Billy Gibbons

"Here's a favorite. This is a faithful reproduction of the very first guitar that I ever layed my hands on back in Christmas day when I turned thirteen. I got a Gibson Melody Maker, and on that same day we took it over to the Axel Custom Shop where Fearless Fred put on these fine pinstripe lines down. This thing is outfitted with Seymour Duncan's Stack Humbucker, so it's a little bit different than the original but it sure does play and feel great. This is a good one," says Billy Gibbons about the Gibson Melody Maker Electric Guitar.

"This is the new Billy Bo Pros. You can’t really tell but about half of it's smaller all the way around. It'll fit in a regular Stratocaster or Telecaster case instead of the really big normal case. These are, once again, John Bolin-made with a flipflop finish and inspired artwork. This one is made to the stop-tell piece - the first one we've had like that just because of the graphics. Other than that, it's all new old start Gretch parts with a new TV Jones pickup. It's the same thing with the spare guitar: Billy Bo Pro, John Bolin made, Gretsch specs - different colors. It also has a pin strike that we don't use. It's just there to be sure it will be in tune. The era of the Bigsbys are over for us I think. We've been using Bigsbys for four or five years I think. I'm glad they're gone. They keep in tune because we use the gauge seven strings, and he doesn't change guitars all night. We have a tuner in the back so that if we did go out of tune we could tune it. We don't change guitars nightly; we change guitars a couple rounds a year. We change everything - except the fur. We'll get different things, different arrangements, different colors. Sometimes they'll be left-handed. There's always something new, so they just change them all because if we just want a new one then we need a spare and we need the encore. It's a process but we do it a couple times per year at least. When we swap them out they're all new. Billy is really consistent in what he wants. As long as the guitars are really light, we get them chambered - he's been into lately getting the neck chambered as well as the body - because he uses really light strings, 7-38s, so he's go this really light touch. He only uses the eights on the ones with open tuning - that's the heavy strings. He's up there and he's barely touching it. The settings are all heavy metal settings: bass all the way up, gain all the way up, no treble, all mids. I mean it's all muffled, but when he plays it he just barely hits the strings and that works for him. I have a hard time playing in tune because if I put the guitar on it's down to here, and it's got sevens on it so I have to bend over to hit a D chord for it just to be in tune," Billy Gibbons's guitar tech says in a different rig rundown that, says Billy Gibbons's guitar tech about the Gretsch Billy-Bo Electric Guitar.

"This one has always brought some interesting and amusing attention inspired by Bo Diddley and his famous fur guitar. He showed us all of his tricks of course. We're never too far from featuring this on our song Legs. It's got a great sound and sure is comfortable and pillow-like," says Billy Gibbons about the Gretsch Bo Diddley Signature Electric Guitar. For reference, Billy Gibbons covers his Bo Diddley guitar with white fur.

"Here it is. The faifthful reproduction of the famous Pearly Gates 1959 Sunburst. Once again, this instrument has got the feel, has got the flavor, has got the finery, and it's probably the one that is most easily associated to ZZ Top from the early days when Pearly Gates really carved up the cornestones. This is a faithful reproduction that does the job," says Billy Gibbons about the Gibson Custom Billy Gibbons "Pearly Gates" Les Paul Standard Electric Guitar.

Billy Gibbons's guitar tech says in a different rig rundown that, "There's two Les Pauls with really high action tuned to open E with heavier strings for Billy, which is a gauge of eight. This is the first Pearly Gates that Gibson prototyped. This is the first one and we use it actually as the spare because it's very heavy. The main guitar is a Pearly Gates that has been hollowed out and uses new old-stock Gibson parts, old Gibson pickups, and had the headstock redone to read 'Gibbons Lucky Mojo' instead of Gibson Les Paul. And it's extremely light, but it started life as a normal Pearly Gates model."

"The infamous fur guitars. So we have two rigs: A and B. The A rig... has the Gretsch Bo Diddley. The B rig Gibson guitar is a Gibson Explorer. This is a standard issue, and it's actually it's a John Bolin-made guitar, made to Gretsch's specs. It's your typical fur-covered guitar - everyone has one," says Billy Gibbons's guitar tech in reference to the Gibson Explorer Electric Guitar.

"The spare for the main is pretty much an identical guitar. Although this one is a Fender Esquire, it's still John Bolin made. It's Gibson scaled. The only difference is that it does not have Glendale saddles, it has six saddles and it's stringed through the body, not a top-loading bridge. It's firstly the same guitar I consider it the same guitar, and it's only used if something goes wrong with the main Tele guitar," says Billy Gibbson's guitar tech about the Fender '50s Esquire Electric Guitar.

Elwood Francis, BFG's guitar tech, starts off saying, "Okay, this is the main guitar. John Bolin. Cream T Pickup, which is a prototype that he is only doing for Billy at the moment." Billy Gibbons, starting at 0:51, adds, "Chambered body. Chambered neck. Chambered headstock. Bolin, John Bolin, out of Boise, Idaho, he is the officiated prototype builder for both Gibson and Fender. The playability of these things has proven to be a real bonus. And they've become the starters of the show. Only because we want a change of sound and a little change of pace do we have to crowbar these out of our hot little hands to go to the next one."

In this video, Billy Gibbons can be seen using the Holy Grail electric guitar from RebelRelic at La Grange Fest in 2011.

Throughout this video, Billy Gibbons of ZZ Top, Moving Sidewalks, and Revolting Cocks, is playing his Palir Guitars Classic T.

At 10.50 in this rundown video Billys tech talks about his prototype reissue '61 SG Les Paul.

Link to the Premier Guitar article for more details.

At 15.31 in this rig rundown video Billy's tech talks about his Peeler John Bolin telecaster style guitar.

The legend says that,when Billy Gibbons was opening some shows for the Jimi Hendrix Experience,Jimi said to his manager that ''This boy has some potential in it !''.So a gift for being such a talented musician Jimi gave him this 1960 Pink Fender Stratocaster...

Gibson Custom is launching a new signature guitar — the BGSG, which is short for the Billy Gibbons SG. The guitar is based on a 1961 Gibson SG, complete with a sideways vibrato arm. The body of the guitar has a unique design which sort of mimics the swell of a tail fin on a vintage Cadillac, and is covered in a golden lacquer. Only two of these beauties have been built so far.

Gibbons says the BGSG “came about following discovery in Paris of a mint example of the transition Les Paul produced in 1961. The feel of the instrument maintained power and balance and the sound was right. That ignited my resurgence in interest of the guitar’s glamorous appeal.”

The BGSG does not have a pickup selector, opting to use separate volume knobs for each pickup, and a joint tone control. “The straight-ahead assignment of one master tone control allows a personalized blend between the twin pickups,” says Gibbons before concluding “It’s another example of Gibson's ‘less-is-more’ greatness.”

He can be seen playing an erlewine custom guitar with one humbucker in this video

Billy claims to own a 50s prototype moderne but refuses to prove it. This must be a reissue in the picture

Billys engineer for eliminator said he used custom made dean guitars for the recordings for the album

"you know what is wrong with this guitar ? nothing"

https://reverb.com/item/73845-duesenberg-senior-52-09-2-made-for-billy-gibbons

"After the two effects we have about six amplifier outs. Two of the outs go to my Voodoo Modified JMP1 Marshall heads. The Voodoo mods make these amps amazing. They sound so much better than they used to. We have two of them: the main one is setup for Billy's main dirty sound and goes to the Marshall 120-120 power amps; the second Marshall JMP1 has a clean sound that goes to a direct box straight to tape for recording purposes because they record every night," says Billy Gibbons's guitar tech about the Marshall JMP-1 Tube MIDI Guitar Preamp.

"The Voodoo mods make these amps amazing. They sound so much better than they used to. We have two of them: the main one is setup for Billy's main dirty sound and goes to the Marshall 120-120 power amps," says Billy Gibbons's guitar tech about the Marshall ValveState Pro 120/120 Power Amp.

"With the other outs, I have one that goes to a Marshall Class5 - that's just for me to listen to his guitar," says Billy Gibbons's guitar tech about the Marshall Class5 Series 1x10 amp.

"The other out goes to a new prototype Magnatone 50s watt amp with an English sounding bass tone like a Plexi. It's all handwired. Actually it's the first amp," says Billy Gibbons's guitar tech about the Magnatone Super 59 Amp.

"Both the Marshall power amps and the Magnatone go to these Demeter Iso boxes which are just an enclosed single 12 with Heil microphones," says Billy Gibbons's guitar tech about the Demeter SSC-1 Silent Speaker Iso Cab.

"I monitor through this. We don't mic any on-stage cabs. Right now we're using some Magnetones 4-12s. We have 2 Demeter Iso boxes loaded with an Eminence Governor and a Man of War in the other. That's right off the power amps. One is run off the power amp, the other is run off this Mojave Scorpion. Now the Mojave Scorpion is separate; it's always on, it doesn't see the EQ, it's set completely different. It's basically there for when Billy turns down for the older songs. Where there's is as much gain is when he turns down - those JMP1s will not clean up. They're not responsive at all, they get a lower grind to them. So this amp comes in with all that. So he gets all that stringy stuff and it mixes in really well with the Marshall. It is EO 34s but it's set up more like a Hiwatt because it has the high volume and low volume for the EQ, but it does sound Marshall-like," says Billy Gibbons's guitar tech about the Mojave Scorpion 50-W Amplifier Head.

At the back of his rack we spotted a 50s Tweed Twin which he uses sometimes.

"@billyfgibbons @zztop with his #blackstar #artisan 15 #TheSoundInYourHead #TBT"

Billy Gibbons Guitar tech goes over his gear

Quote from "The History of Marshall" by Michael Doyle

"[…] Naturally there are many modern Marshalls that can come close to approximating the Bluesbreaker sound but the most surprising one is the old 5005 (Lead 12) solid-state combo so beloved by Billy F Gibbons. He recorded such guitar greats as "My Head's in Mississippi" with this amp, and I am eternally in his debt for bringing it to my attention!."