Back in June, Joe Perry told Total Guitar that the guitar he misses the most is the 1950s Strat he recorded “Walk This Way” with, which went the way of the wind when he left Aerosmith in 1979.
Well, apparently that’s not the only one he misses as he tells the Guitarist he regrets selling a red Hofner Stratocaster clone that he used in the 1990s for a version of “The Star Spangled Banner” on the 4th of July at Lake Sunapee in New Hampshire where he spent his summers growing up.
He says, “I did that for a couple of years with that particular guitar, and as the years went on the guitar ended up getting back with my main collection… [and] I earmarked a few guitars to go and somehow that guitar got on the list.
“And like three or four months later, I found out that it was gone and was like, ‘Next time, I gotta pay more attention to this. I’m not getting rid of anything else for a while.’”
Ironically, he came across the guitar year later in Japan.
“We’re on the bullet train, and as it’s pulling out…I saw a kid holding that guitar out for me to sign it.
“But the train was already moving, slowly pulling out, and the kid was holding it out with a magic marker. I’m thinking, ‘Man, I gotta get the kid’s number to see if I could buy it back or trade it for something else,’ because it did have some sentimental value, you know?
“But we were off to the next city, and at that point I didn’t have any ideas about how to get in touch with the guy. I suppose I could have tracked him down through the fan club and tried to figure out who it was, but it was lost…”
But he’s not giving up, saying, “I’ll buy it back. I’ll trade it for something else, you know? It would be fun to get that back. And again, that was one of those off-the-wall, not exactly the hippest guitar of the month.
“But it sounded pretty cool and it had a really good neck. It was more about the sentimental things. I regret having lost that.”
With Aerosmith no longer touring, Perry has a little more time on his hands to track it down.
REUTERS PHOTO
