![]() (Duals, actually recommended by Neil Young.) That sound - that sound lures you up to the apron of the stage, squaring off precisely in front of that barking tweed amp so you can later on get around to asking what brand of hearing aids Still is rocking these days. He seems to be remembering the hell out of it himself - right here and right now, in rehearsal, in front of a band that’s sticking to him tighter than his shadow. Your pinned-back ears abruptly remember that Stephen Stills used to be known as a scorching guitar god. He’s burning like a dude who used to get handy personal guitar tips direct from his pal Jimi Hendrix, with that raggedy-ass tweed amp barking like a Doberman. It sounds like 10 million bucks right here in rehearsal, where Stephen Stills is burning. It’s rattier and a lot more unraveled than any of ‘em ever, and it sounds like a million bucks. You know how those old fabric-covered tweed Fender amps get all ratty at the edges and unraveled at the corners and all tattered and beat-to-shit from roadwork and life? Well, this one’s worse. Like Stephen Still’s tweed Fender Bassman amp, which he’s had for 30 years, when it already had 40 years of mileage. In the immortal words of Ray Wylie Hubbard, some things are just cooler’n hell - regardless of who used to play ‘em once upon a time, or who currently owns ‘em. “Searching for Jack Kerouac and Andy Kaufman…missing Tom Petty and Kobe…but this old river keeps on rolling though…the streams thin out and runs to dry…but the Magic forever remains.” ![]() Trophies Mounted On The Wall Pinned like butterflies under glass - Ladies and Gentlemen, the Jim Irsay Collection! (Photo by Sean Reiter) (You know how cocker spaniels are, right?) All except for the part at the very end that Kerouac’s friend’s cocker spaniel chewed off and swallowed. Since the guy already had guitars from John, Paul, and George, he couldn’t help himself: He contacted the Associated Press, and told them, “Finally, after 45 years, the Beatles are together.” And you’ve heard about Jack Kerouac’s On the Road, right? Kerouac blazing away, typing it single-space on a single 120-foot-long roll of paper, bashing it out on benzedrine, bebop and brilliance for three single-minded sleep-free weeks without ever having to yank out a single typed page or feed fresh pages in - well, after coughing up $2.43 million, the guy with the great collection owns that original scroll too. A major bargain, and a whole lot less than someone else paid for the pair of wooden British toilet-chain balls that dangled between Mick Fleetwood’s lanky legs on the cover of Rumours (you’ve seen that cover, right?) What’s more, the guy’s got a bass drum-head with “The Beatles” logo from back when they played The Ed Sullivan Show, and then a Ludwig drum set from Ringo that it pretty much fits. Like after Christine McVie passed away, he honored her death by scooping up her former husband John McVie’s bass, the exact same one used on Fleetwood Mac’s Rumours (you’ve heard of that, right? Sold almost as much as Dark Side of the Moon) snapping it up for a piddling $100 grand. This guy’s really great collection isn’t only just really great guitars. Only not just any Fender Mustang, but one that Kurt Cobain flung around in the artificial video fog of “Smells Like Teen Spirit.” That one cost $4.5 million, which now is not the most ever paid for a guitar, or even the most ever paid for one of Kurt Cobain’s guitars, but is most definitely the most ever paid for a Fender Mustang. ![]() Until the guy with the great collection paid even more for a Fender Mustang. At 3.9 million bucks, it was, if only for a brief couple of years, the most expensive guitar ever. The guy’s got the actual black Stratocaster - a real one - that David Gilmour played on Dark Side of the Moon and The Wall. It’s gnarly, but only in the pathetic sense.īecause this guy, the guy with a really great collection, he actually owns one of Jerry Garcia’s guitars, “Tiger,” the one from the ‘80s with Jerry’s custom-built secret stash compartment. Sorry, but nobody really cares why you’re still hanging on to that pinewood derby pseudo-Stratocaster you hacked out with a jig-saw for a C-minus back in high school wood-shop. ![]() He had a bunch of really, really great old stuff - not like that crap in your collection, all that stuff you keep out in the garage, those cardboard boxes packed solid with your formerly impressive accumulation of CDs. Once upon a time, there was a guy who had a really great collection.
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