Ripper

Classic living example = 1970s Kalamazoo L9-S / L-9S Ripper (two Super Humbuckers, Q-system, set neck). No current Gibson USA Ripper (no product page on Gibson.com, 29 September 2026). Ripper II (2009) is not this table: maple, rosewood, 34" scale, 12" radius (Sweetwater), Corian nut, top-load only, Seymour Duncan humbuckers, six-way switch, 350 basses. Blue Book runs that limited series summer 2009–2011; Wikipedia's period column stops at 2009. Scale inches disagree with the 1970s 34½". Mix flagged. The Grabber is the bolt-on you slide. The G-3 is three fixed single-coils. The Thunderbird is the bird. An Epiphone Ripper, when that brand offered one, was usually a bolt-on with a humbucker or a P/J, not these pickups. The EB-3 is the short-scale set-neck.

Construction

The job was a long-scale Gibson that was not an EB. FlyGuitars: players had tired of the EB basses that carried the 1960s, and a mid-'70s ad said they hadn't been hanging about for fifteen or twenty years. Mahogany was out. The earliest bodies are maple. A big contoured double-cut, two new humbuckers, and a circuit you had to learn. No fancy inlays. Plastic covers. Knobs and pickups on the guard, which saved the factory time against routing them into the wood. Still a large bass. No short-scale twin. All-maple examples can be heavy. One 1976 bass on FlyGuitars weighed 4.2 kg. That is one instrument.

Not a Grabber. Not a G-3. Not an EB-3. Not a Thunderbird. Vintage Guitar (Willie G. Moseley, January 2015) gives the mid-'70s trio one new body: 14½" wide, 1¼" deep, maple neck, 20 frets, 34½" scale. Gibson's Gazette (18 November 2025) still files the Ripper beside the Grabber and the G-3. The outline is what they share. The Grabber (gibson-grabber) is the bolt-on you slide. The G-3 is three fixed coils. The EB-3 (gibson-eb-3) stays short-scale. The Thunderbird (gibson-thunderbird) is the other long-scale Gibson. This plate is the set neck and the four-way switch.

The start is more than one date. FlyGuitars: a small batch of 1973 prototypes, a different body, shallow cutaway on top like a 335, deep on the bottom, pickups and controls in the wood, electronics from the back. Shown at the June 1973 NAMM show in Chicago. UK magazine Guitar, via FlyGuitars, reported an L65 guitar and an L95 bass — the magazine's spelling — and did not use the name Ripper. Dartanyan Brown, of Chase, told FlyGuitars those were first drafts Bruce Bolen reviewed with him, with Greg Lake, and probably others. The flat edge was uncomfortable. They beveled it. The January 1974 ad guitar was a mock-up grabbed ahead of the line: smaller guard, one pickup in it, EB-style humbuckers, no bridge cover. Shipping, from Larry Meiners's Gibson Shipment Totals as printed by FlyGuitars, already has cells in 1973: 19 ebony and 20 natural maple gloss. Vintage Guitar and Andy Baxter (Bass Guitar Magazine) both open the model in 1973. This plate starts at 1973. It does not bury the prototype body, and it does not pretend the January ad was a shipping guitar.

Who drew it splits. FlyGuitars: Bill Lawrence, then at Gibson, designed the Ripper and the L6-S. Wikipedia says the same, on a page that still asks for citations. Baxter is narrower: Lawrence designed the pickups. The pickup page on FlyGuitars agrees he did the humbucker and the circuit, and that he was there only briefly in the early and mid-1970s. Ralphe Armstrong, to FlyGuitars in June 2007: he met Bruce Bolen and "designer Walt Johnston," wrote down what he wanted, "and that's how they came up with this bass called the Ripper and the G-3." Three accounts. Not one designer.

The name on the page changed with the hyphen. FlyGuitars: Gibson's literature says L9-S from 1973–1976, and L-9S after. Same bass.

The point of the bass is the Q-system, and it does not solo the neck pickup. Two Super Humbuckers, identical, part 13679. Sidewinder coils, fewer turns than the EB humbucker of fifteen years earlier, a cleaner sound, an Indox magnet at each side (FlyGuitars). The 1975 catalog: master volume, midrange and treble roll-off, a four-position transfer switch. Vintage Guitar quotes the owner's manual: 1, both pickups, series, in phase; 2, bridge only; 3, both, parallel, in phase; 4, both, series, out of phase. The 1978 sheet, via FlyGuitars, adds the words: more bite; maximum treble; more bottom end; funky, dirty. FlyGuitars calls that a varitone. The catalog says transfer switch. Same four throws. The mid control is a roll-off. Lake's prototype write-up calls it a choke. Not an active boost. Lawrence's notes, via FlyGuitars: a neck-only setting was drawn, and production left it out. Gibson cut a vinyl 7-inch in 1974 so a player could find the tones. Richard Evans narrates side one, settings on the sleeve, Phil Upchurch on "It's Your Thing." Side two is Bass Meant, Dartanyan Brown with Chase.

Then the body changed in ways that date a bass. Earliest production: wider, short round horns, tortoiseshell guards from deep red to nearly black. Wikipedia: a few early guards are bright red, and some "black" guards are dark tortoiseshell. FlyGuitars: by late 1974, with alder, the horns get longer and sharper and the body a little narrower. Wikipedia puts that slimmer body in 1975. The wood years are in the spec table. Baxter agrees maple returns in 1977, and says the majority of 1975 are alder, not every one. 1976 is the year FlyGuitars and Wikipedia do not share.

Pickups moved the same years, not the same week. First covers: two screws through the middle, into the wood. FlyGuitars: late 1976 or early 1977, three screws into the guard, and the route changes shape. The pickup page says the three-tab cover is 1977. Wikipedia says three posts from 1976 on. Coils unchanged. The tabs break, and the cover does not come off cleanly, so a broken ear often means another pickup. Stringing changed with them. Early: four separate holes in the back. Late 1976 / early 1977: a recessed black plate. The tailpiece could already be strung at the bridge. The Grabber cannot. Tuners: unnamed open-gear in 1973–74, Schaller BM after. The 1976 bass on FlyGuitars has the Schallers.

Fretless is 1975, L9-FS. Same list as the fretted bass, except tobacco sunburst at $30 more from November 1975 until 1 January 1977. The 1975 catalog: sunburst, ebony board. Ebony and natural by 1977. Maple board by 1978. The 898 shipped 1975–79 are in the rarity table.

The end does not agree with itself. Vintage Guitar: the trio discontinued in '82. FlyGuitars: Meiners stops at 1979; small numbers at least as late as 1982; still in the 1983 catalog; few shipped in the 1980s. Wikipedia: 1973–1983, then the 2009 reissue. Reverb's product page prints 1973–1985. July 1980 is the last list on FlyGuitars's price page. The 1981 catalog is the close-out.

2009 is the caption, not a second spec sheet. Ripper II: 350 basses, 34" against 34½", rosewood, Corian, top-load only, Seymour Duncan humbuckers, a six-way switch instead of four. Sweetwater: maple, 12" radius. Blue Book runs the limited series summer 2009–2011. Wikipedia stops the period column at 2009. One Music Zoo listing called a natural an ash body. Don't average that with maple.

Players

Krist Novoselic — a blonde one, on Nevermind. Guitar World (Joel McIver, 18 February 2022, reprinting a 2011 Bass Player interview): "I played a blonde Ripper on Nevermind." He is six foot seven, which he offers as the reason a big bass suited him. "It's big and heavy, it's a big gun, but it's got that sustain that I really like." Two of them were stolen. The blonde "sounded different from my other black one." That is the album, in his mouth. It is not a track sheet, and it is not the Grabber. Baxter notes he also used an RD Artist and a Thunderbird. Those are other basses. Mike Dirnt played a G-3. Gibson Gazette (18 November 2025): his original G-3 on Dookie (1994), notably "Longview." The Gazette's sentence that lumps him with Novoselic as someone who loved "these" basses does not move Dookie onto a Ripper.

Rick Danko — the film, and a later photograph. Vintage Guitar: the Ripper's most notable appearance is Martin Scorsese's The Last Waltz, the 1978 documentary, "wherein bassist Rick Danko played one." The same article's caption is a different day: a natural L-9S in 1979, on tour with Paul Butterfield. Bob Sanderson's photograph. Two appearances. Not one guitar proved to be both, and no song on the film is pinned here.

Lou Barlow — the first Dinosaur album, and half of the second. Reverb's interview (14 November 2016): "I initially had a Gibson, it was a Ripper. We actually recorded the first and half the second album with a Ripper." He calls the tone nasal and says it stands out, then he "upgraded to a really nice 4001 Rickenbacker." He names that second record in the same interview: You're Living All Over Me. Which half is unpublished. Sweep It Into Space (2021) is a different story: Guitar World has a pair of Grabbers on that album, and a '65 Precision on "Garden" and "Wonder Why." Not this bass.

Suzi Quatro played one for about three years and then did not want the next Gibson. FlyGuitars, June 2006: "very very big body... neck was also thick and long... good woody sound... but cumbersome... pretty colour... tan... finally moved on." The Grabber, after it, "had none of the tone or feel of the Ripper." Vintage Guitar lists her with the Ripper endorsers. Both stand. No album is pinned on the three years.

Greg Lake — a prototype, in print in 1974. FlyGuitars's report of Guitar Player, September 1974: a new prototype Gibson called The Ripper, more powerful pickups than the standard bass humbuckers, a midrange choke, four different sounds. Lake calls it the most "reliable and accurate" instrument on the market. That is a prototype in a magazine, the same season Brown says Lake was looking at first drafts with Bolen. It is not an ELP track list. The production bass has 20 frets.

Peter Cetera posed for the ad. Vintage Guitar: he posed with one for an ad in '79. FlyGuitars has the ad "It Sounds Like Peter Cetera." A pose. Not a Chicago record.

Bill Wyman — a gift, for a solo album, not a Stones record. FlyGuitars, citing Andy Babiuk's Rolling Stones Gear: Gibson gave him the Ripper in 1975, and he used it through 1976 to promote Stone Alone. A Stones record does not move onto it.

Gene Simmons gigged one. The Alive! cover is the other bass. Vintage Guitar: a Grabber, natural headstock, on the cover of Alive!, September 1975. "Simmons also gigged with a Ripper." Which songs are which is unpublished here.

Louis Johnson was photographed with one. FlyGuitars: he and George posed for Gibson on a Grabber, a G-3, and a Ripper. On the Ripper photo the bridge cover is off and the knobs are not stock, which is why FlyGuitars thinks it was not only a pickup from the shoot. Vintage Guitar lists him as an endorser. No Brothers Johnson hit is pinned on it here.

Also known to play stays short. Vintage Guitar's endorser line adds Mel Schacher of Grand Funk. No album is pinned. Dave Kiswiney, with Ted Nugent, told FlyGuitars the Ripper "was like a godsend" — balance, the tones, "that big maple body." Justin Meldal-Johnsen told FlyGuitars he has two mid-'70s examples, one maple, one black. Armstrong is in the design argument above, and FlyGuitars shows him with one.

Rarity

You cannot buy a new Gibson Ripper. Ripper II and any Epiphone on the silhouette are other instruments, already out of this table. Japanese lawsuit-era copies — FlyGuitars names Aria, Cortez, Shaftesbury, Ventura, Westminster — are not Kalamazoo either.

No lifetime factory census. FlyGuitars prints Meiners through 1979 only. The natural-satin total cell on that page is blank. 2,242 is 1,057 + 1,185. The year-sum row is those cells added, not a row Meiners printed. The cells come to 10,017. FlyGuitars's 898 fretless, "around 10% of the total," is the two fretless rows. Against 10,017 that is closer to 9%. The phrase is theirs. It is not a second count.

	1973	1974	1975	1976	1977	1978	1979	Total
Fretless L9-FS				95	107	76	74	352
Fretless, tobacco sunburst			108	255	57	79	47	546
Ebony	19	426	118	734	442	466	198	2,403
Natural maple gloss	20	3,075			715	351	187	4,348
Natural satin			1,057	1,185				2,242
Tobacco sunburst			5	22	52	19	28	126
Year sum	39	3,501	1,288	2,291	1,373	991	534	10,017

Wikipedia calls 1976 the peak year. In this table 1974 is the peak, on the strength of 3,075 natural maple-gloss basses, and 1976 is second. 1976 does lead the ebony, natural-satin, and fretless-sunburst cells. Keep the sentence and the table. After 1979 the cells stop. Small numbers into 1982, a 1983 catalog line, few shipped. That is why a full-run total is unknown.

What is actually thin: a 1973 bass, 39 of them in the cells; fretted tobacco sunburst, 126 through 1979; the unlisted 1974 cherry sunbursts, a handful and not a catalog color; the June 1973 prototype body, which is not this outline. The fretless row without a finish name is 352, and it does not say how they were painted. Novoselic's blonde and his black one were stolen. They are missing objects, not a vintage Ripper.

Value

Informal estimate, 29 September 2026. Not an appraisal.

Asking prices are not sold prices. Celebrity instruments are not comps. A Ripper II is not a 1975. An Epiphone is not Kalamazoo money. A Grabber is not this bass. Period list, FlyGuitars: June 1973 $450; January 1975 $449; November 1975 $469; June 1976 $499; January 1977 $539; January 1978 $559; January 1979 $599; July 1980 $699. The March 1976 list puts the Ripper at $469–$499, from the EB-3's $469 and up, over the G-3 at $389–$469 and the Grabber at $329–$379, under the Les Paul Triumph at $679. The tobacco fretless carried the extra $30 noted above. All of that is 1970s money.

New street. None. No Gibson USA Ripper product page turned up on 29 September 2026. No 2009 list price in a Gibson document this pass. Musician's Friend's Epiphone Limited Edition Ripper page is unavailable. Not a 2026 cart, and not this table when it was.

Used modern. No clean sold band for the 2009 Ripper II, or for an Epiphone Ripper, this pass. 350 is a production count, not a price.

Vintage / collectible. The dollar widget on Reverb's L-9S price-guide page did not render (29 September 2026). Flag: thin sold-comp access. Reverb's Brazil mirror of that guide printed R$7,809–R$14,786, 386 orders, Good to Mint, "All Models," and said the estimate is from US sales. Reais are not a dollar band. Do not convert them. One US listing's own widget, a 1979 natural, printed $1,996–$2,599. That is one listing's widget, not the 386-order band. Named asks, not hammers, on pages fetched the same day: Willie's American Guitars, a 1974 natural in Good condition, $3,600. FlyGuitars's live sale links: a 1976 with the original case, $3,400; a 1979 fretless ebony, $2,999; a 1979 natural stamped Second, one pickup rewound, $3,250; an untested bass, $2,500. A $3,500 ask on that page has Seymour Duncans in it. Not a stock comp. Do not average the asks. No hammer for the stolen Novoselic basses, Danko's, or Wyman's is in these sources.

See also

• gibson-grabber — the same outline, a bolt-on, and one coil you slide; not this set neck or this switch
• gibson-eb-3 — the short-scale set-neck the March 1976 list priced the Ripper beside
• fender-precision-bass — the long-scale bolt-on Gibson was selling the 1970s basses against; not this body

Sources

• FlyGuitars, Gibson Ripper — 1973 launch; maple, alder 1975–76, maple from 1977; 34½"; nut 1⅝"; three-piece set maple; 20 frets; Q-system; 1975 catalog body 21½" × 14½" × 1¼"; combination tailpiece; Meiners shipping table through 1979; 898 fretless; L9-S vs L-9S; June 1973 NAMM prototypes; Dartanyan Brown on the ad mock-up; late-1974 body change; pickup and string-through changes late 1976 / early 1977; 1983 catalog, few shipped; Japanese copies
• FlyGuitars, Ripper publicity and pricing — lists June 1973 $450 through July 1980 $699; March 1976 ladder against Grabber, G-3, EB-3, Les Paul Signature, Les Paul Triumph; tobacco fretless +$30, November 1975 to 1 January 1977; 1974 promo 7-inch, Richard Evans, Phil Upchurch, "It's Your Thing," Bass Meant
• FlyGuitars, Ripper controls (1978 sheet) — four positions and the tonal words; no neck-only; Lawrence's notes
• FlyGuitars, Ripper humbucker — Lawrence; part family; sidewinders; fewer turns than the EB humbucker; Indox magnets; two-screw cover, three-tab cover in 1977
• FlyGuitars, 1976 Ripper — set neck, glued in; Schaller BM; weight 4.2 kg on the pictured bass
• FlyGuitars, Ripper users — Armstrong, June 2007, Bolen and Walt Johnston; Guitar Player, September 1974, on Lake's prototype; Cetera ad; Johnson photograph; Wyman via Babiuk, Rolling Stones Gear, 1975 gift, Stone Alone through 1976; Kiswiney; Meldal-Johnsen
• FlyGuitars, Suzi Quatro interview, June 2006 — about three years on a tan Ripper; big body, thick neck, woody sound; Grabber rejected after it
• *Vintage Guitar*, Willie G. Moseley, Gibson Basses in the '70s (January 2015) — debut '73; 14½" × 1¼"; 34½"; 20 frets; Q-system from the owner's manual; sunburst dropped for black by 1975; fretless 1975; Lake, Schacher, Quatro, Johnson, Cetera ad in '79; Danko in The Last Waltz (1978) and the 1979 Butterfield photograph; Simmons gigged a Ripper, Grabber on Alive!; trio discontinued '82; Novoselic and Dirnt only as later players of the trio
• Andy Baxter, 1973: Grabber and Ripper (*Bass Guitar Magazine*) — 1973; maple, majority alder in 1975, maple again in 1977; Ripper "set-neck (through-body)"; Les Paul headstock; natural / black / tobacco sunburst and which board; Lawrence designed the pickups; Novoselic, and also an RD and a Thunderbird
• Wikipedia, Gibson Ripper — 1973–1983 and 2009; peak year stated as 1976; alder-in-1975-only infobox, which disagrees with FlyGuitars on 1976; 1975 body change; three-post pickups from 1976; cherry sunburst a 1974 handful, never catalogued; plastic nut; Ripper II Corian, top-load only, Seymour Duncan, six-way, midrange notch. The page asks for citations. The user list is not a credit
• *Guitar World*, Krist Novoselic (18 February 2022) — blonde Ripper on Nevermind; black one sounded different; both stolen; six foot seven; sustain
• Reverb, Lou Barlow (14 November 2016) — Ripper on the first Dinosaur album and half of the second; then a 4001
• *Guitar World*, Lou Barlow (20 September 2021) — Grabbers on Sweep It Into Space; '65 Precision on "Garden" and "Wonder Why"; not the Ripper
• Gibson Gazette, Epiphone Mike Dirnt Grabber G-3 (18 November 2025) — original G-3 on Dookie, "Longview"; Ripper named as a sister model, which is not a session credit
• Sweetwater, Gibson Ripper II — 2009 limited run, 350; maple; rosewood; 34" scale; 12" radius; Corian nut; Seymour Duncan; six-way
• Blue Book of Guitar Values, Ripper II (BAR2) — 350; set three-piece maple; rosewood; 34"; Grover Shamrock; six-way; natural; summer 2009–2011. Dollar figure paywalled
• Reverb, Gibson L-9S Ripper — years printed 1973–1985; the blurb's six-position switch is the reissue, not the 1975 catalog; dollar widget did not render, 29 September 2026
• Reverb Brazil, Gibson L-9S Ripper price guide — 386 orders, Good to Mint; R$7,809–R$14,786 from US sales; not converted
• Reverb, 1979 Ripper natural — that listing's widget, $1,996–$2,599; not the all-models band
• Reverb, 1974 Ripper, Willie's American Guitars — ask $3,600, Good; one bass at 8 lb 4 oz, not a model weight
• The Music Zoo, 2009 Ripper II — one natural described as ash; conflicts with Sweetwater and Blue Book maple; 350