Depending on what era of Jeff Beck’s unique guitar playing one prefers, he’s typically imagined with either a Gibson Les Paul or a Fender Stratocaster in his talented hands. Or perhaps his love-it-or-hate-it Les Tele-Gib hybrid springs to mind?
Certainly not a PRS.
However, Paul Reed Smith has now claimed that, in his final years, Beck was glued to one of his electric guitars. And he's desperate to get it back.
In the Yardbirds, Beck played a sunburst Les Paul that, since his passing, has been loaned out to Lenny Kravitz’s foil, Craig Ross, and Marcus King. Later, his Blow by Blow era — which saw him butting heads with Beatles producer George Martin — was underpinned by his Oxblood Les Paul.
But, after once claiming that the Gibson axe “means business,” he pivoted to the “endless color” of the Fender Stratocaster, an instrument he was deeply associated with until his death.
Smith’s claim, then, that PRS had pulled him over to the dark side comes as quite the surprise.
So what’s going on?
“People don’t know this, but Jeff Beck had a PRS at home, and he loved it,” he says in the new issue of Guitar World. “He told me I’d never see him with it, but he used it to record.”
Unfortunately, Smith remains tight-lipped about what model of PRS it was. Educated guesses include an early prototype of John McLaughlin's signature, a Private Stock McCarty, or even a semi-hollow model, but those could all be way off the mark.
The important thing for Smith is tracking the guitar down.
“We’ve been trying to get it back,” the luthier and businessman explains. “It wasn’t part of the auction this year, but I know he loved that guitar.”
That auction saw big hitters like the Yardburst Les Paul that went for $496,484, and the OxBlood model became the world’s most expensive LP and smashed a series of auction records. But the PRS never made it so far.
So did it leave his possession before his death, or is it somewhere in the Beck family vault still?
In March, Manfred Mann's Earth Band guitarist Mick Rogers claimed he owns Beck's last-ever recording, but added that it is unlikely to ever be released. Going off Smith's words, Beck may have tracked the song with his PRS. But, of course, this is pure speculation.
It’s a fascinating mystery either way. Let’s hope the truth soon reveals itself.
In related news, Buddy Guy has been reflecting on how Jeff Beck and the British blues guitarists of the 1960s gave his career a shot in the arm, and Ronnie Wood has revealed why he switched from rhythm guitar to bass in the Jeff Beck Group.
