Travis Bean
Travis Bean is an American luthier and machinist from California.
In the 1970s, he made high end electric guitars and basses featuring machined aluminum necks (an unusual design that provides incredible sustain, running through the instrument body with the pick-ups solid-mounted to the aluminum. The majority of these instruments featured solid koa wood bodies and humbucker pickups. Models included the Artist, Standard, Wedge (rare), and TB500(rare) with single coil pickups.
Bean produced several more similarly designed guitars and basses in the late 1990s, though no more than 9-10.
Musicians who play or have played Travis Bean guitars and basses
- Joe Perry
- Slash
- Stanley Jordan,
- Jerry Garcia
- Status Quo
- Steve Albini - TB500
- Keith Richards
- Scott Paterson of Sons and Daughters
- Jeff Schneider of Arab on Radar
- Gary Schider of Funkadelic
Bass Players
- Bill Wyman of the Rolling Stones,
- Status Quo,
- Matt Gentling of Archers of Loaf
- Rose Marshack of Poster Children,
- Bob Weston, who plays in the group Shellac
- Mick Karn of Japan.
- Peggy Foster played a Fretless Bass serial #248 on Steve Vai's Flex-Able and Anthology albums.