The former Rolling Stones against the museum: yellow on stolen guitar

The discovery of the Les Paul stolen in 1971 at Mick Taylor of Rolling Stones and his exhibition in an exhibition hosted by the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York in 1971. The former guitarist of the band of “Paint It Black”, today 76 years old, accused the New York museum of having unjustly appropriate the instrument that was stolen over fifty years ago and of which the traces had been lost for all these years, demanding to get it back. But the Metropolitan Museum of Art does not seem to be intent on supporting Taylor’s requests: “This guitar has a long and well documented history. It is true that Taylor played it, but it has never been the owner”. The Metropolitan also adds that The guitar was auctioned by Christie’s, even appearing on the cover of the catalog, and which in 2019 was exhibited in an exhibition of the MET without Taylor or his team being any claim.

The incredible story of the Les Paul ended now at the center of a real war had told you about it a few weeks ago. The guitar in question is not any guitar, but a Gibson Les Paul who made the history of rock’n’roll: it was the six ropes played by Keith Richards during the first, historic appearance of the Rolling Stones All? And Sullivan Show, when in October 1964 in the study of the iconic American program Mick Jagger and companions launched their second album for the market for the market for the market American, “12 x 5” with Chuck Berry’s “Around and Around” and Kai Winding’s “Time is on my side”. Not only that: that guitar had also been a passive spectator of a tragedy, the one that was consumed a few meters from the stage where on 6 December 1969 the band of “(I Can’t Get no) Satiscation” performed at theAltamont Raceway Park With a free concert, when in the climate of violence, chaos and disorganization that characterized the band’s free show a man – Meredith Hunter – was stabbed by the Hell’s Angels, who served as a security service for the Stones. To play the Gibson Les Paul that evening at Atlamont was just Mick Taylorwho had joined the band just before and would leave her in 1974, and who had purchased the instrument – also passed between the hands of Eric Clapton and Jimmy Page – from Richards in 1967.

The instrument disappeared in September 1971, when a group of Marseglase drug dealers (to which Keith Richards was due to money) broke into Villa nellcôte, the Boémien of the Rolling Stones refuge on the French Riviera, in France, where Jagger and his companions had refuge to record between drugs and quarrels “Exile on Main St.”, and looked after the villa. Richards guitars, Bobby Keys’ saxophone and Bill Wyman’s bass. There were no arrests: neither the French police nor the Stones themselves put pressure to investigate thoroughly, perhaps also because of the compromising nature of the environment in which they lived.