RE: What are Jimmy's LP Guitars worth?

["Tim Druck" <tcdruck@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

John,
        I'm by no means an appraiser, estimator, or auctioneer, but your
message intrigued me.  So here goes:
        The closest comparisons we have are from a Christie's auction
held in 2004, in which several of Eric Clapton's most famous guitars
were sold, including "Blackie," a black and white 1956 Fender
Stratocaster used notably from 1970 until the mid 80s.  "Blackie" is the
guitar most associated with Eric Clapton visually, and was used on some
very memorable music.  This guitar sold for $959,500.
        At the same auction, Stevie Ray Vaughan's famous multi-year
Fender Stratocaster, "Lenny," named, of course, for his wife, sold for
$623,500.  Clapton's red Gibson ES-335 sold for a Gibson-record
$847,500.  And Clapton's 1939 Martin 000-42 sold for $791,500, a record
for any Martin guitar.
        Clapton being mostly identified with the Fender line, it's safe
to say that Jimmy Page's Number One would easily set the Gibson record,
Mr. Page being more closely identified with Gibson than Slowhand ever
was.  This, of course, neatly avoids the argument of who was more
popular/influential and which guitar was used on the most important
music - all things which are judged only by a potential buyer and vary
with the individual.  Added the natural appreciation of all tangible
objects with time elapsed since 2004 and the fact that Jimmy was more
associated with Number One than Clapton was with Blackie (besides the
fact that most of today's music fans pin Eric to that '39 Martin
triple-ought anyway, not to mention the white-on-white Strat, the recent
graffiti Strats, and others,) it's safe to say that Number One is worth
over a million dollars in real terms.
        The real fact is that Number One in particular is a very special
instrument, considered not just a tool for Jimmy Page but almost a
partner in the sound and the music they seemed to create together.
Items that have a synergy with an influential person or important time
come at a serious premium - Number One, for example, is far more
valuable than the Lake Placid Stratocaster.  Blackie is more valuable
than the red Gibson.  I saw a 1970 Plymouth Barracuda sell for over a
million dollars recently - granted, the car was very rare (one of 68
convertible Hemi-Cudas built in 1970) but without that mystical
connection to the muscle-car era it would have been scrap metal.  There
aren't very many Edsels left either.
        Ultimately, Number One is priceless.  It simply means too much
to too many people, some of whom have massive resources, to pin an
actual value on the instrument.  It's certainly as valuable as some of
the most storied artifacts of the celebrity culture - off the top of my
head, Paul McCartney's Hofner bass, Hendrix' Stratocaster, B.B. King's
Lucille ES-335 (any of the 26 of them), Number One, and Eddie Van
Halen's Frankenstein are probably the five most valuable guitars on the
planet, in any given order.  And they're all priceless, capable of
setting off a riot in the most genteel auction house in the world.  

TimD



-----Original Message-----
From: owner-zeppelin@xxxxxxxx [mailto:owner-zeppelin@xxxxxxxx] On Behalf
Of john tyra
Sent: Tuesday, May 23, 2006 8:25 PM
To: zeppelin-digest@xxxxxxxx
Subject: What are Jimmy's LP Guitars worth?