1965 M-20

WC_Guitarist

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You’d think sellers would mention Eric Clapton in their ads for the M20, as that, at least, would be accurate, as that’s who the guitar in that photo originally belonged to.

Clapton gave it to the photographer who shot the Drake LP cover, and the photographer loaned it to Drake as a prop for the photo shoot, since Drake had arrived without his guitar.

(Never seen a photo of Clapton with the guitar though — maybe that’s the rub?)
That's an interesting twist in the story! Martin makes an Eric Clapton guitar; I'd be too intimidated to play it. Now interestingly, I am NOT at all intimidated by the Bob Marley guitar. I guess they just have different vibes.
 

wileypickett

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The late Michael Chapman, who I shared a number of shows with, had some great stories of life on the road.

He was one of the few people in the world who actually saw Nick Drake perform live. (Drake was notoriously shy and played very few shows.)

Chapman said, “Drake was an alien.” (Great songwriter, great singer, great guitarist.)

Chapman, who played in a number of open tunings himself, said Drake’s tunings were baffling — he couldn’t make hide nor hair of them, but Drake’s use of them, he said, was sublime.
 

Westerly Wood

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The late Michael Chapman, who I shared a number of shows with, had some great stories of life on the road.

He was one of the few people in the world who actually saw Nick Drake perform live. (Drake was notoriously shy and played very few shows.)

Chapman said, “Drake was an alien.” (Great songwriter, great singer, great guitarist.)

Chapman, who played in a number of open tunings himself, said Drake’s tunings were baffling — he couldn’t make hide nor hair of them, but Drake’s use of them, he said, was sublime.
I think The Road is one of the finest acoustic guitar songs every penned. It is just incredibly well thought out and performed, and yet, when it gets to the end, I always think it was never finished.

 

tonepoet

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Yeah, I would say way overpriced. Great guitars, however. I got mine way back in 1981 for $300, which seemed a lot, at the time. Going to an inflation calculator on the net, that would be about $977 today, adjusted for inflation. I think it is from about 1958, by some of the clues. The S/N was written on the label in fountain pen ink and is very faded. 4-digits that look like 3286 or 6286 or 8286. The first digit is very faded. It is a Hoboken and has the body silhouette label and they were not pressing the S/N into the back of the headstock yet. So, maybe 1958 or 1959. I'm not sure. Maybe Hans has some ideas about the clues. Years back, I put some Guild machine heads on to replace the old worm-gear tuners it had. After decades of service, I also needed to have a re-fret done and had it done by David's Broken Note in Woodland, CA (He does great work). Here's a link to a video of the re-fret job he did.



-tonepoet
 

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