Talk about buyer's remorse! And it pays to ask questions. I knew to steer clear of this auction item. The auction company told me they had no idea how old they were, when Ringo received them or from whom.
And some sucker overpaid for these by about $16,000....
It was made very clear in the Ringo auction listing that this was not his original kit. Don't know why this guy has to be so vague unless he's trying to rip someone off.
Coffee Break2
It has a disclaimer:"The Kit For Sale The kit offered is an original Premier Duroplastic Kit circa 1960 that was purchased directley from Ringo Starr of the Beatles , we cannot state that the Kit Offered was used on any Specific Studio or Live Performances by Ringo Starr only that it carries the same Specification as the Kit used on many early Beatles Recordings Pre 1964"What can we say, but: Caveat Emptor
Not really that great of a disclamer. "We cannot state" still puts it in a gray area. An uninformed but optimistic person might still wonder if these possibly could be THE drums. A better wording might be "We can state with 100% certainty that this is not the Premier set that Ringo used at any point in the Beatles."...but then no one is ever going to shell out $60K for them.
Couldn't they just go to Ringo and ask him if he ever played them and when and where and so on. Even if it was not at a public performance, they can at least get the details on whether or not he played on them just by himself or even with some friends jammin (famous friends). It would help clarify and keep them out of ambiguity territory.
I would think that Ringo would give them a conversation and that this seller (music store in London) would be able to get in touch with Ringo. Seems all you would have to do is prove you are the one that bought this very kit from Ringo's auction.
One thing for sure - to snag that up for $17000 then turn right around and try to get $60K for it. That is QUITE speculative. If it did not sell for more in the first auction in the first place, why would it sell for more on Reverb?
It would indeed be a hard sell now or any time in the future, as while this may have been Ringo's at one time, it is not THE Ringo Premier kit, so any discussion of that would be misleading and of no special value, since, again it is not THE Ringo Premier kit.....and never will be.
Ringo probably never even laid his hands on this kit. The buyer was stupid to pay $17k for this and is an jacka** for thinking he can profit on it. Lucky he can get a tax writeoff for his loss and leave it at that.
Gary Astridge has stated that Ringo told him he never played these drums or messed with them in any way. It sounds like a situation where someone gave them to Ringo, who apparently wasn't all that excited about the gift, (probably just some old drums to him) and just had his people put them into a storage locker. When it came time to sell off some stuff these came out of storage, were sold (dumped) and now here they are.
So they technically did "belong" to Ringo but he didn't initially seek them out, play them, or apparently even covet them to any degree.
It looks like it's never even been gigged. And it's certainly not "one of the worlds most iconic and recognisable symbols of musical history of the 20th Century"
That would be his Ludwig.
