Johnny Marr has accumulated a fair few guitars since his time with British indie rock pioneers The Smiths. In fact, he’s gotten to the point where he’s auctioning off his four-decade guitar collection at Christie’s in London this September.
Yet, among them all, there’s one guitar – a 1960 Cherry Red ES-355 – that harks back to a very exciting time for Marr. It was 1984, around the time The Smiths started generating enough buzz to be wined and dined by the industry.
So, when legendary music executive Seymour Stein of Sire Records approached the band, Marr took the opportunity to coax him into acquiring his dream guitar.
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“[It was] one night in 1984. It was a done deal we were going to sign to Sire,” Marr tells Guitarist. “We’d have happily paid him: it was our dream label. But I was asking about The Stones in the ’60s, and he made the mistake of telling me he’d always take Brian Jones to get a guitar. So I saw my opportunity. I told him if he bought me a guitar, The Smiths would sign to Sire.”
Marr was committed to not letting Stein’s promise slide. “On a snowy day in New York, I hung around the Sire offices all day, so Seymour wasn’t going to escape,” he reveals. “We walked to We Buy Guitars on 48th Street and, as is often the way – and it’s a bit like this with pets – it already felt like I owned it when I saw it.”
Now estimated to fetch over $200,000 at auction, the Cherry Red ES-355 is one of the guitars that’s most associated with Marr’s Smiths era.
The veteran guitarist points to the “romantic notion” that many musicians, including himself, have: “that instruments have music in them”. And, in the case of the ES-355, it would deliver some pretty timeless hits.
Not only did he write two songs shortly after acquiring it, but he also used it extensively in the studio for the band’s sophomore album, Meat Is Murder. It was a fixture on stage throughout 1984 and 1985 as well – widely regarded as The Smiths’ golden era.
“As soon as I got that 355 back to the hotel, I wrote Heaven Knows I’m Miserable Now,” he remembers fondly. “Which took about 10 minutes. Then I immediately wrote Girl Afraid.
“There’s a few guitars like that in the auction. If they end up in the hands of songwriters, they’ll definitely deliver songs.”
For more from Marr, pick up issue 541 of Guitarist from Magazines Direct.
