WORLD EXCLUSIVE: Gibson Custom Shop Kirk Hammett GREENY Les Paul Standard!

Published on 28 March 2023

It’s here. 

The one you’ve been waiting for. 

It’s by far one of the most famous, near-mythical instruments on the planet, and Gibson Custom Shop have created a very limited number of replicas, all hand-aged by the Murphy Lab.

What is this, of which we speak?

Why, it’s the Excalibur of electric guitars itself: the one and only Greeny Les Paul Standard!

Greeny

Alongside Billy Gibbons’ revered Pearly Gates, Greeny must rank as the most loved, most sought after, and most talked about electric guitar in the world. It’s certainly the most famous Gibson Les Paul, thanks to a trio of very notable players. Yes, we know you already know all of this since you drink up the mythology as much as we do, but indulge us for a minute as we briefly recount the legend of Greeny…

The guitar known affectionately as Greeny is a super-rare 1959 Gibson Les Paul Standard. It has the serial number 9 2208 and is already a legendary instrument due to its scarcity, given how revered this period of Gibson’s history is. Les Paul Standards from 1958-1960 are known worldwide as Holy Grail electric guitars, with the few surviving examples from 1959 being considered the best of the best.

This particular one, originally finished in Sunburst, was originally owned by Fleetwood Mac guitar pioneer Peter Green, hence the nickname. The guitar has a very distinctive tone thanks to two main differences from other ‘59 LP’s: the middle pickup selection is wired out-of-phase, and the neck pickup itself has a reversed polarity due to a magnet being fitted the ‘wrong’ way round. The result is a uniquely nasal tone in the middle position, particularly for such a famously chunky sounding guitar. An instant legend was born.

Green used the guitar on Fleetwood Mac records and tours before selling it to Gary Moore, who played it for decades, both with Thin Lizzy and throughout his solo career. Now, it belongs to none other than Metallica’s Kirk Hammett, who takes it out on world tours to this very day.

The Sunburst has long since faded to a beautiful amber ‘lemon drop’ colour and the guitar has accrued its fair share of wear and tear during its years of active service. Gibson aficionados have long since clamoured for an excellent quality replica to be made available, and now, such a thing exists.

Gibson Custom Shop, Murphy Lab Aged

Kirk Hammett has actually lent this iconic instrument to Gibson’s Custom Shop in order to allow them unrestricted access to every inch of the guitar. These replicas of the Greeny are spectacularly close to the original in every way: from the perfect hue of amber finish to the exact marking on the body, right through to the tarnishing of the hardware. The neck carve is a perfect replica. The fingerboard is Indian rosewood. The Greeny Les Paul has been recreated as exactly as is possible, which is just as it should be.

That’s the outside, but what about the inside? Believe us, Gibson Custom Shop have taken huge pains to recreate those ultra-famous tones, using specially created alnico 2 pickups (yes, with the flipped magnet in the neck unit) and exhaustively authentic circuitry and switching. The pots are audio tapers and the capacitors are authentic bumblebee units. It’s as real as it gets, and we have ONE of these guitar available for sale. 

One Available: How to Order

Indeed, such is the limited nature of this instrument, and so great is the demand, that production numbers of these hand-made masterpieces is currently tiny. Even top Gibson Custom Shop dealers like ourselves only have one Greeny guitar available to sell. Many dealers won’t be able to offer the Greeny Les Paul at all, so in order to make it fair for everyone, we have decided on the following:

There will be no regular product page to click through and buy from at this point. 

All interested parties should email us at orders@guitarguitar.co.uk with ‘Murphy Lab Greeny’ in the subject header.

These emails will be collected, and one will be selected completely at random. This lucky person will be contacted by our team to complete their purchase.

This way, it’s not a case of ‘first past the post’: everyone has an equally fair shot at getting their hands on this most iconic of guitars.

We really cannot wait for this one to show up! For all interested parties: best of luck to you!