Goin' Down To Memphis

Will we ever know the true story of this fabled guitar? For some it's iconic, for others it was simply a cobbled together working tool for a master...

- Dave Burrluck

It's far from easy to tell the definitive tale of any guitar that was used by a famous artist back in the day. The Oxblood is no exception, not least that it's pretty much 50 years ago that Jeff Beck retired it. What we do know for a fact is that the guitar was auctioned at Christies on 22 January 2025 and sold for £1,068,500, making it the most expensive Gibson Les Paul ever sold at an auction.

Of course, that huge sale price has little, if anything, to do with the instrument itself. Imagine rocking up at a well-regarded vintage guitar dealer with a similar piece and asking for a valuation. The devaluation of what was once, purportedly, a 1954 Gibson Les Paul Goldtop would be colossal, wouldn't it? There's the overall brown/black refinish for starters. The P-90-to-humbucker conversion for another. Non-original pots, caps and wiring, Schaller tuners... If it hadn't already had a headstock break before you'd purchased it, not to mention a slimmed down neck, it had definitely had one at the end of its working life - not just a head repair but a totally new neck. And its overall condition was, at best, shoddy. “Basically, what you’ve got there is the body and perhaps the fingerboard of a '54 Les Paul,” says our hypothetical dealer.

Yes, our tongue is in our cheek, but that's the reality, isn't it? There are still questions around the origin of the guitar, who did the conversion/repair work, and what pickups were in the guitar on purchase. There's even some dispute over when Jeff bought it. What can be classed as hard evidence is the much better documented use that Beck put it to. From the original outings with Beck, Bogert and Appice - the reason he needed another Les Paul - to guesting on the encores of Ziggy's last gig in July 1973, the Oxblood was played with Stevie Wonder, Billy Preston, The Rolling Stones and many more. And let's not forget its use on and appearance on the cover of seminal album Blow By Blow. That's not in dispute.