had the horns on his bass shaved down somewhere between 1970 and the release of the RRS album. He also got the bridge pick-up replaced and the metal surrounding changed to a more rectangular one. A Red Rose Speedway sticker was also put on the bass at this point.
If you are a fan of The Beatles you might enjoy these videos by Morgan Rees:
The Beatles “Beginning to the End” factoids:
The Beatles “White Album” factoids:
The making of “YELLOW SUBMARINE” movie:
The Beatles “Rubber Soul” factoids:
Ever Wonder How The Beatles Came Up With Their Name?
