Guild/DeArmond Starfire Bass


 
The Guild Starfire bass was a staple of the 60's sound. Especially made famous by Jack Cassidy of Jefferson Airplane.

Guild was founded in 1952 by a couple of VPs from Epiphone, and went on to become a major force in acoustic and electric instruments through the 60's and 70's. In the '80's the company underwent a series of ownership changes, but in 1995 finally became part of Fender.

Fender had purchased the DeArmond brand of musical instrument pickups in 1997, and then in 1998 combined the company with Guild to produce an alternative line of high quality, affordable guitars and basses modeled after Guild designs but built and assembled in Korea. 

These Korean made instruments were  of very high quality to start with, but were inspected and set up in the US (Corona, CA) where genuine American DeArmand 

pickups were added. This means that these less expensive instruments are quite capable of producing the same great tone as their American made Guild counterparts. 

...Thus was Guild's famous Starfire bass reborn. 

Both the Guild and DeArmond versions of the Starfire are now discontinued.

The secret to great tone with these babies is high quality flatwound strings - I use Thomastic-Infeld (made in Austria). Expensive but worth it.

Cool Features:
    - Short/Medium scale (32")
    - Real DeArmond pickups
    - 60's vibe 
    - Skinny, fast neck
    - One of the last semi-acoustic basses available
    - Did I mention that 60's vibe thing  ...man?