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Gibson Les Paul 1957
The photograph
of George Harrison above is taken from the promotional filming
of the single Revolution in 1968. The guitar George Harrison
is playing is a Gibson Les Paul, 1957 model.
The guitar, nicknamed Lucy, was actually given to him by
Eric Clapton, who used the same guitar during the recording
of While My Guitar Gently Weeps. Before Clapton acquired
the guitar, it was owned by guitar legend Rick Derringer
of The McCoys.
The Les Paul originally had a gold top, but was refinished
to its red color in the early 1960s. The guitar is still
owned by the Harrison Estate today.
Gibson Les Paul 1957 models, in the original gold top finnish,
are available from Musician's
Friend. Musician's
Friend offers a 45-day full refund guarantee.
Gibson J-160E
In
1962, the Beatles ordered two Gibson J-160E acoustic-electric
guitars from Rushworth's - one of the few shops in Liverpool
where US-made instruments were available at the time.
Lennon and Harrison had to order the guitars from a catalogue
and wait for them to be delivered to the store from the US.
Converted to US currency, the total credit price noted for
Lennon's J-160E (and presumably Harrison's too) was around
$450 then or around $3,200 in today's money.
The guitars were shipped on June 27. The purchase receipt
reveals that Brian Epstein, the Beatles' manager, paid for
the guitar in full a year later. John's guitar was however
stolen at the end of 1963. He acquired a replacement in 1964.
The Gibson J-160E guitar featured on many Beatles performances
and recordings. It is, for instance, the guitar that created
the feed-back noise right before the opening guitar riff on
I Feel Fine. According to George Martin, the producer, the
feedback noise was intentional.
John also used this guitar extensively throughout the revolver
sessions. Other Beatles recordings featuring the Gibson J-160E
include You've Got To Hide Your Love Away, A Day In The Life,
Lovely Rita, All Together Now, Glass Onion, Julia and Hey
Jude. John also played this guitar during bed-in for peace
sessions in Montreal and Amsterdam in 1969. It is owned today
by Yoko Ono.
A faithful reproduction of Lennon's Gibson J-160E is available
from Musician's
Friend. Musician's
Friend offers a 45-day full refund guarantee.
Gibson SG Standard (1964 model)
In 1966, George Harrison acquired a Gibson SG Standard 1964-model,
which he can be seen playing in the photograph above.
He used it as his main guitar during the Revolver sessions
and it remained one of his favourite guitars through into
1968.
Probably in 1969, George gave the Gisbon SG to Pete Ham, the
front man of Badfinger.
An almost indentical guitar to George Harrison's Gibson SG
is available from Musician's
Friend. Musician's
Friend offers a 45-day full refund guarantee.
Further reading: "Beatles Gear" by Andy Babiuk |
