1968 Gibson Everly Brothers Rubber-Bridge Bass Conversion

There is a whole backstory to this guitar which you can read over at its original post. Suffice to say, it's an Everly Brothers model that's had its neck thinned, its top replaced, and much of the bracing replaced or modified, too.

I was trying to get along with it as a normal 6-string flattop but I just wasn't happy with it as a guitar because the bracing is so light that it had a bit of a woofy sound so it felt like it was "compressed" when strung-up as a 6. I then swapped it over to a tenor guitar setup where it had a nice sound but the neck's a hair wide and the handling (with the mini-jumbo body shape) was not great for typical playing styles you'd do with a tenor (read: lots of lead and fill playing).

So, the "Take 3" solution was to convert it to a small acoustic bass guitar which I'd thought of at first but was too chicken to do the first time around. I initially left the rosewood saddle I had made for it as a tenor (recompensated) to try this out and I had stuck a magnetic pickup in the soundhole at the time and tried that at first but I didn't think the sound was exciting even though it did sound good that way. I swapped the pickup out to a K&K acoustic pickup and that made it a lot more fun and different. Then I removed the hard saddle I was using and changed it over to a rubber saddle instead. This gave it more of a "bumpy" upright sound as it took the brightness away from the sound due to its having a fretted board instead of a fretless one.

The stringing style is, of course, different because it's got a tailpiece setup and downpressure bar behind the saddle. The light foam behind the bridge just damps the extra string length and can be removed as desired. With it removed there's more of that "behind the bridge" overtone stuff going on which can be nice... or not... depending on your taste!

My last alteration was to install a 1/2" wooden dowel connecting the neckblock to the endblock. It's painted black so it's not obvious unless you're looking for it. I had dealt with severe neck joint trauma on this guitar in the past -- years ago -- and it had remained stable, but I wanted to dot the "i" and cross the "t" for my peace of mind before releasing this out into the wild again. I also reduced the tuner numbers down to 4 and fit nice, Gotoh, aged-finish keystone tuners to lighten-up the headstock over the big Grovers that were on it.

As per the last posting, it has cracks here and there throughout, lots of wear and tear, and a repaired headstock break. Still, it's workmanly and plays spot-on with low action and an easy, comfy feel and stable neck. The strings seem to be LaBella clear nylon tapewound strings over copper wraps. They were nearly-fresh strings pulled from an acoustic bass guitar I was swapping roundwounds onto and they suit it perfectly.