Well, this sucks. The “Rickenbacker 4003” showed up in what appeared to be a Rickenbacker case. You know that feeling you get when you pull something out of a box and it is supposed to be one thing but the alarm bells go off in your head that it actually isn’t? Yeah. That one. First, I’m definitely not an expert, but I’ve never seen a 4003 that doesn’t have a USA emblem below the strings near the neck. Then, this was supposed to be “mint” from a collector’s stable, and yet it had grunge stains on the body, and dust all along the side of the bridge pickup. I decided I’d go ahead and pull the strings and change them out for some Rotosounds. Whoops. Wear marks on the frets. “Played lightly, if ever.” Nope. Then, this….

chipped fretboard

There’s a divet in the top of the fretboard there. So, needless to say, it’s going back. The thing that sucks is that if I want another bass by Christmas, I’ll probably have to just shell out more money because the refund on this is presumably gonna take a couple of weeks.