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Lot Essay
When Radiohead were recording the album ‘In Rainbows’, I loaned them this guitar and a few others.
JOHNNY MARR, MARR’S GUITARS, 2023
Johnny Marr purchased this 1957 Gibson Les Paul Gold Top from British recording engineer Paul Wright in the late 1990s, as he was really into Free guitarist Paul Kossoff at the time. After Marr formed The Healers in 2000, he used the Gold Top to record parts for the songs ‘InBetweens’, ‘Caught Up’, and ‘Long Gone’ on their 2003 studio album Boomslang. Marr played the Gold Top on stage when he performed the Jackson C. Frank song 'My Name Is Carnival' as part of a short set with The Healers at Patti Smith’s Meltdown Festival at the Royal Festival Hall in London on 24 June 2005. After he had become friendly with Radiohead’s Ed O'Brien following Neil Finn’s 7 Worlds Collide shows in Auckland in 2001, Marr offered to loan the band some guitars ahead of the recording sessions for their 2007 album In Rainbows. Knowing that they didn’t have a Les Paul, he sent over this Gold Top, along with an SG and a Strat.
It’s great having a friend like Johnny because you can talk about the universe but you can also talk about Fender Deluxe Reverbs and Gibsons 335s – everything as important as the rest. Radiohead were embarking on making ‘In Rainbows’ in 2006 and I phoned Johnny and said, “I think we’ve got a good album here”. Johnny said, “Do you want to borrow any of my guitars?” and at that stage our guitars were really quite limited; Thom didn’t have any and Jonny [Greenwood] had been getting into modular synths, and I think Johnny [Marr] said, “I have an idea of what I’ll send down”. He had his tech deliver the 1957 Les Paul Gold Top, a 1964 SG and a 1964 white Fender Stratocaster and he said “This is ‘The Boy With The Thorn In His Side’ Strat”. We had really no idea about vintage guitars. I was trying this 1957 Les Paul thinking, “Oh my god, this is the most extraordinary guitar I’ve ever played – I need to get one of these”. There were two sessions for ‘In Rainbows’, and these three guitars were part of the arsenal for the sessions. ‘Bodysnatchers’ was one of the first songs we recorded, with the five of us playing live, pretty gnarly, like a nest of angry guitars, and I’m pretty certain I played the Les Paul on that. I’d never played a guitar like the Les Paul – there’s something about the neck on that, the classic Gibson 1957 neck, this beautiful solid piece of wood and the age and tone and resonance, and it looked incredible. At the second sessions, we were all suddenly like: Oh my god, these vintage guitars have an incredible sound to them – not only have they got the provenance of Johnny and what he played on them, but in themselves they were amazing guitars. I remember I went to a guitar store in Bath and I ended up buying a 1964 Epiphone Casino that became part of my arsenal. And so, in a way, Johnny lending us these vintage guitars opened the door to us appreciating the sound and understanding the vintage guitar. How great is that – we are all huge Johnny Marr fans, and I felt he was sort of like a big brother watching over me. I remember we finished mixing it, and I drove up that night from Oxfordshire to Manchester because I was so proud of this record, and I wanted him to hear it because Johnny is one of the most supportive people you will ever meet in life and was so supportive of Radiohead. When you have the blessing of Johnny, it means a lot. You get Johnny Marr giving you the thumbs up, saying you guys are great. You know it’s a big deal lending someone your guitars; there’s a lot of trust. You can’t quantify how important those gestures are, but they actually mean a lot, and I don’t think it’s any coincidence that him lending us those guitars was part of making, for me, what is one of my favourite Radiohead albums – it’s one I really love.
ED O’BRIEN, MARR’S GUITARS, 2023
After releasing his first solo album The Messenger in 2013, Marr enlisted the Les Paul Gold Top for a heavier sound on his 2014 follow-up album Playland. I kind of felt instinctively that we were going to go in a little more of a stronger kind of direction musically, he told Donald Gibson for Write on Music in 2014. The drums were going to be louder and… I wouldn’t say bombastic, but I just knew that [from] the way we were playing live it was going to be a little harder sounding - along the same lines, but harder. The Gold Top can be heard on the title track ‘Playland’ and euphoric album opener ‘Back in the Box’. The song is really a celebration of those moments in life when maybe you just want to punch the air, he told Gibson. I thought that was a good balance, really, and a good way to start off a record. I think when music does that it’s the greatest thing. The Gold Top came into play once again on Marr’s 2018 solo studio album Call The Comet, when he used it to record the backwards solo on the song ‘Hey Angel’.
JOHNNY MARR, MARR’S GUITARS, 2023
Johnny Marr purchased this 1957 Gibson Les Paul Gold Top from British recording engineer Paul Wright in the late 1990s, as he was really into Free guitarist Paul Kossoff at the time. After Marr formed The Healers in 2000, he used the Gold Top to record parts for the songs ‘InBetweens’, ‘Caught Up’, and ‘Long Gone’ on their 2003 studio album Boomslang. Marr played the Gold Top on stage when he performed the Jackson C. Frank song 'My Name Is Carnival' as part of a short set with The Healers at Patti Smith’s Meltdown Festival at the Royal Festival Hall in London on 24 June 2005. After he had become friendly with Radiohead’s Ed O'Brien following Neil Finn’s 7 Worlds Collide shows in Auckland in 2001, Marr offered to loan the band some guitars ahead of the recording sessions for their 2007 album In Rainbows. Knowing that they didn’t have a Les Paul, he sent over this Gold Top, along with an SG and a Strat.
It’s great having a friend like Johnny because you can talk about the universe but you can also talk about Fender Deluxe Reverbs and Gibsons 335s – everything as important as the rest. Radiohead were embarking on making ‘In Rainbows’ in 2006 and I phoned Johnny and said, “I think we’ve got a good album here”. Johnny said, “Do you want to borrow any of my guitars?” and at that stage our guitars were really quite limited; Thom didn’t have any and Jonny [Greenwood] had been getting into modular synths, and I think Johnny [Marr] said, “I have an idea of what I’ll send down”. He had his tech deliver the 1957 Les Paul Gold Top, a 1964 SG and a 1964 white Fender Stratocaster and he said “This is ‘The Boy With The Thorn In His Side’ Strat”. We had really no idea about vintage guitars. I was trying this 1957 Les Paul thinking, “Oh my god, this is the most extraordinary guitar I’ve ever played – I need to get one of these”. There were two sessions for ‘In Rainbows’, and these three guitars were part of the arsenal for the sessions. ‘Bodysnatchers’ was one of the first songs we recorded, with the five of us playing live, pretty gnarly, like a nest of angry guitars, and I’m pretty certain I played the Les Paul on that. I’d never played a guitar like the Les Paul – there’s something about the neck on that, the classic Gibson 1957 neck, this beautiful solid piece of wood and the age and tone and resonance, and it looked incredible. At the second sessions, we were all suddenly like: Oh my god, these vintage guitars have an incredible sound to them – not only have they got the provenance of Johnny and what he played on them, but in themselves they were amazing guitars. I remember I went to a guitar store in Bath and I ended up buying a 1964 Epiphone Casino that became part of my arsenal. And so, in a way, Johnny lending us these vintage guitars opened the door to us appreciating the sound and understanding the vintage guitar. How great is that – we are all huge Johnny Marr fans, and I felt he was sort of like a big brother watching over me. I remember we finished mixing it, and I drove up that night from Oxfordshire to Manchester because I was so proud of this record, and I wanted him to hear it because Johnny is one of the most supportive people you will ever meet in life and was so supportive of Radiohead. When you have the blessing of Johnny, it means a lot. You get Johnny Marr giving you the thumbs up, saying you guys are great. You know it’s a big deal lending someone your guitars; there’s a lot of trust. You can’t quantify how important those gestures are, but they actually mean a lot, and I don’t think it’s any coincidence that him lending us those guitars was part of making, for me, what is one of my favourite Radiohead albums – it’s one I really love.
ED O’BRIEN, MARR’S GUITARS, 2023
After releasing his first solo album The Messenger in 2013, Marr enlisted the Les Paul Gold Top for a heavier sound on his 2014 follow-up album Playland. I kind of felt instinctively that we were going to go in a little more of a stronger kind of direction musically, he told Donald Gibson for Write on Music in 2014. The drums were going to be louder and… I wouldn’t say bombastic, but I just knew that [from] the way we were playing live it was going to be a little harder sounding - along the same lines, but harder. The Gold Top can be heard on the title track ‘Playland’ and euphoric album opener ‘Back in the Box’. The song is really a celebration of those moments in life when maybe you just want to punch the air, he told Gibson. I thought that was a good balance, really, and a good way to start off a record. I think when music does that it’s the greatest thing. The Gold Top came into play once again on Marr’s 2018 solo studio album Call The Comet, when he used it to record the backwards solo on the song ‘Hey Angel’.