Höfner 500/2 Club Bass (pre-owned)

500/2 Club Bass — Sunburst, 1964

Most people know Höfner for the violin bass, but the Club Bass is the one a lot of players end up loving more. It’s the same idea — a hollow German body, a 30-inch scale and a pair of Höfner pickups — in a single-cutaway shape that sits on a strap like a small archtop. It’s been a quiet favourite for anyone chasing that round, woody sixties thump ever since.

This one is a 1964, made in Bubenreuth in the middle of Höfner’s golden decade. Spruce top, flamed maple back and sides, cream binding and a sunburst that’s mellowed into deep amber and brown. It’s been played properly for sixty years and wears every one of them, but it’s had a neck reset, so it plays low and easy — much more comfortable than most vintage Höfners we get in. At 2.15 kg you’ll forget it’s on your shoulder.

Body, Neck & Woods

The Club Bass body is hollow, with a spruce top and flamed maple back and sides, and there are no f-holes, so it doesn’t feed back as easily as a real archtop. Spruce is a top wood — light, stiff and quick to respond — and on a hollow bass it gives you that airy, blooming low end you only really get from an acoustic-style build. The flamed maple on the back is a lovely piece of wood, with tight stripes running right across the sunburst.

The neck is a laminated maple set neck, glued into the body the old way, with a rosewood fingerboard, pearl dots and 22 frets. On a set-neck hollow body the neck angle is everything: as these basses age the angle creeps forward, the bridge ends up too low for the strings to clear the frets, and the action goes up. This one has had a proper neck reset, so the geometry is right again and it plays low, clean and comfortable all the way up.

The 30-inch scale is what makes a Höfner feel like a Höfner. Frets are closer together and strings are slacker, so your fretting hand has less work to do and the notes get a fat, thumpy fundamental with a soft attack. Paired with a light hollow body, you get a bass you can play for hours without getting tired.

Condition

This is a well-played vintage bass, and you can see it. The top has plenty of wear, with finish worn through to bare spruce where the forearm and picking hand rest, scratches and small marks all over, and the sunburst has darkened with age. The back and sides are in better shape, with a few scratches and some light wear around the edges. None of it is structural — it’s the kind of wear you get from a bass that’s been played for sixty years instead of sitting in a cupboard.

The neck has been professionally reset, which is the most important job you can do on an old Höfner. The pearloid pickguard is new. The tuners on the headstock aren’t original — they’re replacements that work well — but the original Höfner tuners come with it, so you can put them back on whenever you want. The staple pickups, the control panel with its switches, the fretted bridge and the trapeze tailpiece are all period Höfner. The back of the neck and headstock are finished in black. Höfner did this at the factory in the sixties when a neck’s wood wasn’t pretty enough for a clear or sunburst finish, and the black on this one has worn in along with the rest of the bass. It comes in a Höfner hardshell case — not the original case, but a proper Höfner one that fits it well — with the old tuners stored inside and a strap included. If you’d like closer photos of any detail, just ask and we’ll send them over.

Electronics, Sound & Feel

The pickups are Höfner’s staple pickups from the early to mid sixties, named after the flat, rectangular pole pieces that sit next to the adjustment screws under the chrome covers. One is at the neck and one sits just in front of the bridge, and on a hollow Höfner that neck pickup is where the magic is: deep, round and warm, with a lot of air around the note.

The pearloid control panel is classic Höfner. Each pickup has its own volume knob, the bass and treble switches turn the neck and bridge pickups on and off, and the rhythm/solo switch flips between two voicings — a rounder sound and a brighter, more cutting one. There’s no tone knob, and you don’t need one: find your blend, flick a switch, and play.

Plugged in, it sounds great. There’s a lot of warm, deep bass, the kind of low end that fills a room without getting woolly, with the soft, woody attack only a hollow short-scale bass gives you. Put flatwounds on it and play with a pick near the neck and you’re straight into early-sixties Merseybeat. Play it with your fingers and it’s a lovely, mellow bass for jazz, soul, indie and singer-songwriter work.

Who’s it for? Anyone who wants a real sixties Höfner they can actually play rather than just look at. With the neck reset done, the hardest part is already taken care of. It’s light, it’s comfortable, it sounds huge, and it has the kind of honest play wear you only get from sixty years of use. We think it’s a great one.