Original 1961 Les Paul SG Standard
Hand-Painted 'The Fool' by Rick Daskam

1961 Gibson 1961 Les Paul SG Standard 'The Fool'

This 'unique' guitar is a near exact replica of Eric Clapton's famous psychedelic 1963 SG Standard. It is an original mid-1961 Gibson SG Standard that has been specially hand-painted by Rick Daskam. Thirteen inch wide, 1 3/8 inch thick, solid Honduras mahogany body with beveled edges weighing just 7.50 lbs. One-piece mahogany neck with a nice, fat nut width of just over 1 11/16 inches, a standard Gibson scale length of 24 3/4 inches and a very fast thin-to-medium profile. Back and front of headstock hand-painted. On the back of the headstock is a small rectangular window displaying the original serial number. Two-layer black over white plastic truss-rod cover with "Les Paul" engraved in white, secured by two screws. Mid-sixties, individual Grover Roto-Matic tuners with half-moon metal buttons. Single-bound Brazilian rosewood fretboard with 22 jumbo frets (re-fretted) and inlaid pearl trapezoid position markers. Original five-layer, black over white plastic pickguard with five screws (now painted "The Fool"). Two ca. 1963 early "patent number" pickups (covers removed) with outputs of 7.88k and 7.18k. The original black plastic pickup "rings" are stamped on the underside "MR 491" and "M-69 7" (neck pickup), and "MR 490" and "M-69 8" (bridge pickup). Inside the neck pickup cavity is a small white label with "M.J.K / 2003" written in ink. The inside the bridge pickup cavity is signed in ink "R. Daskam / #6". The potentiometers are all stamped "134 61 03" (Centralab, January 1961). Four controls (two volume, two tone) plus three-way selector switch on lower treble bout. Original black plastic bell-shaped knobs with metal tops. A wonderful example of Rick Daskam's artistic genius on an original 1961 Gibson Les Paul SG Standard. Housed in the original Gibson five-latch, shaped black hardshell case with orange plush lining (9.00)

As per the specifications of the original guitar, which was given by Eric Clapton to George Harrison, who then gave it to Todd Rundgren in 1974, the following changes have been made: the tuners have been replaced with mid-sixties chrome-plated Grover Roto-Matic tuners with half-moon metal buttons. And now for the best part... the guitar has been hand-painted with a brush exactly like the original. It was painstakingly researched from every angle before setting out to create the ultimate SG ''Fool'' reproduction. This guitar is as close to the original as you are going to find, period. Every inch of this guitar was hand-painted by artist Rick Daskam, and then 'clear-coated' to protect the artwork. We took detailed photographs of this guitar before the 'Fool' paint job and we instructed the artist to leave the original serial number "20982" (ca. June 1961) showing through a small rectangular 'window' on the back of the headstock. Simply amazing…

Eric Clapton's famous psychedelic SG is illustrated on p. 48 of Fuzz & Feedback, edited by Tony Bacon. "He bought the guitar probably in early 1967 to replace his stolen Les Paul Standard. Soon Clapton had a Dutch group of artists known as The Fool paint the guitar. They set a fiery-haired angel amid clouds and stars, added an idyllic landscape to the pickguard, and put an explosively 1960s version of a sunburst finish on the back... Clapton used the guitar widely with Cream, both on-stage and for recordings such as the Disraeli Gears and Wheels Of Fire albums. Since 1974 the guitar has been owned by musician/producer Todd Rundgren."

Rick Daskam is an acknowledged artist and landscape painter from Southbury, Connecticut. He has won many awards including The Salamagundi Club NYC (2010), The Society of Creative Art, Newtown, CT (2010), the John N. Lewis Memorial Award (2009) and the Frank and Marjorie Van Steen Award (2007), etc., etc. This is the sixth "Fool" that he has painted - but almost certainly the first 'original SG Standard'.

"The Fool were three Dutch artists: Simon Posthuma, Marijke Koger, and Josje Leeger, with a Canadian, Barry Finch, added for their album. Moving to London in the 1960s, The Fool painted the exterior of the Apple boutique, as well as a car and a piano for John Lennon. They worked on Eric Clapton's SG in 1967" (Tony Bacon, Fuzz & Feedback, p. 49).

"Considering all the Les Paul models as a whole, sales declined in 1960 after a peak in 1959...[and] by 1961 Gibson had decided on a complete re-design of the line in an effort to reactivate this faltering model. The company had started a $400,000 expansion of the factory in Kalamazoo during 1960 which more than doubled the size of the plant by the time it was completed in 1961...One of the first series of new models to benefit from the company's newly expanded production facilities was the completely revised line of Les Paul models. Gibson redesigned the Junior, Standard and Custom models, adopting a new, distinctly modern, sculpted double-cutaway design. The 'Les Paul' name was still used at first, but during 1963 Gibson began to call these new models the SG Junior, the SG Standard and the SG Custom...The transition models -- those produced between 1961 and 1963 -- had the new SG design but the old Les Paul names, and these are now known to collectors and players as SG/Les Paul models...SG-style solidbodies have attracted a number of players over the years, including John Cipollina, Eric Clapton, Tony Iommi, Robbie Krieger, Tony McPhee, Pete Townshend, Angus Young and Frank Zappa" (Tony Bacon, Electric Guitars: The Illustrated Encyclopedia, pp. 134-136).