If you could own your holy grail...would you?

Moe_Zambeek

Inspired by @miserneil and the Mick Ralphs tele thread, if you had the opportunity to buy the guitar associated with your hero, would you?

There would be two candidates for me - Malcolm's Gretsch jet and Angus' 70/71 SG. For me, I'd quite like to try them and experience them but owning them would be almost too much of a historical responsibility! 

What guitar would it be for you, and if you could raise the funds, would you buy it?

mikeyrob73

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/0/09/James-Hetfield%27s-%27EET-FUK%27-Explorer.jpg

Or 

https://i.pinimg.com/originals/f0/5e/31/f05e317f09330bfe5d1f1384d35a721c.jpg

Or 

https://www.premierguitar.com/ext/resources/archives/7896137a-3f51-4afd-aa9b-e4c401b0e537.JPG?1502216454

HarrySeven

Interesting question.

However (and I'm not being wilfully contrary here), I genuinely don't (or have ever had) a "hero" (of any sort - guitar or otherwise).

Guitarists I appreciate, yes.

But hero? No.

So on that front, I'm out.

Another thing - ergonomics/playability-wise, we're a fickle lot...speaking from experience, I've had the opportunity to handle a number of "celeb" guitars over the years and quite often I've thought "how the F*CK do you play that bag of sh*t?"

UPDATE - Considering the recent discussion on here re. signature guitars (and whether they should be precisely built/set-up to the artist's specs), *if* you acquired a "hero" guitar, would you make it playable for yourself or leave it "as is"?

Clashman

It' a bit daft really.. here is a guitar owned by someone famous who will never play it again..

TTBZ

@HarrySeven summed up my thoughts on the matter quite nicely I used to have a few guitar heroes but I couldn't give a shit any more. Even back then I probably wouldn't have wanted their guitars as I seem to have quite specific tastes about what I like in a guitar, so I'd probably end up modding it and ruining it in the eyes of purists.

prlgmnr

I've a bit of a thing for Chris Poland's semi-hollow Yamaha SG with a floyd in.

Neill

Easy.  Wilko Johnson's red Telecaster.

It's terrible I know, but I remember thinking when we all thought he was going to die, who's going to get his Tele...

Wouldn't even attempt to play it - he doesn't even play it anymore - but if it came on the market that really would be a hard decision.  I doubt it ever will, as we now know Wilko is immortal. 

Nunogilberto

Half of my guitar heroes (like the two in my username) have guitars I wouldn't get on with, playing wise...

peglegpete

Already own a guitar built for one of my hero’s... not a “famous” guitarist but a hero none the less... this was custom built for “Stephen hawking”... managed to get my hands on it!...

http://a65.tinypic.com/akd4k5.jpg

Sassafras

If it meant having to do battle with Nazis then probably not.

John_P

I was planning to try and be fairly strict about future purchases and save towards only buying guitars that have some interesting history or age so this is a great choice for a thread.   
Even buying parts that have a back story and putting them into a project guitar and a new lease of life is cool.   

I remember a few years ago Steve Rothery sold a few guitars including his Roland guitar synth Strat, I was watching it on eBay and couldn’t get near a computer when it finished so I missed out - it only went for around 1500 iirc which would have been stretch at the time but just about doable.  Heartbreaking to miss it - that’s the guitar in the Kayleigh video and a massive part of why I started playing.   

bluechargeboy

Two celeb guitars I have previously obsessed over would be Nuno's N4 and Vai's Evo.

(1) I know both of these guitars are borderline fucked
(2) I would still not be able to shred!

So I'm out.

Schnozz

I went straight out and bought a Charvel Star as soon as I had the money and it was a let down...

I don't really have another Holy Grail 

Babones

I prefer the idea of my guitar ageing with me and being/becoming/remaining my holy grail. While there are people that I admire, my only heroes are my folks.

BloodEagle

Jeff Hanneman Jackson, if it came up for sale I absolutely would be interested

HarrySeven

John_P said:

I remember a few years ago Steve Rothery sold a few guitars including his Roland guitar synth Strat, I was watching it on eBay and couldn’t get near a computer when it finished so I missed out - it only went for around 1500 iirc which would have been stretch at the time but just about doable.  Heartbreaking to miss it - that’s the guitar in the Kayleigh video and a massive part of why I started playing.   

G-505 controller, IIRC.

Voxman

1959 Gibson Les Paul -  but I'd take Mark Knopflers '58 too!

Moltisanti

i'm with you on both the Hetfield ESP and Jeff Hanneman Jackson, for me it would be one of these two:

guitarfishbay

Honestly? Nah.

Firstly I don’t have a holy grail guitar and secondly if it belonged to someone else it’s probably not set up for my tastes anyway, I might want to change parts on it... it would probably make another person much happier to just keep it as is, so I’d pass.

earwighoney

1986 Marlin Sidewinder. 

stickyfiddle

The Edge's white Les Paul that he sold a few years back. It might even come up for sale again if/when Guitar Center defaults on its debt!