Cheap Trick

Cheap Trick

This 130-page book was published by Stardom Books in Japan in 1979. The text is entirely in Japanese. The book includes more than a dozen black/white and color photos of Tom Petersson’s Hamer Quad and B12A 12-string basses, some which are unique to this book. Also included are many “behind the scenes” photos of Cheap Trick, fans, and Rockford, Illinois.

Three views of the Hamer Quad 12-string bass.

Reputation Is A Fragile Thing

Published in 1998, Reputation is a Fragile Thing gives a good overview of the band Cheap Trick, their recordings, concert tours and behind the scenes information. Set lists by tour and a discography are included as are dozens of black & white photos, some of which include 12-string basses. While there are some original conversations with band members, much of the information is taken from previously published sources, in fact, more than 50 magazine articles are referenced on the Acknowledgements page.

Pete Comita is shown with his zebra striped Hamer Standard 12-string bass.

STILL COMPETITION - THE LISTENER’S GUIDE TO CHEAP TRICK

Authored by Robert Lawson, Still Competition was published in 2017 and includes extensive details about each of Cheap Trick’s albums, including Bun E.’s Basement Bootlegs and Robin Zander’s solo album. A few 12-string bass photos are scattered through the book, which also includes highly detailed comments such as, “To help promote All Shook Up, on January 17th, 1981 the band made an appearance on the television show Saturday Night Live where they performed two of the new songs. ‘Baby Loves To Rock’ has (bassist Pete) Comita playing a white Hamer 12-string bass (#0989) that belongs to Nielsen while for ‘Can’t Stop It But I’m Gonna Try’ he used a zig-zag striped Hamer 12-string with a scaled-down Standard body (#0432).” (Editor’s note: Pete Comita referred to this as his zebra striped 12.)

This book is highly recommended for every hard core fan that loves to know the specifics that just can’t be found anywhere else.

Cheap Trick Album Guide & Archives

Music Life published this 190-page book in December of 2022. The text is Japanese. There are a variety of photos of Tom Petersson scattered throughout, and includes some of the 8-string and 12-string basses he has played. The Hamer Quad 12-string bass is shown on the front cover.

Tom Petersson on stage with a Greco BK-1200 8-string bass.

THEY JUST SEEM A LITTLE WEIRD

The 12-string bass is mentioned in passing three times: Regarding Heaven Tonight: “The album contains the first recorded use of Petersson’s twelve-string bass, which gave him a huge, atypically heavy tone and had been added to their live arsenal to try ‘to get more sound out of a three piece and a vocalist,’ says Nielsen.”

Regarding the Budokan shows, “…an effortlessly cool Petersson created an orchestra with a mere twelve strings…”

About Pete Comita and the show in Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada on August 7, 1980: “The bass player was carrying the usual monster twelve-string, but he looked just slightly off. Who was this imposter? Where was Tom Petersson?”

This Band Has No Past

This book published in 2022 details the origins of Cheap Trick and documents the band in extensive detail up to about 1980. While the book relies heavily on previously published articles, there are also new interviews with the band members and others associated with Cheap Trick.

Chapter 23 contains much information about the origins of the first Hamer 12-string bass, including comments by Jol Dantzig of Hamer Guitars. This site and Mark Rowe are also credited with providing some details.

The foreword to the book was written by Jeff Ament, who also mentions the 12.

Turn It Up!

Tom Werman mentions the 12-string bass in a single paragraph about Cheap Trick’s bassist Tom Petersson, although he is mistaken about Petersson’s use of a six-string bass.

American Standard

This book published in 2024 is largely a history of Cheap Trick from the band’s inception until about 1980. It is mostly a compilation of excerpts and quotes that were previously published in magazines and other books about the band.

The 12-string bass is briefly mentioned in several quotes and a couple of photos are included.

*Guitars of the Rich And Famous* - The 12-string bass is mentioned in the comments about Rick Nielsen’s involvement with Hamer guitars.

*Book of Days: ‘70’s* includes a half page photo of Cheap Trick with a short biography of the band. The CD included with the book contains the live version of “I Want You to Want Me” from the *At Budokan* album.

Cheap Trick Notebooks

These notebooks first appeared on Amazon in September of 2021. They are available in either 6” by 9” size or 8½” by 11” size and have 120 pages of college ruled paper. The cover photo is the same as the LP liner “Metropolitan” photo showing the Hamer Quad 12-string bass as used on the Heaven Tonight album except that the signatures have been moved and are printed in red instead of white.

Notebooks with these two covers appeared in November of 2021 on Amazon. They are 6” by 9” format and contain 110 pages. The green Chandler Royale 12-string bass is shown on the front cover of one notebook, while the other notebook has this same image of the Chandler 12 on the back cover.

Cheap Trick Coloring Books

When I was young I enjoyed many coloring books, all of which were WAY better than these abominations! It seems these days even coloring books have been dumbed down!

Tom Petersson and a Gretsch 12-string bass.

CHEAP TRICK - COLOR BY NUMBER

Coloring books showing images of the band Cheap Trick appeared in 2020. These are standard 8½” x 11” format and are printed on demand by Amazon as they are sold. While these coloring books are advertised as being for adults, they are very crudely done with no fine detail. The images are barely recognizable, and the color-by numbers clearly stand out from the images. Typically coloring books intended for adults feature much finer designs and subtle numbering.

A couple of images that include a Gretsch 12-string bass are included in this 30-page coloring book.

Three different cover images are offered for sale but the content is identical in all three. Amazon shouldn’t allow this kind of deception. Anyway, if you like to color, put on your helmet and enjoy!

Several photos of Tom Petersson’s multi-string basses appear throughout the book.

CHEAP TRICK ADULT COLORING BOOK

Cheap Trick Adult Coloring Book appeared in November of 2020. It is a collection of other people’s copyrighted photos that have been used without authorization, rendered in black/white, and run through a Photoshop filter to give them a grainy appearance. Some of these photos clearly initially had the Getty Images or other watermark on them - these have been either whited out or blacked out. Many images include so much black area as to make coloring them pointless. 6” by 9” format.