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General Interest
Rivolta Mondata CC review: sets a new standard for what a mass-produced offshore guitar can be
$1,399, rivoltaguitars.com
If you’re reading this, you probably already know about Dennis Fano: the man who created two of the most respected and revered boutique electric guitar brands of the last few decades – first with his own name and more recently under the Novo marque.
- READ MORE: Eastman Fullertone Offset ’62 review – “it has a unique sonic voice and retro feel all of its own”
There’s a compelling argument to make that in terms of electric guitars, nobody on earth knows how to make a better playing, better sounding instrument than him – as the monster waiting lists and remarkably consistent resale values of Novo and Fano guitars will attest. The problem is that even on the used market, you’re veering into ‘half-decent used car’ territory – and very few of us are whispering “Treat Yo Self…” at the prospect of dropping five grand on a guitar, no matter how good we’ve been.
Mercifully for those of us not burdened with an overabundance of paper, there’s Rivolta – the brand partnership between Fano and purveyors of affordable, quirky guitars Eastwood, which celebrates its 10-year anniversary this year.
In the beginning, Rivolta was a place where Fano could get weird and explore some of his most esoteric ideas – full-length block inlays! Weirdo top carves! Baritones! – but over the years the brand has evolved.
Rivolta is still a place where Fano can take big risks design-wise – last year’s gloriously unique Forma series being a perfect example – but here in 2026, some of the more polarising edges have gradually been shaved off to create something that’s a lot more universal.
This has never been more overt than in the brand new Mondata CC – and in terms of the overall package of aesthetics and functionality, it might be the most compelling Rivolta yet.
Image: Adam Gasson
Rivolta Mondata CC – what is it?
The magic of Rivolta was always found as much in who designed them as who made them. Despite being made alongside Eastwood’s other guitars in Korea, Rivolta guitars added a level of refinement and quality borrowed from Fano’s US-made instruments.
The rub was that there were always some eccentric elements to the design and functionality that meant that these guitars didn’t become as popular as they deserved to be – the Mondata CC might well be the guitar to change that.
Because, for starters, just fucking look at it. Dennis Fano has built a career doing marvellous and unique things with offset shapes, but the Mondata in its CC form is something special. Stripped of the extraneous switches, elaborately over the top pickguards and polarising headstock combos that have been a fixture of the model (and the Rivolta line) since it debuted in baritone form half a decade ago, now replaced with an understated elegance across the board.
Most notably, instead of the usual three-a-side angular headstock, we get the beautifully proportioned stepped six-in-a-line number seen on the original Fano-branded instruments, and the first Rivolta Regata semi-hollow model.
I cannot overstate what an improvement this makes to the guitar’s overall look – combined with the majestic body shape, it feels complete and considered in a way that no other Rivolta guitar has before it.
Speaking of the Simarouba body, the Mondata’s raised central block has always nodded to the guitar’s Firebird inspiration. But here, with a simple understated pickguard, Gibson-style four-controls and a three-way switch wiring, tune-o-matic bridge and tailpiece, and of course those mini-humbuckers, that spirit is in full effect. The finest compliment I can give this guitar from a visual perspective is that it looks more like a lost classic from the Kalamazoo drawing board than what Gibson actually found in Ted McCarty’s filing cabinets.
Image: Adam Gasson
Unlike a Firebird, however, the Mondata CC is a more traditionally set-necked instrument, with a scale length that’s bang on 25 inches – splitting the difference between Gibson and Fender is a theme we will come back to, I suspect.
That neck is of the one-piece roasted maple variety – a recipe Fano has used almost exclusively for Novo guitars over the last decade or so – though you wouldn’t be able to tell as it’s sprayed with a caramel satin finish that fits nicely with the rest of the guitar’s gloss tobacco burst.
You get an ebony fretboard that’s bound with white plastic, and a generous complement of 24 medium jumbo frets. The ‘board’s edges are factory rolled, while the 12-inch radius will make any Gibson fan feel right at home. The inlays are Rivolta’s own pearloid ‘MOTO’ style – that’s rounded off blocks to you and me. I’ll admit I don’t love these as much as I’d love dots or regular blocks, but they’re about as inoffensive as quirky inlays can be.
Equally inoffensive is the set of quality Wilkinson tuners keeping things in check on the peghead. Those vintage Fender-style buttons further add to the hybrid vibe of the whole thing.
The pair of mini-humbuckers are Rivolta’s own design, and the output measured 6.5k at the bridge and 7.5k in the neck. There’s no case as standard, but you can add a custom-fit premium gigbag for an extra $100 or a wooden hard case for $200.
Image: Adam Gasson
Rivolta Mondata CC – build quality and playability
The first thing to note about the Mondata CC is that this is a pretty big guitar for a solidbody: as evidenced by the fact that it pretty much obscures every trace of my trusty Jazzmaster when I rest the Mondata on top of it for comparison’s sake. This is worth remembering because it’s also impressively lightweight for such a chonky boi – barely tipping 7lbs on my trusty luggage scale.
This is no doubt down to the use of Simarouba for the guitar’s body. This South American wood is quite an uncommon tonewood, but it’s notably less dense than most traditional timbers used in guitar building, giving it a lower overall weight. The more classic and familiar pickup, electronics and hardware arrangement no doubt contributes to this too – there are no extraneous pots, switches or a vibrato here to add mass. It’s a well-balanced guitar both on the strap and on the lap too, with no noticeable dip at either end. The rear body contour on the top also makes it a more ergonomic and enjoyable instrument when played seated.
When I reviewed the Forma series, I enthused at length about Rivolta’s wonderfully characterful necks – and the Mondata gives me another excuse to rabbit on about it. Novo guitars might have the most wonderfully playable necks in the business, and Fano has clearly brought that knowledge to bear here.
I’m so used to mass-produced guitars having necks that simply exist in the middle ground of generic inoffensive usability, it feels almost subversive to make a guitar at this price point with a neck that reminds you that actually, a guitar’s neck is designed to enable a meaningful and organic connection between player and instrument.
Quite how the Rivolta Chunky C+ neck carve does this is quite hard to quantify – it’s not slim, it’s not a baseball bat… it’s just… right? At every point up the neck it feels like the connection is meaty enough to feel secure, without ever feeling like you’re having to wrestle with it. It’s really quite some feat of craftsmanship to do this at scale.
The general playability is helped by that new super smooth satin-finished neck (a real improvement over the gloss on the Formas), some nicely rounded ‘board edges, immaculately installed and polished frets, and a body shape that allows excellent upper fret access, should you be that way inclined.
It’s a similar story all over really – the finish and build quality is first class, internal wiring is neat and tidy, and everything feels solid, dependable and ready to take on the road. There’s nothing here that would instantly hint that this was a guitar made in Korea and not the USA, bar that price tag – and that’s a very good thing indeed.
Image: Adam Gasson
Rivolta Mondata CC – build quality and playability
It’s worth noting out of the gate that, despite appearances and the lack of adjustable poles, the pickups here are listed as mini-humbuckers and are not the same as Firebird pickups. You might wonder why I’m splitting hairs here, but traditional ’Bird pickups do have quite a different kind of construction to a mini-humbucker – with alnico bars set in the bobbins themselves, and steel reflector plates on the top and bottom.
This is what gives Firebird pickups their distinctive single-coil-esque quality – albeit without the hum, of course. Mini-humbuckers are constructed much more like traditional buckers, just smaller, and so have more in common with their big brothers – albeit with some sonic differences.
Plugging in the Mondata CC, you can readily tell this out of the gate – but that doesn’t detract from it being a rather glorious experience. Mini-buckers tend to offer the grunt and power of a full-sized bucker but with increased clarity and high-end response, and flicking the three-way toggle switch to the bridge position and running it through a dirty Marshall Plexi, you’ll find the sort of unrestrained fun that respectable people would no doubt disapprove of.
Interestingly, given the snarl and grunt at play here, I find the bridge pickup uncommonly usable when cleaning things up too – it’s strident, sure, but without the piercing nature that a lot of bridge buckers can offer.
Switching to the neck and there’s an enjoyable woodiness to proceedings, but without the darkness that you’d normally find from a neck humbucker. It’s more like swimming in maple syrup than molasses if that makes any sense? It’s thick, it’s warm, but you don’t feel like you’re losing too much of the inherent character of your sound.
The middle splits the difference between the two nicely, offering a punchy, insistent sound with a soupçon of fluteyness – it’s again very usable. While this isn’t a guitar that’s going to offer you glassy, Fender-style cleans, there’s a quality spectrum of Gibson-adjacent tones to be found in here.
Image: Adam Gasson
Rivolta Mondata CC – should I buy one?
It’s increasingly rare in this job when a guitar comes across my desk that has me looking at my guitar rack and having some genuine hard internal conversations about which one of my treasured instruments is going to have to have a new home under the bed in the immediate future.
But the Mondata CC has been making me do those equations virtually since the moment I pulled it out of its box. I’ve played some really impressive mid-priced guitars over the last few years, and while there’s no doubt that the Mondata CC is not the most inexpensive Korean-made instrument you can buy, it might very well be the best.
The only hair I can really split is the fact that at the moment it’s only available in a single finish – imagine this guitar in Pelham Blue, Shoreline Gold or some of the other legendary DuPont metallic shades? The lack of an included gigbag or case also feels a little on the mean side. It’s certainly not the cheapest guitar you’ll find coming out of Korea either, but if you want a fantastic-sounding, elite-playing, rock-ready guitar that stands out from the crowd, you need to check this out.
Image: Adam Gasson
Rivolta Mondata CC – alternatives
An even more affordable Asian-made guitar that’s seeking to offer a killer blend of unique looks and high-quality characterful build is Eastman Fullertone Offset ’62 ($999 / £899) – it’s a killer guitar for the price. If you want real Firebird mojo then Gibson’s new Firebird Platypus ($2,499 / £2,199) is a very cool, USA-made option. Another USA-made offset guitar that’s more in the ballpark of the Mondata is the PRS S2 Vela ($2,049 / £1,699) – it’s a stripped-down, no frills thing, but personally that’s part of the charm.
The post Rivolta Mondata CC review: sets a new standard for what a mass-produced offshore guitar can be appeared first on Guitar.com | All Things Guitar.
The 15 Most Expensive Guitars Sold At Auction
What price for a piece of bona fide rock ‘n’ roll history? Well, if that piece happens to be an iconic guitar used by an equally iconic guitar player, then the last few decades have demonstrated that price is ‘an awful lot indeed’ – especially if that guitar has been sold at auction.
- READ MORE: Why the sale of Jim Irsay’s Greatest Guitar Collection On Earth is a sad moment in guitar history
In the decades since Eric Clapton’s iconic Blackie Strat was purchased by Guitar Center for just shy of a million dollars, more and more legendary guitar players have put their collections under the hammer, and it’s led to increasingly outlandish sums being paid for some of the most iconic guitars in rock.
The 2024 auction of Mark Knopfler’s guitars at Christie’s saw some practically every lot smash its estimate, but despite that the most iconic item of the day – a 1983 Gibson Les Paul Standard that the Dire Straits legend used to write and record Money For Nothing and Brothers In Arms – smashing its $19,000 estimate and selling for a whopping $753,231 (£592,200), it wasn’t enough to make it onto our list (in fact it wasn’t even the biggest seller of the day, with a Burst Knopfler bought in 1999 selling for a massive $880,186).
Even Blackie itself – once the benchmark for outrageously expensive electric guitars, no longer occupies a place in the top 15 most expensive guitars sold at auction, falling out of the list in June 2024. It shows how wildly the market for rock star guitars has inflated in the last few years.
The seemingly endless appetite for rich folks to pay increasingly outlandish sums for iconic instruments has meant that several guitars have appeared on our list for a short time before dropping off. Bob Dylan’s ‘Newport Folk Festival’ Strat, the guitar used when the folk messiah turned “Judas” with an electric band on 25 July 1965 sold for $965,000 in 2013 and had a home on our list, but not anymore.
Bob Dylan’s ‘Newport’ Strat. (Image: Eleanor Jane)
Another guitar to fall off the list was Rory Gallagher’s iconic 1962 Stratocaster – which barely lasted three months on the list before being unseated in January 2025. Another brief entrant into the list was Jeff Beck’s ‘Anoushka’ Fender Custom Shop Strat – it barely lasted 10 months on our list but holds the distinction of being a rare non-vintage artist instrument that cracked the million dollar mark.
Also not making it into the list are some of the most iconic guitars of all time that never made it to auction. It’s almost impossible to confirm private sale figures, so the rumours that Kirk Hammett paid $2 million for Greeny – the 1959 Les Paul previously owned by Peter Green and Gary Moore – or that the late Microsoft founder Paul Allen paid $1.3m back in 1993 for Hendrix’s Woodstock Strat will have to remain just that: rumours.
The most seismic change in this list came in March 2026, however, when the collection of late Indianapolis Colts owner Jim Irsay came to auction at Christie’s in New York. We had christened Irsay’s collection ‘The Greatest Guitar Collection On Earth‘ when we got an up-close look at it in 2022 – and many of the guitars already featured on our list, having been bought by Irsay for huge sums at auction.
It was perhaps no surprise then that the sale completely redrew the landscape of rock star guitars at auction, with nearly half of our top 15 guitars being moved or replaced in one crazy afternoon. We’ve entered the age of the eight-figure rock star guitar – and these are the most expensive ones of the lot.
15 David Gilmour’s 1954 Fender Stratocaster $1,815,000
The Pink Floyd man’s second most iconic Strat is the one steeped in the most controversy – for years people assumed that the serial number #0001 meant it was the first Strat ever made. Instead, it turns out that #0100 was actually first, but this is still one of the first pre-production Strat prototypes ever made. The fact that this guitar is also laying down the rhythm parts on Another Brick In The Wall Pt 2 only further adds to this guitar’s legend.
It was sold in 2019 when Gilmour auctioned off a huge amount of his iconic gear for charity – it’s the first guitar from that sale we’ll see in this article, but it won’t be the last…
14 Jerry Garcia’s Wolf Guitar $1,900,000 (2017)
The Grateful Dead guitarist loved weird and heavily customised guitars, and this one made by luthier Doug Irwin, is perhaps the most eccentric guitar the late guitarist owned (though not the most expensive…), with a body made of ultra-strong purpleheart, capped back and front with bookmatched maple.
The guitar also features an innovative plate system for mounting the pickups, which allowed Garcia to swap them from their original SSS configuration to the HHS it currently sports. The Wolf was auctioned in 2017 with proceeds benefiting the Southern Poverty Law Center.
13 George Harrison’s ‘Revolver’ Gibson SG $2,271,000 (2026)
George Harrison acquired this 1964 SG Standard in 1966 and it quickly became a studio favourite, featuring on Revolver (Photo: Eleanor Jane)
The most expensive Beatles electric guitar ever sold at auction isn’t one of the iconic Gretsch and Rickenbacker guitars that John Lennon and George Harrison used to such seismic effect in their early career, instead its this humble-looking SG that became a real favourite of Harrison in the studio in the later part of their career, and was used particularly heavily on the peerless Revolver.
The guitar was part of Jim Irsay’s enviable collection of Beatles gear, which also included a pair of John Lennon-owned electrics – a Rickenbacker and a Gretsch. All three were sold at Christie’s in March 2026, and while the Lennon guitars went for exactly the same figure ($1,27m) this one pipped them to the post, and sneaked onto our list.
12 David Gilmour’s Martin D-35 $2,393,000 (2026)
The first guitar to have the distinction of dropping out of our list and then jumping back onto it later, this guitar was originally sold for $1,095,000 in 2019, when it was bought by Irsay, but then catapulted back onto the list in 2026 and more than doubling its previous price. And it’s honestly not hard to understand why this special guitar was so in demand. This 1969 D-35 is, of course, the sound of Wish You Were Here – we certainly wish we could afford it…
11 John Lennon’s 1962 Gibson J-160E $2,410,000 (2015)
John Lennon tuning his Gibson J-160E during the filming of ‘A Hard Day’s Night’. Image: Max Scheler – K & K/Redferns via Getty Image
With its electric-like volume and tone knobs and the pole pieces of a P-90 pickup rather artlessly sticking through the top between the neck and soundhole, the J-160E wasn’t Gibson’s most elegant design, but it was the perfect instrument for young songwriters craving amplification in the early 60s, including a couple of cats called John Lennon and George Harrison. This particular J-160E can be heard on Love Me Do and continued to be a favoured acoustic for Lennon throughout his career.
10 ‘Reach Out to Asia’ Fender Stratocaster $2,700,000 (2004)
Reach Out To Asia Stratocaster. Image: Fender Wiki
Something of a curio on this list, this guitar isn’t an iconic artist instrument at all, but rather a stock Mexican-made white Fender Stratocaster that just happens to have been signed by (deep breath) Mick Jagger, Keith Richards, Eric Clapton, Brian May, Jimmy Page, David Gilmour, Jeff Beck, Pete Townshend, Mark Knopfler, Ray Davies, Liam Gallagher, Ronnie Wood, Tony Iommi, Angus and Malcolm Young, Paul McCartney, Sting, Ritchie Blackmore, Def Leppard and organiser Bryan Adams. The guitar was auctioned off to help the victims of the 2004 Indian Ocean Tsunami, and certainly did its job.
9 Eddie Van Halen’s 1982 Kramer $2,734,000 (2025)
Image: Kramer
“It’s very simply the best guitar you can buy today”. If you’re a guitar player of a certain age, you probably remember flicking through a guitar magazine and being presented by a striking picture of Eddie Van Halen, guitar in hand, lit cigarette tucked under his E string alonside this quote. It’s one of the most memorable and iconic guitar ads ever, and one that certainly did the Kramer brand no harm in the early 80s when EVH was at his most godlike pomp – the brand briefly became America’s biggest guitar brand off the back of this in the middle of the decade.
The guitar used in that shoot was a custom Kramer modelled on Eddie’s iconic ‘Frankenstein’ guitar – but with a striped Kramer ‘hockey stick’ headstock – and was also used for various shows in 1982 and 1983. Then later on in the decade, he gifted the guitar to his tech Rudy Leiren, and it still bears the autograph “Rude – it’s been a great ten years – let’s do another ten. Eddie Van Halen”.
Leiren sold the guitar to Mötley Crüe’s Mick Mars, who would use the guitar extensively on the band’s Dr. Feelgood record. The guitar would later come to be auctioned at Sotheby’s with a massive $2 million estimate – a sign that expectations for iconic artist instruments are catching up with demand – but it still smashed through that. It’s not the most expensive Van Halen guitar on our list however…
8 John Lennon’s Framus Hootenanny 12-string $2,857,000 (2024)
Credit: Julien’s Auctions
The guitar that was famously used on Help! and its accompanying album was thought lost to the sands of time for decades, until it was found in by the new owners of a house in the British countryside when they were clearing out the attic. The guitar was given to Scottish guitarist Gordon Waller, half of the pop duo Peter and Gordon, and then later handed over to one of his road managers, but the guitar hadn’t been seen in public for over 50 years.
The guitar, which is seen being used by Lennon in the Help! movie during the performance of You’ve Got to Hide Your Love Away, was also used by Lennon to record It’s Only Love, I’ve Just Seen a Face and Girl, and by George Harrison for the rhythm track of Norwegian Wood. Before the auction in May 2024, there was speculation the guitar might end up becoming the most expensive ever sold at auction, but in the end the Framus had to settle for being the most expensive Beatles instrument ever, eclipsing Lennon’s J-160E (above).
7 Eric Clapton’s ‘Fool’ 1964 Gibson SG $3,003,000 (2026)
Eric Clapton’s Fool guitar at the media preview for Julien’s “Played, worn, torn rock ‘n’ roll iconic guitars and memorabilia” in 2023. Image: Valerie Macon/AFP via Getty Images
Perhaps Eric Clapton’s most distinctive instrument also has the distinction of being Slowhand’s most expensive electric sold at auction – twice! Hailing from Clapton’s Cream era, the Fool is celebrated as an enduring symbol of the psychedelic era in music, the 1964 Gibson SG earned its name from the Dutch art collective that gave it its striking finish. Sunshine of Your Love, White Room, I Feel Free… Clapton’s iconic Woman tone is all this guitar.
It was sold at auction in 2023 for $1,27m by Jim Irsay, but when it returned to the market in 2026 it smashed its estimates and eventually went for $3,003,000. It’s not the most expensive Eric Clapton guitar ever sold, however…
6 Eddie Van Halen’s Hot For Teacher Kramer $3,932,000 (2023)
Credit: Sotheby’s
Eddie Van Halen’s guitar designs have become almost as iconic as the man himself, but with most of EVH’s most iconic gear still treasured by his family, it’s rare for a bona fide EVH guitar to make it onto the open market. With that in mind, it’s no surprise that interest in this guitar, used by Eddie in the Hot For Teacher video, was so high – and the price tag followed suit.
5 Eric Clapton’s ‘MTV Unplugged’ Martin 000-42 $4,101,000 (2026)
Eric Clapton played this 1939 Martin 000-42 during his MTV Unplugged performance in 1992 (Photo: Eleanor Jane)
The impact of MTV’s Unplugged series on the popular perception of the guitar is hard to understate, and as we’ll see more than once on this list, the impact of these concerts clearly resonates with collectors, too. Eric Clapton’s legendary Unplugged performance, and its accompanying platinum-selling album not only revitalised Clapton’s career, it had a huge impact on the popularity of the acoustic guitar in general.
The 000-42 that Clapton played for the performance is hugely important in a variety of ways – Martin credit it with revitalising interest in the 000-sized guitar overnight, while it also inspired the company’s most successful and long-running signature model. Irsay bought the guitar for under a million dollars back in the day, but it smashed expectations to become the second most expensive acoustic of all time in 2026.
Kurt Cobain performing with his Martin D-18E during Nirvana’s MTV Unplugged. Image: Frank Micelotta Archive/Getty Images
4 Kurt Cobain’s Martin D-18E $6,010,000 (2020)
From one Unplugged moment to another! If there’s one Kurt Cobain guitar moment that’s become even more iconic than the Teen Spirit video, it’s Nirvana’s incredible, bittersweet performance on MTV Unplugged. Kurt bought the D-18E in 1992 at Voltage Guitars in Los Angeles, and it’s a rare bird for Martin guitars in that it came out of the factory with the DeArmond pickups, but Kurt disliked their sound and had it modded with a Bartolini 3AV soundhole pickup.
The guitar was left to Kurt’s daughter Francis Bean, and then ended up with her ex-husband Isaiah Silva as part of their divorce settlement. The guitar was purchased by RØDE Microphones founder, Peter Freedman in 2020 and topped our list for the best part of half a decade – until the 2026 Irsay auction redrew the map somewhat.
3 Kurt Cobain’s Smells Like Teen Spirit Fender Mustang $6,907,000 (2026)
The Fender Mustang used by Kurt Cobain in the ‘Smells Like Teen Spirit’ music video on display at Hard Rock Cafe in Piccadilly Circus, 2022. Image: Rob Pinney/Getty Images
What does an iconic moment in guitar history cost? About seven million dollars? It’s not an exaggeration to say that the Smells Like Teen Spirit music video changed the world, and in it Kurt Cobain is playing a rather fetching but typically unconventional lefty Lake Placid Blue Mustang with a competition strip – 1.5 billion YouTube views and countless hours of MTV airtime later, its place in the pop culture firmament was assured.
Ironically, the guitar wasn’t really one of Kurt’s favourites, only really getting a run-out live on a few other occasions but its place in the Teen Spirit video assured its place in rock history, and in the Jim Irsay collection in 2022 when it was sold for $4,550,000. Interestingly, when the Irsay sale was announced, this guitar had the largest estimated sale price of $2.5-5m. While it comfortably smashed that, it ended up being outshone on the night by two less heralded instruments…
2 Jerry Garcia’s ‘Tiger’ $11,560,000 (2026)
Image: Eleanor Jane
Over the last few years, the magic of the Grateful Dead has been experienced by an entire new generation. Fuelled by the popularity of the John Mayer-aided Dead & Co tours, Deadheads are arguably more numerous and passionate than they have been at any point since Jerry Garcia’s passing in 1995. The sad passing of Bob Weir earlier this year, and the global outpouring of love that has followed reminding us all of the enduring power of the band and its music.
Tiger was built for Garcia by luthier Doug Irwin, and it became his main guitar from 1979 onwards. It was also the last guitar he ever played in public before his death in 1995. Irsay bought Tiger for $957,500 in 2002, and all of the above combined to make those in the know raise eyebrows at the relatively modest $1-2m estimate at the Irsay sale in 2026.
But even they were gobsmacked by how much it eventually went for – $11,560,000 made it the second most expensive guitar of all time, and the second ever guitar to reach eight figures at auction. The power of the Dead endures, clearly.
1 David Gilmour’s Black Fender Stratocaster $14,550,000 (2026)
Image: Eleanor Jane
The Black Strat is David Gilmour’s most iconic guitar and is also one that’s been heavily modified over the years – bought from Manny’s Music in New York, this 1968 model was originally Sunburst but had been refinished in Black by the time Gilmour bought it in 1970. It originally had a maple neck with a late-60s big headstock, but throughout the 70s Gilmour frequently swapped between two 50s necks, one with rosewood and maple.
That wasn’t the end – over the decades since the pickups, tuners, pots, trem and scratchplate have all been swapped, and in fact it’s now estimated that the only original parts of the guitar remaining are the body, selector switch and (maybe) the bridge plate. Despite this, the Black Strat remains Gilmour’s most iconic instrument – the sound of Money, Comfortably Numb and scores more.
Despite its status as effectively the most important and iconic partscaster of all time, that didn’t stop it reaching a world record sum when it first sold in 2019 for $3.9m and became the crown jewel of the Jim Irsay Collection.
In the following years it would have its title usurped by a pair of Kurt Cobain guitars, but the 2026 Irsay auction didn’t just cement the guitar’s status as the most valuable guitar on earth – it completely redrew the map. The gasps as the guitar sailed past $10 million were audible in the Christie’s New York sale room, as the guitar finally sold for a scarcely believable $14,550,000. Where do we go from here? Well, if the last decade is anything to go by, the only way is up…
Editor’s note: this article was first published on 1 February 2024 and most recently updated on 13 March 2026. All figures below are converted into US Dollars and were correct at time of auction and not adjusted for inflation.
The post The 15 Most Expensive Guitars Sold At Auction appeared first on Guitar.com | All Things Guitar.
David Gilmour’s Black Strat is the world’s most expensive guitar again – selling for a staggering $14,550,000
David Gilmour’s most famous and iconic guitar once again owns the title of the most expensive guitar ever sold at auction, nearly than tripling the previous record by selling for $14,550,000 including fees.
Today’s Jim Irsay Collection auction at Christie’s in New York was always likely to reset the market for rock star guitars at auction – we dubbed it the world’s greatest guitar collection in 2022, after all.
But with an estimated price of $2-4,000,000, even wild estimates would never have imagined that the guitar – which was bought at auction by the late Indianapolis Colts owner for $3,975,000 in 2019 – would command such an unprecedented price.
All images: Eleanor Jane
The sale makes the Black Strat not only the world’s most expensive guitar again, it more than doubles the previous record held by Kurt Cobain’s Martin D-18E which he used on Nirvana’s MTV Unplugged performance.
That guitar was sold for $6,010,000 in 2020, though interestingly another Kurt Cobain guitar that was also part of the sale and expected to fetch the highest price did relatively modestly by comparison.
Kurt’s Smells Like Teen Spirit video Mustang held the record for the most expensive electric guitar going into the sale, having sold for $4,550,000 in 2022. It sold in the end for ‘only’ $6,907,000.
That still wasn’t good enough for the silver medal on the night however, as another rock star guitar came out of nowhere to become the second most expensive guitar sold at auction.
Irsay purchased Jerry Garcia’s Tiger for $957,500 in 2002. Built by luthier Doug Irwin, it was the Grateful Dead star’s main guitar from 1979 onwards and in 1995 was the last guitar he ever played in public
Interest in the Grateful Dead has exploded over the last few years, and so perhaps it’s no surprise that Jerry Garcia’s legendary Tiger guitar would comfortably beat its $1-2m estimate.
For it to fetch an astounding $14,560,000 however? That certainly wasn’t on the script for the evening.
The sale also saw Eric Clapton’s “Fool” SG sell for a little over $3m, while a treasure trove of Beatles gear also fetched big sums – most notably George Harrison’s Paperback Writer SG which sold for $2,271,000.
The post David Gilmour’s Black Strat is the world’s most expensive guitar again – selling for a staggering $14,550,000 appeared first on Guitar.com | All Things Guitar.
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