KEEF ’BURST

Some guitars can become more famous than their owners, but when the owner was once Keith Richards, that’s a tall order. Guitarist discovers how his first 1959 Les Paul is still causing controversy some 45-plus years after he last strummed it

“I think it could well become the first million-dollar Les Paul because of its history. Actually, I think it could already be there” Dave Brewis

Keith Richards may not be renowned for the liquid blues improvisations that so many Les Paul players can boast, but he was – unquestionably – the first Brit rock star to embrace the then-discontinued Gibson solidbody. Richards-plus-’Burst was first seen on the second Stones USA tour in 1964, and more Les Pauls were added to Richards’ arsenal during the decade only to be replaced with Telecasters during the 1970s.

Dave Brewis of Rock Stars Guitars, which specialises in the sale of artist-owned instruments, believes the pictured Les Paul (serial no 93182) to be very definitely Keith’s original. In the early 2000s, vintage restorer Clive Brown had called Brewis when he had the guitar in for some work. “I’d been looking for it for a good few years,” remembers Brewis. “I’d looked at so many shots of the Stones to know just from the grain that it was Keith’s original Les Paul.

“It’s been very difficult to get any info from the Stones themselves,” continues Brewis, but through fans, enthusiasts and ‘Les Paul people’ he’s managed to piece together at least some, if not all, of its story. “I understand – via a second-hand story from Andrew Loog Oldham – that they’d got the guitar on their first visit to the States (in 1964). There’s a flurry of activity with the guitar being used by Keith from that point on – The Ed Sullivan Show and every American show on that small [second] USA tour, then Ready Steady Go in the UK, Top

Of The Pops and so on. It runs for about 18 months to two years when the guitar is quite heavily used. There’s also a picture in Andrew Loog Oldhams’s book of the recording of Satisfaction in Los Angeles [May, 1965] and it looks like Keith is playing that guitar. It then gets rather more cloudy.”

GUITAR LEADS

Brewis has other leads to go on: “There’s a picture of Eric Clapton at the 1966 Richmond Jazz And Blues festival playing what looks like the exact same guitar. But from the enquiries I’ve made, I don’t think Eric specifically remembers that guitar. It’s obviously one with a Bigsby. Later, there’s a picture of Mick Taylor playing what again seems to be that guitar. I’d heard a theory that maybe Keith traded it to Eric and then Eric traded back to Mick Taylor and the Stones. But I don’t know.”

Richards is clearly playing a ’Burst-with Bigsby on the 1969 tour but, “I think by then there were more guitars in the Stones camp,” says Brewis. “Is it the one on the cover of Get Yer Ya Ya’s Out? It’s definitely had a vibrato on it but I don’t know. But 1964 to 1966, it’s absolutely cast-iron definite that guitar was Keith’s. After that, I don’t know for sure. I’ve seen photos of Jagger with what looks to be the same guitar recording

Beggars Banquet... there are a couple of shots of Keith with it when the pickguard’s gone but the Bigsby is still on it. But, as I say, after 1966, I wouldn’t definitely say it was that guitar.” When Brewis stumbled across the guitar, it was owned by Mike Jopp who’d played in a band called Affinity, with Mo Foster, back in the 60s before he retired from music. He, apparently, bought the guitar in 1974. “Mike told me he’d bought it from Bernie Marsden and Bernie had bought it, just about a week before, from Cosmo Verrico. I’d spoken to Cosmo and he told me he’d got the guitar when he was in a band called the Heavy Metal Kids and was signed to Atlantic Records. His own Les Paul had gone missing in transit or had been stolen, I think, and he had no guitar. He told his guy at Atlantic that he needed a Les Paul and was presented with this guitar by someone called Phil Carson, who ran Rolling Stones Records out of Atlantic. It was a ‘the band has no use for this guitar now, you can have it’ sort of thing.”

It’s a plausible tale but, according to the current Heavy Metal Kids website, Cosmo didn’t join the band until January 1975 just prior to the recording of their second album; he’d left by the time the third was recorded. It seems, that trying to be precise about this guitar’s ownership or whereabouts from 1966 to 1974, is difficult. A reason perhaps the Stones’ ‘people’ have asked for it to be returned to them?

Dave Brewis brokered the deal for the guitar to pass from Mike Jopp to a collector/memorabilia company in New York. “But about a year later, in 2004, they decided to sell it. They put it in a Christie’s auction, co-hosted by an auction company called Julien’s. The founder, Darren Julien, called me asking about the guitar’s history and did I know about any Stones’ guitars being stolen? All I could say was that Mike had had it for 30 years, it had been in books and magazines and there had been no issues with it. The Stones wanted it back as soon as it hit the catalogue but it was allowed to go to auction, so obviously there was a stalemate, or whatever, reached there. The seller was happy with that, but the guitar didn’t meet its reserve. In 2006, the same seller called me again to say he was still interested in selling it. I mentioned it to Music Ground in Leeds and they had someone in mind for what is the first ‘rock star’ Les Paul – eventually, a deal was done. I’ve never owned it, but I’ve seen it whiz past twice.”

The Keithburst now resides in Switzerland, with a musician/collector. Its value? “I think it could well become the first million-dollar Les Paul because of its history,” muses Brewis. “Actually, I think it could already be there.”