Avid gear collector Kirk Hammett has revealed he’s been thinning out his electric guitar collection and has recently sold “a lot” of six-strings online, but there is a slight twist: he’s been selling them anonymously.
Peter Green’s beloved Greeny Les Paul is the Metallica man’s most fabled instrument, even if he had no interest in buying it at first. However, his collection includes plenty more vintage picks, and he believes an ultra-rare 1959 ES-335 to be his best-sounding coup.
Those two may currently remain in Hammett’s possession, but some of his other guitars have since gone on to new homes, after being anonymously listed on eBay or Reverb.
“I’ll list them on eBay or Reverb and I don’t say they’re mine,” Hammett tells Metal Hammer during a discussion of his overwhelming collection. “I get rid of a lot of guitars that way!
“I get anxiety because I believe guitars should be played,” he adds, saying he believes the guitars deserved better than “solitary confinement”.
“I don’t believe in just storing them away and forgetting about them,” he adds. “I feel guilty! So I have been on a quest to shrink my collection and get rid of the ones I don’t play.”
To that end, Hammett reveals how a bucketload of his guitars had been collecting dust since since the late 2000s.
“There were a few that were only ever used on [2008’s] Death Magnetic,” he explains. “I played them on that tour, then as soon as that tour stopped they went into storage again as I’m not playing those songs.” That means some of them hadn't seen the light of day in 15 years.
Putting the (sadly unspecified) guitars up for sale anonymously is something of an unprecedented move from Hammett, especially since it isn’t the usual route big-name players take when putting guitars up for adoption.
“I try to trade them off because it’s better than just doing a cash deal,” he says. “Everyone leaves with a smile on their face and has something they want! Another way is to just give stuff away.”
It’s a philosophy similarly held by Joe Bonamassa, who once helped Hammett score another rare Les Paul he’d been chasing for years. The blues guitarist says he traded one of his prized Dumble amps for a 1959 Les Paul in 2016 and got “way more joy” from it than he did the tube amp.
Hammett didn’t name the guitars he sold specifically, but a little research into the band’s Death Magnetic era gives us a little clue as to what guitars could have been sold.
Of his gear picks for Metallica's ninth album, Kirk Hammett told Guitar World back in 2008: “I’ve added more midrange to my over sound. I can still appreciate my original scooped sound, but I need to feel the ground shake when I hit a chord.”
While amps included models from Marshall, Randall, and Ampeg, guitar-wise he says: “I think I used a ’58 Paul and a ’59 Tele on some clean stuff, but overall, almost everything is done with my ESP Mummy and Caution guitar, which is the original “Skully” [KH-2 Kirk Hammett signature] guitar – the very first ESP guitar, from 1987.”
“Skully” is, of course, a prized possession, so that was almost definitely not put up for sale, but the late 1950s axes – of which he owns many – could have found their way onto the chopping block along with a number of touring guitars.
Speaking of his 100+ guitar collection earlier this year, Hammett revealed why there are no PRS guitars among the bunch. Interestingly, Jack White's signature Triplecaster can be found in his collection, following a high-profile signature guitar swap.
