The Players
News and happenings from the world of your favourite guitarists
Guitarist was saddened to hear that Greg Lake passed away on 7 December after a long battle with cancer. Before forming Emerson, Lake & Palmer, the bassist and guitarist fronted King Crimson for their first two albums, In The Court Of The Crimson King and In The Wake Of Poseidon. His death at 69 follows the suicide of his bandmate Keith Emerson, nine months before.
Gruhn Guitars in Nashville recently offered a collection of 29 guitars for sale owned and used by Eric Clapton – but hold onto your credit cards, because the majority were snapped up very quickly. Clapton’s history with CEO and chairman George Gruhn goes way back and he assembled Blackie from four Strats he purchased from him in 1970. The selection of modern and vintage instruments for sale included a circa 1929 National Style 3 Tricone, a 1931 Martin OM-28, a 1941 Martin 000-45 ($150,000) that Clapton originally bought from Gruhn in 2005, and a 2014 Fender Custom Shop Sunburst Strat that became one of his main guitars that year ($42,500). There was even Slowhand’s old 1980s Roland G-505 Synth guitar up for grabs.
Ryan Adams has reportedly named his new album Prisoner after the Jacques analogue delay pedal of the same name. The record is released on 13 February and the first single, Do You Still Love Me?, is out now.
Jimi Hendrix’s 1951 Epiphone FT-79 acoustic – the guitar he owned for three years and longer than any other documented guitar in his possession – sold at a Bonhams’ auction for £209,000 on 15 December. It was estimated at £80,000 to £120,000. Experience bassist Noel Redding recalled Jimi purchasing the guitar “secondhand, for about $25, in New York after our first tour of the States and [he] brought [it] back to England with us on the plane”. Also up for auction was Prince’s unmistakable Cloud Guitar, custom-made and taken on the Act I & II, Prince and the New Power Generation Tours of 1993. The guitar’s value was estimated at £25,000 to £30,000 and it sold for £87,500. Queens Of The Stone Age, Them Crooked Vultures collaborator and unsung guitar hero Alain Johannes will be the subject of forthcoming documentary, Unfinished Plan – The Path Of Alain Johannes (release date TBC). The Chilean-born guitarist and producer has long been held in esteem by the likes of Chris Cornell, Josh Homme and Arctic Monkeys’ Alex Turner (all of whom contribute narration), and Rodolfo Gárate’s film will chart Johannes’s work over the years, including the band Eleven he formed with wife, musical partner and former Queens Of The Stone Age keyboard player Natasha Shneider. She passed away from cancer in 2008 and the documentary will also examine how Johannes coped with her loss to return to the stage.