Two years and a half after having discovered its existence, we finally found and got one: the rare Topps Nose Flute, with its great packaging!
We will not repeat what we already wrote
there about the Topps company and cheap toys. Let just say — contrarywise to what we stated in 2012 — that this flute is a *real* Humanatone, branded by Gretsch, and not a Topps dedicated version Humanatone. It dates of the second half of the 1960s.
Mine is a beautiful monochromatic mid-blue sample, and is similar at any point to the regular Gretsch Humies that were sold in cardboard boxes. I carefully removed the stapples to take pictures, and then repacked this collector for another long sleep.
As we said, the difference lays in the great packaging offered to the Topps flute. The young player looks totally enchanted by the whistlings he produces, the colors are rather flashy, and the typographics are funny.
A user manual is included with the Humanatone, with no particular surprise, but showing a strip of three boxes, drawn like a triptych by Roy Lichtenstein :)
A good addition in the collection!
