1966 Orig Epiphone Embassy Deluxe Bass
The Outsiders 1960's Bass Player Mert Madsen Owned
This Epiphone Bass belonged to, Mert Madsen the Bass
player from the band "the Outsiders" who did "Time Won't Let Me". He bought is new in 1966. Played it in concert all over the world and recorded the Album with.
Album cover on the back has the picture of him with this bass.
These Epiphone Deluxe Bass are RARE!
Has the Unreal Great Bell Tone Tunderbird Pickups.
Feather weigh of 7.6 lbs
The band is best known for its Top 5 hit "Time Won't Let Me" in early 1966.... We all heard the song a million times on the radio growing up
The bass is 100% except the bridge pickup ring is missing. Comes in a 60's hard shell case in fair shape, but I am not positive it's original. I do not know Epiphone and probably came in a cheap alligator press cardboard case, and that was no good for touring.
This Bass plays and sets up nice. Big Strings are on it. Thin like a Fender Jazz Bass at 1st fret, but gets very fat going up the neck. I guess it could use new strings, but sounds great as it is. Bass players like old strings and rarely change them, and you guys like what you like...,brand/size..
Bass ser# is 002072
Pots dates are 1966
Only 82 of these were made in 1966
Bridge pickup reads 9.06k
Neck pickup reads 7.78k
You can see it's all original finish under black light pictures.. The Yellow glow is Vintage Nitro and 50+ years old baby!
They were only made from 1963-1969
This is the early example as has no E on truss rod cover like in later 1960
It is a light weight bass. I can't get the dam thing to sit on my scale as bass guitars have long neck and hang off scale and just pain..
You get the Album "Time Wont Let Me" with this bass in Mert playing the bass, and the paper jukebox strip ONLY: NO RECORD: These are orig factory pressed strips (NOT THE FAKE ONES).
The Outsiders-Time Won't Let Me jukebox strip for Capitol 45-6165 to have as Great conversation guitar and part of History.. The 60's Baby!
Based in Cleveland, Ohio, the Outsiders was the brainchild of Tom King, a guitarist, composer and arranger. Initially known as Tom King And The Starfires, the line-up was completed by Al Austin (guitar), Met Madsen (bass) and Rick Biagiola/Baker (drums). The group was just a garden-variety bar band until the 1965 addition of eighteen year old vocalist Sonny Geraci infused the group with new life.
Tom King and his brother-in-law, Chet Kelley co-wrote a song called "Time Won't Let Me" and recorded it on their own. The song blended the group's core sound to brass and horn sections, in what was a fairly complex arrangement. On the strength of the recording, the group was signed by Capitol Records, but the label insisted that the band take a new name. King had been forced to abandon Pama Records, the label for which the Starfires had cut a dozen tunes and was owned by his uncle, who accused his nephew of being an "outsider" to the family.
"Time Won't Let Me" was issued in January of 1966, rising to number five on the national charts and selling over a million copies. An infectious slice of classic American pop, it introduced a series of similarly excellent top 40 songs, that included "Girl in Love" which went to #21.
By the spring of 1966, Capitol was ready for the group to record their debut album and Tom King called up Jimmy Fox, who had been the drummer for a slightly earlier line-up of the Starfires, to play on those sessions. Fox had left the group to attend college, but he came back to play on the album. In the wake of his brief reunion with his bandmates, Fox decided to forego college in favour of forming a band of his own, which would find their own success as the James Gang.
The sessions for some of the songs that would be on the group's second album (Outsiders #2) had already taken place and one of them, a version of the Isley Brothers number, "Respectable" was pegged as their third single, released in July of that year. The song rose to number 15 nationally in the summer of 1966, followed by "Help Me Girl" which stalled at #37 when it was successfully covered by Eric Burdon And The Animals.
