David Gilmour‘s legendary ‘Black Strat’ has become the most expensive guitar ever sold at auction.
- READ MORE: 50 geeky facts about Pink Floyd
The former Pink Floyd member used the model when recording the band’s classic albums ‘The Dark Side Of The Moon’ (1973), ‘Wish You Were Here’ (1975), ‘Animals’ (1977) and ‘The Wall’ (1979).
Gilmour played the instrument – a black Fender Stratocaster – for his solo on ‘Comfortably Numb’ from the latter record, and when making the songs ‘Money’ and ‘Shine On You Crazy Diamond’.
His ‘Black Strat’ sold for an enormous $14.55million (£11million) at Christie’s auction as part of ‘The Jim Irsay Collection’ in New York yesterday (Thursday March 12), per Rolling Stone.
Prior to the sale, the guitar had been estimated to fetch between $2million (£1,495,050) and $4million (£3million).
The sale made the model the most expensive guitar ever sold, eclipsing 2020’s $6million (£4.5million) sale of the acoustic guitar Kurt Cobain played at Nirvana’s MTV Unplugged show in 1993. Cobain’s rare Martin D-18E was then donated to the London Royal College Of Music late last year.
Irsay first purchased Gilmour’s ‘Black Strat’ at auction via Christie’s in 2019, breaking the world record for any guitar sold at auction at the time. Earlier that year, the musician announced that he’d be selling 120 of his iconic guitars to “give joy” to other people and raise funds to help fight climate change.
“These guitars have been very good to me,” he said. “They’re my friends. They have given me lots of music. I just think it’s time that they went off and served someone else. I have had my time with them. And of course the money that they will raise will do an enormous amount of good in the world, and that is my intention.”
‘The Jim Irsay Collection: Icons Of Popular Culture’ auction is described as “one of the greatest troves of memorabilia ever assembled, meticulously compiled over decades by the late philanthropist, passionate music lover, and owner and CEO of the Indianapolis Colts”.
The listing added: “A portion of the proceeds of these sales will be donated to philanthropic causes supported by Jim Irsay during his lifetime.”
Last December, Gilmour celebrated Pink Floyd’s ‘Wish You Were Here’ landing the Christmas Number One album spot.
It marked the band’s second UK Number One record of the year, following on from ‘Pink Floyd At Pompeii – MCMLXXII’. The live album of a 1971 show was released as a concert film in 1972, and re-released with newly mixed audio in 2025. A 4K version of the movie arrived, too.
Pink Floyd also shared the music video for the ‘Wish You Were Here’ title track over Christmas, 50 years after its release.
Last autumn, Gilmour said there was “no possible way” that he would ever work with his former Pink Floyd bandmate Roger Waters again.
David Gilmour released his fifth solo album, ‘Luck And Strange’, in 2024. The record marked the musician’s first full-length effort in nine years, following 2015’s ‘Rattle That Lock’.
