The guitars that define David Gilmour’s career
David Gilmour is one of the most iconic guitarists of all time. His style is based on the blues and minor pentatonic scales, with bends and vibrato aplenty, and he uses a generous use of effects, including reverb, fuzz and distortion. His lead guitar sound made Pink Floyd one of the most distinctive rock bands of the 21st Century.
Gilmour is best known for his use of Fender guitars and, particularly, their flagship model, the Stratocaster. “The Stratocaster tends to enhance the personality of the person playing it,” Gilmour once said. “People playing Fenders are more recognisably themselves than people playing some of the other well-known guitars.”
Today, we’re going to take a look at the guitars that define Gilmour’s career, starting with a 1960’s Fender Telecaster. Gilmour received the guitar on his 21st birthday, and it was the first high-quality guitar that he ever owned. In fact, he first used the guitar in Pink Floyd when stepping in for Syd Barrett in 1967, whose mental stability had begun to deteriorate.
Gilmour was gifted his first ever Fender Stratocaster by his Pink Floyd bandmates in 1968. From there, Gilmour used it on the More and Ummagumma albums, including his first contribution to the band, ‘The Narrow Way’. Sadly, the guitar was stolen in 1970, but this loss led to the purchase of a guitar with an exceptional place in Gilmour’s heart.
Arguably, the most significant guitar in Gilmour’s arsenal, however, is the 1969 ‘Black Strat’ Fender Stratocaster. Gilmour purchased the ‘Black Strat’ just after his original Stratocaster had been stolen. He used it on some of the most iconic moments of Pink Floyd’s career, including the excellent guitar solos on ‘Comfortably Numb’ and ‘Shine On You Crazy Diamond’. The ‘Black Strat’ is the guitar that we imagine Gilmour playing when we close our eyes; such is its iconic status.
While the ‘Black Strat’ is probably the guitar most closely associated with Gilmour, he has previously revealed that his favourite six-string is a Martin D-35. Gilmour played the legendary solo on ‘Wish You Were Here’ with his Martin and composed most of his tunes on the fabled acoustic. The story of Gilmour acquiring his favourite guitar is that he had been heading to a guitar shop to buy an acoustic when another musician approached him on the street and offered to sell him the D-35. Gilmour fell in love with the guitar the moment he took it out of its case.
Luthier Bill Lewis made another of the most famous guitars of Gilmour’s career. It was a Fender Stratocaster, but with 24 frets, so its player could reach higher notes. Gilmour employed the axe’s higher range on the solo in ‘Echoes’, along with a Fuzz Face pedal. Gilmour clearly loved the ‘Bill Lewis’ as it was one of the few guitars he did not sell at auction in 2019.
Few guitarists are as tied to a brand as Gilmour is to Fender. But that doesn’t necessarily mean he refuses to check out their main competitor. The Pink Floyd man used a 1955 Gibson Les Paul Goldtop during the recording of The Wall to perfect effect on the second solo in ‘Another Brick In The Wall’, one of his most renowned pieces.
No deep dive into Gilmour’s guitars would be complete without mentioning one of his most beloved. Gilmour impressively owned a Fender Stratocaster that goes right back to the legendary luthier, Leo Fender himself. The guitar’s serial number is number ‘one’, which suggests that it is one of the first that Fender made. Gilmour used it on the ‘funky’ part of ‘Another Brick In The Wall’. However, he did not hold onto the guitar; he auctioned it in 2019 and raised a whopping $1,815,000.
