RICKENBACKER INCORPORATED, SANTA ANA, CALIFORNIA,1984

In 2022, I was invited to go on a tour of the USA and Canada with The Killers. I had the idea to try to find a Rickenbacker because The Killers had asked me to play some Smiths songs with them in their set. I went into rehearsals and didn't give it any more thought. A few days before the tour started, a friend of mine called to say that there was someone selling a Rickenbacker that I had supposedly signed sometime in the 1990s. I actually guessed which guitar it was, because in 1995 Bernard Sumner and I were on a promotional tour with Electronic and a guy had asked me to sign his Rickenbacker. I remembered it as it was the first guitar I'd ever signed. Back then, it wasn't so common for people to sign guitars. We contacted the person, who was in Canada, and told him that I would buy it. I was starting the tour in Vancouver, so he was able to bring it to the first show. When I got the guitar, it still had my signature on it, which I removed before using it with The Killers in their set.
JOHNNY MARR, MARR’S GUITARS, 2023

Following a surprise guest appearance on stage with The Killers to close their headline set at Glastonbury in June 2019 with a rendition of The Smiths’ ‘This Charming Man’ and the band’s own megahit ‘Mr. Brightside’, Marr was invited to support The Killers on the North American leg of their Imploding The Mirage Tour from 19 August to 12 October 2022. At almost every show on the tour, Marr joined the band during their encore to play a Smiths song on either this Rickenbacker 340 or his Fever Dream Yellow Signature Jaguar (lot 108), before closing with 'Mr. Brightside'. Smiths songs performed over the course of the tour were ‘There Is a Light That Never Goes Out’, ‘Stop Me If You Think You’ve Heard This One Before’, ‘What She Said’, ‘Please Please Please Let Me Get What I Want’, ‘This Charming Man’ and ‘You Just Haven't Earned It Yet, Baby’.