The Police guitarist Andy Summers reveals in a new interview that he once sold his Les Paul guitar to Eric Clapton after Clapton begged him for it.
The revelation came during an interview with YouTuber Rick Baeto, as Summers was discussing how he was friends with guitar players like Clapton, Jeff Beck and Albert Lee in the ’60s.
Summers says he walked into a club with his Sunburst Les Paul and Clapton was simply in awe of it. Summers let Clapton know he got it at the London guitar shop Rose Morris and that they had another one, so Clapton went out and purchased it.
“So, time moves on. Eric’s Les Paul gets stolen, and he knows I’ve got the other one. He starts calling me relentlessly,” Summers shares, noting that by then he had moved on to playing a ’58 White Telecaster.
Summers says the Les Paul was in a case under his bed, and even though he wasn’t playing it, he was still reluctant to sell it.
“I kept resisting it. But finally, he called me so many times that I actually agreed to sell it,” he says. “I didn’t feel great about it, but he just really wanted it. So, we agreed on a price.”
And Clapton wound up getting it for a bargain.
“I charged him 200 pounds for it,” he says. “It’s worth about 2 million now. Who knew?”
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