Aaron Lewis

"It’s not one of the 9/11 special ones, but I do believe they did those runs all around the same time. They did the special 9/11 that had the all-blue back and neck and the back of the headstock was blue, as well. That was a very limited run. I think they only made 11 of them. But I think they made a regular run, as well, right around that time frame." - Aaron Lewis.

At 3:54, you can see a Genz Benz El Diablo head set up behind Aaron on top of a Marshall 4x12.

"One of the oldest Gibson acoustics that I have and it’s probably in the best condition out of all of them. I don’t know, but if it did get played, it was played by someone with baby hands. Well, you know what, it did get played because the fretboard is worn out from fingernails, but the guitar looks almost brand-new. It’s amazing and sounds unbelievable. Obviously, somebody took good care of it and it got played, it got the dirt played right off of it, because the fretboard itself underneath those cowboy chord positions is totally scalloped and worn out." Taken from a discussion with Aaron Lewis in a Gibson article.

"Found that guitar in Aspen, of all places. I went there to do a charity event and we were walking around one afternoon and I saw that there was a vintage store there and I walked in and that sucker was just screaming at me. " Taken from a discussion with Aaron Lewis in a Gibson article.

"I picked that up in the same batch as the ES-334, from the same gentleman, and you plug that into a Marshall and it’s Angus Young. My guitar tech, when I’m out with Staind, likes to name the guitars so it makes it easier for him to know which one he is grabbing. With there being little light on stage, they all have these little labels on the side of the headstock with the name on them, and the name of this guitar is Angus. You plug it in and it sounds like Angus Young."Taken from a discussion with Aaron Lewis in a Gibson article.

"That was the first big-dollar purchase that I made, the first truly collectable guitar that I purchased. I got that straight from Gruhn Guitars in Nashville, and I got lucky on that one. It hadn’t even hit the showroom floor yet. It had just come in. It is the quintessential, wrap-around tail piece, early ’50s Gold Top sound." Quoted from a discussion with Aaron Lewis in a Gibson article.

"That Les Paul acoustic I have been playing on stage since I’ve owed it. It came very gaudy, very cherry sunburst, so I stripped it and made it a natural finish. Every band that we go out on tour with, every single guitar player, asks me what it is, where I got it. They have never seen it before. Gibson made it for one year. " - Aaron Lewis. Source.

In this interview, Aaron Lewis says, "That has been a favorite guitar of mine since the day I picked it up. I got it from my friend Nate, a.k.a. “Willy” of Willy’s American Vintage in St. Paul, Minnesota. But it was Willy’s guitar and wasn’t even for sale. I was in there looking at all the guitars on the wall and I looked over and sitting on the floor near the counter was this old Lifton case. And I was like, “What’s in there?” And he was like, “Oh, that guitar. Well, that’s my guitar.” I said, "Can I check it out?” And he was like, “Sure, go ahead, check it out.” So I took it out and I started playing it and I talked him into selling it to me. You know, I have to say he’s a good businessman because it wasn’t all that difficult to talk him out of it. I have since gone back in with the prototype of the 1951, the one that we did, the run that we did, and 15 minutes into him playing it and getting reacquainted with an old friend and everything else, I told him that it wasn’t his and he didn’t believe me. That’s how spot-on these guitars are to the original. "

Aaron Lewis played Yairi acoustic guitars in the early 2000's, particularly on "Break the Cycle", he was featured in this ad for Alvarez/Yairi guitars

"I got that at the Hollywood Guitar Center, as well, and somebody had played the finish off of half of the guitar with the back of their fingernails to the extent where the finish is so far gone and the wood is so wore away, that it’s like corduroy. That just happens to be that guitar’s name, just like the other guitar that I was saying had a name, too." Quoted from a discussion with Aaron Lewis in a Gibson article.

"There are two of those, as well. One is blond and one is tobacco sunburst, and just amazing-sounding 12-strings. The thing about 12-strings is that a lot of times they are really bright, because of all the extra unwound strings and that big body of that J-200 really adds all the meat back. So you get this very meaty, yet crystal clear… and all the high end that you could possible want with all the meat." Taken from a discussion with Aaron Lewis in a Gibson article.

"Yeah, I noticed that when we saw the laundry list. I noticed that one right away...And then, the next one I would run in after would be my 1957 Gold Top, that was Jimmy Ripp’s guitar before I bought it, and he used it live on pretty much all of the Mick Jagger solo touring. The guitar has been on, like, 45 different records over the years, recording-wise. I think the last record it was on before I acquired it was the last Jerry Lee Lewis record. I have had a lot of people play that guitar through clean amps, through dirty amps, and everything in between, and the response from just about everyone is that is the best-sounding Les Paul they have ever heard. It’s just a beast when you put it through distortion and, man, if you plug it into an old Vox AC30 or an old Fender, the clean tone that you get out of it is ridiculous." As mentioned in this Gibson interview.

"My very first Gibson actually isn’t even in the pictures; it wasn’t worthy of having a picture taken of it. It’s a 1957 LG-0, which would have been the student guitar back in that time frame, and it’s not a great guitar. It wasn’t really made to be a great guitar. It was kind of one of those guitars that were made for kids to figure out if they wanted to play or not and learn how to play on it and then get a good guitar. " Taken from a discussion with Aaron Lewis in a Gibson article.

In this photo, Aaron Lewis is seen holding Gibson J-200 acoustic guitar.

In this interview with Gibson, Aaron Lewis says, "And then, the next one I would run in after would be my 1957 Gold Top, that was Jimmy Ripp’s guitar before I bought it, and he used it live on pretty much all of the Mick Jagger solo touring. The guitar has been on, like, 45 different records over the years, recording-wise. I think the last record it was on before I acquired it was the last Jerry Lee Lewis record. I have had a lot of people play that guitar through clean amps, through dirty amps, and everything in between, and the response from just about everyone is that is the best-sounding Les Paul they have ever heard. It’s just a beast when you put it through distortion and, man, if you plug it into an old Vox AC30 or an old Fender, the clean tone that you get out of it is ridiculous."

As mentioned in this interview for Gibson...

"Which of these Gibsons we’re going to talk about is your most prized? Or to put it another way: if there’s a fire, which one do you run in and grab?

Man, I’d be full-handed. I would probably get stuck in the fire and burn trying to get too many of them out at once. But I would have to say that, out of the Gibsons, the first one that I would run in and grab would be my 1958 ES-335 that they only made 10 of."

"Well, they made ten of those guitars from, I think, late September, early October until the end of December. This one is even more special than there only being 10 of them in the fact that it’s wired mono. It’s wired that way straight from the factory and there’s not a crack in the guitar – there is not a shoulder joint cut, the covers have never been off the pickups, and it honestly gives any Les Paul I have a run for its money as far as heaviness goes. And then you get that beautiful hollow body tone when you play it through a real clean set-up. That thing is extremely special."

"It was Alpine White and it is now a very creamy banana color. I just really like those guitars. There is something about those 20th Anniversaries. If I’m not mistaken, that was what Randy Rhoads played, as well. They are just good, heavy… they’re like a boat anchor around your neck. They’re both 12 pounds and maybe a little more than that, and I think the black one is even a little bit heavier than the white one. " Taken from a discussion with Aaron Lewis in a Gibson article

Along with this photo, Lewis said about this guitar "I drove, like, four hours in New Hampshire to get that guitar and I plugged it in and strummed one chord on it, unplugged it, put it back in the case, and walked out of the store with it. There’s something about those old Gary Rossington reissues that — I don’t know if they wired things differently, I don’t know what’s different — but man, that is one fabulous sounding batch of guitars." - Source.

Talking about his guitars, Aaron Lewis says, of his 1956 Gibson J-45, "I picked that up from Lloyd Chiate, who was the guitar player for Eddie Money back in the day. And he had — for many, many years, and has since closed — he had a store on Sunset [Boulevard] called Voltage Vintage, and I picked that guitar up from him. In hindsight, on that same day when I was looking at that guitar, he brought me upstairs and showed me another guitar that should have been the guitar I walked out of the store with, because it was Tom Petty’s Hummingbird. You know, there are stages of collecting and when you first start out as a collector, you go through these stages until you finally get to the point where now you’re only purchasing guitars that have a collectable value to them. Where back then, I was more thinking about the fact that, and we hadn’t gotten deep enough into our career at that point, it was the difference between the four or five grand that the guitar was instead of the seven or eight grand that this guitar was. Like I said, in hindsight, I made the wrong decision," in this interview.

"It’s prototype #1 and #2, because they only made two of them. They are basically a Hummingbird, but with Rosewood back and sides and the tree of life is super ornate, all Mother of Pearl and Abalone all the way down the fretboard. They are absolutely beautiful guitars." - Aaron Lewis.

Fishman states on their website that Staind's Aaron Lewis is one of the artists using this pick up system.

In this photo, Aaron lewis is seen holding a Shure SM58 mic

"That was one of the first guitars I picked up. I picked that up from my friends at the Chicago Music Exchange and it was at that point — because you go through phases and stages — and it was kind of at that point where I was comfortable starting to spend a little bit more money on the guitars I was picking up. The price was right for what it was and my boy took good care of me, so I picked that one up. It’s a great sounding guitar, too." Aaron Lewis states in a Gibson article.

"That was one of those that I picked up kind of early in that stage (when) I spent a little more money on (guitars). And that, again, was a ’68 Gold Top that got routed out for humbuckers and I threw ’59 PAFs in it, and it is a beast." - Aaron Lewis in this article from Gibson.

"Ah, the correct reissue. This was the one that the first 150 were Murphy-aged and it is #179. It was not Murphy-aged, but having it out on the road for as much as I have, you might think that it was." - Aaron Lewis.

In this interview, while talking about the various guitars in his collection, Aaron says, "It’s a good Firebird. Those ’76 limited editions were good Firebirds. The Explorers that came out in ’76 with the black wax pickups on the back are quite good, too, and one of the few I haven't picked up yet. "

In this photo, Aaron Lewis can be seen using a Shure U2 SM58.

In a live performance of Staind's "Layne" on The Tonight Show with Jay Leno in 2003, Aaron Lewis is seen playing an Ibanez SZ320 BK guitar, as documented in a video by RyanNinja on YouTube.