John McLaughlin has opened up on his guitar-collecting habits, and remembered the time he gifted Jeff Beck a vintage Fender Stratocaster that would end up starring on one of the late guitar great’s seminal records.
“I gave a 1967 white [Fender] Strat to Jeff Beck after a tour we did together in 1974, or ’75,” McLaughlin says in a new MusicRadar interview. “And when we lost Jeff, his wife wrote to me and said, ‘I’m going to sell the guitars. They’re all around me, and they keep reminding me of him.’
The guitar itself was especially cherished by Beck, who not only used it on tour in 1975, but took it into the studio to record the Wired album. It also ended up on the record’s cover art.
Intriguingly, the tale surrounding the Wired Strat is a little hazy. Last year, over 130 of Jeff Beck’s electric guitars, tube amps, and other ‘tools of the trade’ went under the hammer, with the entire collection eventually selling at auction for an astounding $10.7 million.
There were a number of Fender Stratocasters in the mix, and McLaughlin insists he saw the one that he gifted Beck in amongst them.
