YAMAHA CORPORATION, HAMAMATSU, JAPAN, 1983

Inspired by the guitarists of the late 70s art-rock movement, Johnny Marr began hunting down Yamaha SGs around the time that he released his first solo studio album The Messenger in 2013 (see footnote to lot 89). With the help of Richard Henry Guitars, Marr assembled a collection of three SG-1000s, two SG-1300s and one SG-700, all of which he employed on his studio recordings from 2014’s Playland onwards. Marr told us: People think the guitars on my solo records are mostly the Signature Jags, but they’re mostly Les Paul Customs and Yamaha SGs. Marr used this brown Sunburst SG-1000 when he reunited with The The to record their first single in 15 years, ‘We Can’t Stop What’s Coming’. Released in 2017, the song paid tribute to Matt Johnson’s late brother Andrew, who had designed many of the band’s record sleeves, and was also featured in Johanna St Michaels’ 2017 Matt Johnson documentary The Inertia Variations.