How a sculptor ruined Jimmy Page’s legendary Telecaster ?

It can get a little much occasionally, but when people fawn over the 1960s, they do so with good reason. Free higher education, great music, and fashion were pretty killer compared to the slop you get today. Still, it’s worth appreciating the good things we have now because, as Jimmy Page found out the hard way, 1960s hippie culture could often take things too far.

As a sign of just how good music fans had it in the 1960s, Page was good friends with fellow guitar extraordinaire Jeff Beck. The two of them ran in the same circles and had deep respect for each other’s abilities from the early days of their careers. This is when Beck replaced Eric Clapton in The Yardbirds, and Page was still a respected session guitarist about town.

In fact, Page vouching for the latter’s skills personally is what got him into The Yardbirds in 1965. An act of kindness that Beck repaid by buying the Led Zep founder a 1959 Fender Telecaster, one that would stay in his arsenal for years after. Sure, for sentimental reasons, and also for the practical reason that the ’59 Telecaster is one of the greatest guitars ever made.

This guitar would help begin Page’s journey from a session legend to a bona fide guitar hero, making his own music. So, of course, the path toward immortality in Led Zeppelin began here and, arguably, began with Jeff Beck, and Page always had his brother in blues to thank for it. You see, while the iconic image of Jimmy Page is him in a catsuit, thrashing away on a Gibson Les Paul, sometimes with a violin bow, that Tele quietly became his signature guitar, especially in the early years of Led Zeppelin.

What did that Telecaster mean to Jimmy Page?

Page used that Telecaster on pretty much all the early Led Zeppelin albums, and for a large number of their early concerts, as you can see from basically any photo during that time. Eventually, the guitar garnered too much personal significance to be taken out on tour anymore, especially as the 1960s gave way to the 1970s, and Led Zeppelin’s touring schedule became a lot harder.

Rather than risk it on the road, Page kept the Tele at home for use in the studio only. The irony is that by doing so, he left it in the least safe pair of hands he possibly could. That of a sculptor friend who was looking after his house while the musician was away on the road. As Page explained in an interview with Fender, this ‘friend’ of his decided to give him a little homecoming gift when he returned.

What he’d done was completely repaint the guitar, such that Page couldn’t recognise it at first, with little modulating lines in very earthy colours. As he recounted in the interview, “Now, I would have probably smashed the guitar over his head. I was still so vibed up from the tour that the whole thing sort of didn’t fully connect.”

Obviously, the new paint job didn’t last long. Within a few weeks, Page had the whole thing stripped and essentially reset to factory settings after being manhandled by this amateur. A sign, if one was needed, that untrammelled artistic expression is rarely a welcome act, especially when involving someone else’s prized possession.