Vox Astro IV Bass 1960s – Sunburst

Vox Astro IV Model Hollow Body Electric Bass Guitar (approx. 1968), made in Recanati, Italy, sunburst polyester finish, laminated maple body and neck, original hard shell case. Plays well, all electronics work, straight neck.

The unique violin-body Vox Astro IV was a direct descendant of the 1966 V-250 “Violin Bass”, which itself was only available for a year or so. The Astro was built with the same arched, F hole hollow body but used the very narrow neck that Rolling Stone Bill Wyman requested for his namesake teardrop-body model in 1966. The Astro IV is a pretty far-out take on the Hofner violin bass and has all the typical evolved Vox appointments for that year; wider-cased metal covered pickups (with more output than the earlier design) and a large headstock with larger long-stemmed tuners and a giant VOX logo.

The Astro IV also has a special period feature: elaborate onboard transistorized effects that were pioneered by Vox starting in 1967. A “distortion” circuit, adjustable from a sizzly fuzz to a white noise maelstrom, and a rotary Bass boost/Bass cut treble boost. There is also a “G” tuner, a bonus in the pre-electronic tuner days of 1967. This model is most remembered for its appearance in Bill Wyman’s hands at two well-documented Rolling Stones gigs: the “Rock ‘N’ Roll Circus” TV special in 1968 and the massive Hyde Park concert in the summer of 1969. An oddball Vox classic, but one with a pedigree!

This bass is a very good player with some old and solid but visible repairs. Overall there is some of the typical heavy Vox Polyester finish checking, and the back edge lower side of the body shows several solid but quite visible crack repairs, well sealed but not perfectly touched up. The rest of the body is fairly clean. There are no alterations and the instrument is complete except the snap-on bridge cover is missing. Overall this is a good player’s example of this cool Vox bass obscurity-even the active effects are amazingly still functional. Complete with the very large OHSC, a bit worn with two of the three latches broken, but still useable. Questions are welcomed. Thanks for looking.