"He slept with these instruments," said equipment manager Steve Parish, who handled Garcia's guitars for more than 25 years. " You could lose amps. You could break things, and sometimes we did. But I could never look Jerry in the eye and say, 'I don't have your guitar." Jerry had about 25 guitars, but 70% of his time in the spotlight he played just 3, all custom built by the same luthier. His first was a Danelectro (age 15). His acoustic in the days with Robert Hunter prior to his switch to the banjo is uncertain. With the Warlocks in '65 age 23 he played a red Guild Starfire, also used on the 1st Dead albumn.



1966- same guitar 1967-Guild and then in the summer he switched to a black 1957 Gibsons Les Pauls with P90's with covers removed and Bigsby tremolo

1968 - Gold-top Les Paul with P-90 single coil p/u's. 3 Twin Reverbs, 2 Fender 4x12 cabinets, JBL D120 speakers







1968 Summer- switches to another Black Gibson

1969- Gibson SG with a Vox Crybaby wah-wah pedal. Played on Live Dead





1970- 1963 Sunburst Strat with Brazilian Rosewood fingerboard





Martin D-18 and a ZB pedal steel on Wokingman's Dead, American Beauty By May 1970 he's back on the Gibson SG like above

1971- Sunburst Les Paul

March and April Jer switches to a custom built guitar. Said to be a Alembic project





May Jer breaks out the Natural 57 Fender Strat that Graham Nash gave him



Summer switches to a Gibson Les Paul TV

1972 -Alligator -the Graham Nash guitar

June switches back to Sunburst Strat no American Flag sticker

‘56/’57 Sunburst all mapleneck Strat and switches back to the Strat that Graham Nash gave him, with Alligator sticker.



72- cont. Garcia bought the first guitar Doug Irwin ever made for $850 (known as 001) and ordered another one custom-made. By this point, his silverface Fender Twin amp was already a central part of his sound. He continued to use the preamp from the Fender amp through 1993. From the late '70's to about 1993 he didn't use the power amp & speakers of the Fender, instead using three JBL D120/E120 speakers in a vertical box powered by a McIntosh solid state amp (note that this probably made the power amp Class A, which is not the Class AB power amp that the Fender normally has). It was miked with a Sennheiser 421 mic. 1973- Jerry continues using Alligator In May '73 he received the his first custom Doug Irwin (Sonoma, CA)--the "Wolf" he paid $1,500. (Garcia gave Irwin's 001 to original Dead road crew member Ramrod. Garcia gave away a lot of guitars.)

- Description: 25.5 in maple neck, 24 fret ebony fingerboard, blonde Western "quilted" maple body with at purpleheart (amaranth) core. Guts like a Strat with

an Alembic Stratoblaster installed .

1974- Wolf *1972-1974 the wah pedal is a ColorSound "Vol + Wah" 1975- Travis Beam TB 1000A



Jerry, "I don't like any guitars that are available. I'm trying to have a guitar built." Hence, the Travis Bean. He laughed upon first seeing it, but quickly changed his mind when he tried the custom aluminum-neck guitar made in San Francisco. 1976- Travis Bean TB500 w/single-coil pickups and fx loop.



10/3/76 last Boogie Mark I show; 10/9/76 first appearance of dual Twins



Effects- Mu-Tron III +Mu-Tron Octave Divider +MXR analog delay



1977- Travis Beam TB500 get's the Unity Gain Buffer built by John Cutler

77- Fall Jerry get's his modified Wolf back from Doug Irwin. Complete with single coils and effects loop.

Irwin removes the Wolf sticker and Inlays the Wolf into the guitar. He also removes the Peacock on the headstock and adds his signature Eagle logo.





1978- Wolf 19 79 -Reconstruction- Keystone -Ibanez Musician





1979 through 1990- TIGER

August 4th 1979 at The Oakland Auditorium Tiger debuts



"Tiger" (pearl coverplate) Description: Seven years to make, ebony fingerboard on maple neck, an arched cocobola top and back, vermilion neck and body striping, and W. flamed-maple body core. Meticulous scrolled inlay finger position markers and hand-crafted brass hardware; Strat approach, but with one DiMarzio SDS-1 single coil and two DiMarzio Super 2 humbuckers that were easily removed 'cause Jerry thought their ouput weakened after a year or two. Also had Jerry's effects bypass loop (he knew his electronics!), as well as an op-amp buffer/amp to maintain the high end during effects "on". Result: Garcia's favorite guitar for the next ll years & most played. Jerry strapped this heavy 13 1/2-pound guitar for 11 years.

More Details 1988-89 Jerry started playing a Black Strat w/ Midi during space,... Here comes digital Jer

1989- Fall tour (notiably the Hampton Warlocks show) Wolf briefly came out of retirement as a guinea pig for MIDI synthesizer experiments. In the 1989 Jerry mounted a GK-7 synth interface on the Wolf. Mated to the GK-50 controller . After a Roland synthesizer was successfully attached to Wolf, San Francisco repair expert Gary Brawer later retrofitted it internally. Tiger went back to the shop for retrofitting. Garcia used the synthesizer attachment to make his guitar sound like a trumpet or other instruments. 1990- Rosebud Irwin delivered his $11,000 masterpiece, Rosebud, with MIDI controls built in. "Everything he had learned about guitars went into Rosebud

Jerry played Tiger for another year for Garcia Band Shows.



More details

1993- The Stephen Cripe guitar " Lighting Bolt "





Garcia's next guitar arrived in the mail at the Grateful Dead office in 1993. Stephen Cripe, a 39-year-old Florida woodworker who spent years building custom interiors for Caribbean yachts, decided to try his hand at making a guitar. Using a few photos and a well worn "Dead Ahead" video., he knocked off Irwin's design of Tiger with a few flourishes of his own, like carving the body out of a piece of East Indian rosewood recycled from a 19th century Asian opium bed. It had an acoustic piezo pickup built in. Built "totally by feel", the cocobola through-body neck has a recycled Brazilian rosewood fingerboard (note: Jerry's interest in the rain forest) with an unusual accuracy in the higher end allowing him to play where he usually avoided.



" Garcia was amazed when it came around," said band mate Bob Weir, "at the guesswork he had to make -- and got right -- to give that guitar Irwin's look and feel. It was astounding." Garcia gave the piece to San Francisco repairman Gary Brawer to fix the electronic guts, but it was a miracle guitar.



He pronounced the piece "the guitar I've always been waiting for" and began playing the instrument exclusively. It came to be called Lightning Bolt. Garcia met with Cripe briefly backstage at a Florida concert and commissioned a second guitar for $6,500, known as Top Hat, although Garcia almost never played it. Cripe, whose hobby was making fireworks, died in May 1996 when his work shed blew up. He used an exploding firecracker as the insignia on his guitars' headstocks.



In April of '95 Jerry ordered the backup "Top Hat". 1994- Summer Tour Jerry brings back out Rosebud but in the fall back to Lightning Bolt. 1995- Lightning Bolt was in the shop on the last tour. In his final show at Soldier Field in Chicago on July 9, 1995, Garcia started out playing Rosebud, but midway through the show, the guitar developed problems. Garcia strapped on the tour's spare guitar -- Tiger, out of mothballs for the occasion -- and finished his final concert on his old trusty ax. Others: Martin D-18 "American Beauty", "Wokingman's Dead"

ZB pedal steel 70-74

Takamine acoustics 1980 acoustic shows & benefits

Alvarez-Yairi "Garcia/Grisman" + live shows

Jerry used "Rosebud" at the last Grateful Dead show in Chicago. On Aug 4, 1995.

Jerry recorded "Blue Yodel # 9" using a mint condition 1939 Gibson Super 400N acoustic that seen in the video for the movie "Smoke". Its likely the last guitar Jerry ever graced...



Effects:

Effects used during the early '70's were limited mostly to the Vox wah-wah pedal being occasionally used.

By the late '70's, he was using the Mutron envelope filter (which was used for Estimated, Shakedown, etc.), and he continued to use it until the very end. A Mutron Octive Divider, MXR Distortion +, Phase 100 and Analog Delay.

By the late '80's, his effects consisted of mostly Boss effects: Octave Divider, Turbo Overdrive, Super Overdrive, EQ's, etc. in two effects loops. He also used some extremely expensive Lexicons a PCM-42 or PCM-60, with a PCM-70) reverb/delay units in the rack behind him; these are studio units.

By 1993, he was using these effects, but used a Groove Tube TRIO preamp as well as a Real Tube Reverb unit to go direct to the soundboard, when all of the power amps & speakers were removed from the stage. They used in-the-ear monitors instead of floor monitor wedges. Chandler Stereo Digital Echo

Korg O1R/W

Korg M1R

Emu Proteus/1

ADA MicroCab

Alesis Midiverb

Boss OD2

Turbo Overdrive Boss OD1

Overdrive 2

Boss GE7 Equalizers

Boss OC2 Octave

Mutron III

MXR Phase 100

Groove Tubes Trio

Tube Works Real Tube Reverb

some ADA rack mount FX box More guitar info: 65,66 - Guild - cherry red

6/21/67 - black 1956 Les Paul w/p-90's p/u covers removed

8/4/67 - ditto,but this guitar has a Bigsby tailpiece/tremelo bar. It could've been installed,or could be a different axe.

3/3/68 - gold-top Les Paul with single coil p/u's (aka soap-bars,aka P-90's) three Twin Reverbs w/two ext. Fender 4x12 cabinets, JBL speakers

3/1/69 - cherry Gibson SG. I associate this gtr with the "Live Dead" sound. Vox Crybaby wah-wah pedal

10/24/69 - sunburst Strat. He's pictured playing this one on several 1970 dates,but he's back on an SG on 5/6/70 and pics captioned "1970" on p.257 in the Compendium. The SG gets some studio use w/Crosby,12/70. 3/24/71 - page 310. Looks like a Les Paul neck on a handmade body. I'll take a guess that it was an early effort from the Alembic guys, because the raised pickguard appears to be made of hand-cast metal,and they were into that.

4/71 - page 313. Same guitar or a Les Paul? I can't tell.

8/71 - sunburst Les Paul

4/72 - natural finish Strat.As heard on Europe '72.

5/20/73 - same guitar,it now has an extra knob and a custom-made plate covering the electronics. ....in a GP interview he sez the plate broke (when tweaking electronics?) and they fixed it such that it looked like 03/23/75. Mesa/Boogie MkI as pre-amp > MC2300 > 3 2x12's

06/17/75. mxr distortion+, mxr phase100

09/28/75. Travis Bean MC1000 w/humbuckers

76 Travis Bean MC500 w/single-coil pickups and fx loop +Mu-Tron III +Mu-Tron Octave Divider +MXR analog delay

early '77 Travis Bean MC500 recieves Jerry's first unity-gain buffer/fx loop jack combo, placing all effects in front of Jerry's gtr vol. knob.

05/77. 1 (silverface)Twin Reverb as pre-amp > McIntosh MC2300 power amp > 3 JBL 2x12's; BF Twin as reserve backup head

09/28/77. return of "Wolf", w/added buffer/fx loop, still with 3 single-coil p/u's... Bean returns for select JGB shows through '78

mid '78 "Wolf" gets new Dimarzio pickups:(b,m)Dual Sound;(n)SDS-1

fall '79 "Tiger" Irwin custom:(b,m)Dual Sound,(n)SDS-1

Feb. to Mar. '80 JGB tour Mesa Boogie MkIIa head> MC2300> Hard Trucker JBL 3x12

'82 "Tiger" gets pickup change:(b,m)Dimarzio Super 2,(n)SDS-1... that.

More info on guitars Garcia began playing electric guitar with the Warlocks, before the band changed its name to the Grateful Dead. He used an inexpensive cherry-red Guild Starfire. He played that instrument for several years and used it on the band's early recordings. But as early as 1971, Garcia expressed dissatisfaction with factory-made guitars, even though he played models favored by other rock guitarists -- the Gibson Les Paul and the Gibson SG. Until he walked into Irwin's Sonoma studio in early 1972, he had been playing a vintage '57 Fender Stratocaster, a classic rock 'n' roll guitar given to him by Graham Nash, with an alligator decal on the body that gave the guitar its name, Alligator. Garcia bought the first guitar Irwin ever made for $850 (known as 001) and ordered another one custom-made. Irwin delivered Wolf, named after its distinctive inlay of a wolf, in May 1973 for $1,500. (Garcia gave Irwin's 001 to original Dead road crew member Ramrod. Garcia gave away a lot of guitars.) After a brief dalliance with an aluminum guitar designed by Southern California maverick Travis Bean, Garcia replaced Wolf with Tiger in 1979. The guitarmaker spent more than six years working on it, and Garcia played the heavy 14-pound guitar for 11 years. Irwin mixed exquisitely detailed, intricate brass work with dense, exotic hardwoods in his designs. He also incorporated a lot of special features Garcia himself devised, like a loop that ran the signal back through the guitar so he could control his special effects with knobs on the body of the guitar or a built-in pre-amp hidden beneath Irwin's inlays. "Jerry knew more about his guitars and equipment than anyone," said Parish. Wolf briefly came out of retirement in 1988 as a guinea pig for MIDI synthesizer experiments. After a Roland synthesizer was successfully attached to Wolf, Tiger went back to the shop for retrofitting. Garcia used the synthesizer attachment to make his guitar sound like a trumpet or other instruments. In 1989, Irwin delivered his $11,000 masterpiece, Rosebud, with MIDI controls built in. "Everything he had learned about guitars went into Rosebud, " said Parish. Garcia's next guitar arrived in the mail at the Grateful Dead office in 1993. Stephen Cripe, a 39-year-old Florida woodworker who spent years building custom interiors for Caribbean yachts, decided to try his hand at making a guitar. Using a few photos and a Dead video, he knocked off Irwin's design of Tiger with a few flourishes of his own, like carving the body out of a piece of East Indian rosewood recycled from a 19th century Asian opium bed. Garcia was floored. He gave the piece to San Francisco repairman Gary Brawer to fix the electronic guts, but it was a miracle guitar. "Garcia was amazed when it came around," said band mate Bob Weir, "at the guesswork he had to make -- and got right -- to give that guitar Irwin's look and feel. It was astounding." He pronounced the piece "the guitar I've always been waiting for" and began playing the instrument exclusively. It came to be called Lightning Bolt. Garcia met with Cripe briefly backstage at a Florida concert and commissioned a second guitar for $6,500, known as Top Hat, although Garcia almost never played it. Cripe, whose hobby was making fireworks, died in May 1996 when his work shed blew up. He used an exploding firecracker as the insignia on his guitars' headstocks. Lightning Bolt was in the shop on the last tour. In his final show at Soldier Field in Chicago on July 9, 1995, Garcia started out playing Rosebud, but midway through the show, the guitar developed problems. Garcia strapped on the tour's spare guitar -- Tiger, out of mothballs for the occasion -- and finished his final concert on his old trusty ax.