the top 10 most listened to electric guitars in history?

mentoneman

mentoneman

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when he starts playing it’s flashback city





it made me wonder which specific electric guitars, including recorded music and concerts, have been the most widely heard in history?

I’d say:

1) Neal Schon’s 1977 Black Les Paul Deluxe
2) Eddie’s 1977 Frankie
3) George Harrison’s 1964 Rickenbacker 360/12
3) The Edge’s 76 Gibson Explorer
4) Angus’s 1970 SG
5) Brian May’s Red Special



keef’s Micawber tele, jimmy’s 59 les paul, springsteen’s 1950s tele, jerry’s alembic wolf, tony’s sg, and jimi’s woodstock strat are all pretty iconic too!
 
NowYou'rePlayingWithPower said:
Going with:

Andy Summers
Eric Clapton
Brian May
Keith Richards
Paul Simon
James Hetfield
David Gilmour
Eddie Van Halen
George Harrison

...and whatever guitars they used on their most popular tracks 🤷‍♀️😅
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no cheating!😁

you have to think about not only the popularity of the band/player, but a particular instrument that they stuck with while recording and touring.
andy summers is a good one if he used a particular tele for the glory years. i thought about slash and hetfield but did not know if they had one favorite axe they remained faithful to.
 
mentoneman said:
no cheating!😁

you have to think about not only the popularity of the band/player, but a particular instrument that they stuck with while recording and touring.
andy summers is a good one if he used a particular tele for the glory years. i thought about slash and hetfield but did not know if they had one favorite axe they remained faithful to.
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I would almost guess that the most listened to guitar in history is probably on a video game or movie soundtrack and likely gets glanced over.
 
A few guesses from me:

Brian May’s Red Special

The Montrose / STP Burst has appeared on a lot of recorded stuff apparently.

Nile Rogers’ White Strat

The Gilmore Black Strat

Pearly Gates

Clapton’s Blackie

Malcolm Young’s Gretsch

One of Angus Young’s SGs

Tony Iommi’s Monkey SG

Springsteen’s Tele
 
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I'd say it would have to be a toss up between some year of Gibson or Fender. Artists use a lot of models on their recordings. I'd be hard pressed to say that "this guitar" owned by this artist is the most heard.

If I had to guess though, I'd say one of the guitars that the Beatles used on their early recordings. So many listens to that music. including by me.
 
Jimty said:
A few guesses from me:

Brian May’s Red Special

The Montrose / STP Burst has appeared on a lot of recorded stuff apparently.

Nile Rogers’ White Strat

The Gilmore Black Strat

Pearly Gates

Clapton’s Blackie

Malcolm Young’s Gretsch

One of Angus Young’s SGs

Tony Iommi’s Monkey SG

Springsteen’s Tele
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I would think that Tony Iommi's "Old Boy" Jaydee would be on more recordings and live performances than the Monkey?

s-l1200.webp
 
Paul Jackson

Steve Cropper

Eric Gale

Cornell Dupree

There are def a few more soul and R n B session players out there who played on a lot of stuff, they just don't have the profile.
 
If you dip your toes into the Nashville swamp, I'll go with Brent Mason's Tele. That plank is probably the most recorded and recognized guitar in that town.

Then you got the Skynyrd gutars, Dwayne's and Dickey's Gibsons, Carlton's 335...there is no end to the list.
 
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If Lukather used one most of the time in the 80’s, he’s up there. Played on almost any major record that needed session guitar. Dan Huff’s guitar too.
 
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BackCrack said:
If you dip your toes into the Nashville swamp, I'll go with Brent Mason's Tele. That plank is probably the most recorded and recognized guitar in that town.

Then you got the Skynyrd gutars, Dwayne's and Dickey's Gibsons, Carlton's 335...there is no end to the list.
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it would be cool to determine which session guitar player and their favorite instrument was ranked the top of the heap.
it’d be something to try to figure out who played on the most popular songs/records in history and how many times they used a particular guitar to do so.
 
GOHOINC said:
Santana and his prs might be higher up there than you think, billboard says that song smooth is the #2 single of all time...
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i did consider him for his longevity but more for the black magic woman sg era. jeff beck to a lesser degree but he went through his les paul era and then strats galore.
 
U2's The Edge and his Strat would be up there (Edit: or was it his Explorer??, hell if I know, but they're a massive band and had No.1 songs in every country around the globe more than once...huge, staying power, radio friendly)

Cool thread.
 
psychodave said:
The studio session players from the 50-60’s. Those people were on like 95% of the albums from that time… albums which still get play rotation to this day.
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thought about tedesco and the wrecking crew, glen campbell, landau, luke, huff, mason etc. but again those guys were paid to be chameleons with multiple guitars for producers to choose.
 
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