Duane Allman

This is the guitar that Duane is perhaps best known for. He got it from ZZ-Top’s Billy Gibbons in June 1971, and recorded with it on “Eat a Peach” and The Allman Brothers at Fillmore East albums. After Duane’s death, this guitar remained with his brother Greg, who eventually traded it with Twiggs Lyndon, who kept it untill his death. It is now back in the possession of Duane’s family.

This was Duane’s main guitar during the first year of the Allman Brothers Band, and he also used it on the recording sessions of “Layla and Other Assorted Love Songs” with Eric Clapton. He eventually traded it for the 1959 Les Paul, but kept both PAF pickups from this one. After Duane’s death, the guitar changed a couple of hands before ending up with Scot LaMar who often borrows it to Warren Haynes, Derek Trucks, Vince Gill and others for live performances.

Duane traded this guitar with Stone Balloon’s guitarist Rick Stine for his Goldtop Les Paul, a Marshall head and $200 on top of that. Duane’s only condition was that he keeps the original PAF pickups from the Goldtop Les Paul.

This instrument was used mainly for the acoustic slide playing.

This was recalled as his favorite acoustic guitar.

Duane used this guitar during his time as a session guitarist at the Muscle Shoals Sound Studio. This guitar can now be seen at the Hard Rock Cafe in London.

Duane acquired this Telecaster while playing with the Allman Joys around 1965/66, and it remained his main guitar with the Hourglass in 1967/68. It had a late-sixties V-shaped Stratocaster neck installed, and originally a black pickguard, which was replaced with a white one at some point. Another custom thing on this guitar was a Vox fuzz-box which was installed on the guitar itself, just bellow the volume/tone controls.

This was Duane’s first electric guitar. Duane got it in 1960, after his brother Gregg saved enough money to buy his first guitar, a Teisco Silvertone. At the time Duane was thinking about other stuff, and he decided to spend his money on a Harley 165 motorbike. Gradually, Duane began to take an interest in the guitar, leading to fights over his brother’s Silvertone, so eventually their mother had to settle the things down by buying Duane a double cutaway 1959 Gibson Les Paul Jr. Duane later gave this guitar to Delaney Bramlett, and it is currently owned by a collector/musician in Japan.

Duane used this guitar with used with Hourglass, and on the Allman Brothers’ first album released in 1969.

Also used during the Muscle Shoals Sound Studio sessions with Aretha Franklin and Wilson Pickett, and during the very early days of the Allman Brothers Band. This guitar has a rosewood neck, black pickguard, and matching pickup covers and volume/tone control knobs.

Duane gave it to Delaney Bramlett in 1970. He would often show up with the guitar, which Delaney loved to play, when he would jam with Delaney and Bonnie. It was part of the band’s arsenal, sometimes played by Dickey Betts, as late as February 1970. Delaney played this guitar at Duane’s Funeral on Nov. 1, 1971. According the the current owner, who very kind to provide us with these details, the guitar now has a white pickguard and pickup covers.

For playing slide, Duane usually used the 1961 Gibson SG cherry red which he got from Dickey Betts, who played it in the early days of the Allman Brothers.

If its to trust a couple of sources (one of them is this video featuring Duane’s 335: “Simon Campbell playing Duane Allmans ES-335“), Duane also owned a red ES-335 with Bigsby tremolo system.

Seen on couple of pictures. Duane traded this guitar with Gregg Allman for his Telecaster, so he owned it for quite some time. We couldn’t find out if he ever recorded with it.

Mentioned in this September 15, 2008 post on the official Allman Brothers Band website forum.

Here is an excerpt from the first draft of Johnny's book:

"(...) Duane had borrowed a '59 gold top Les Paul from Tommy Compton, who still lives in Decatur, and he didn't want to give it back to Tommy. And Tommy definitely wanted it back. Eventually it worked around to Gregg trading the Wurlitzer for the guitar. The guitar was worth more than the piano but Tommy had a use for it and was trying to keep Duane from getting busted because Tommy's dad was ready to go after Duane to get the guitar back. So, the piano was sent back to Decatur and Duane kept the guitar. Of course that guitar would be worth a fortune now, certainly more than the piano is worth. Tommy eventually sold the piano to a guy who sold it to Eddie Hinton. After Eddie died in '95, his mother sent the piano back to the guy who'd sold it to Eddie and I bought it back from him a year or so later to use in my studio."

Used in the early days, prior to ABB, paired with his Fenders. The amp had JBL speakers.

Used during the recording sessions with Eric Clapton on “Layla”.

After switching to Gibson, Duane also made a transition from Fender amps to Marshalls. He usually played through Marshall Bass 50 head and two Marshall 4×12 cabinets with JBL-D120 speakers. Later he used Cerwin Vega ER123 along with Celestions (2+2)

After switching to Gibson, Duane also made a transition from Fender amps to Marshalls. He usually played through Marshall Bass 50 head and two Marshall 4×12 cabinets with JBL-D120 speakers.

Mentioned in this September 15, 2008 post on the official Allman Brothers Band website forum.

Here is an excerpt from the first draft of Johnny's book:

"Duane was playing a Telly with a Strat neck and he and Gregg both had super Beetle Vox amps. I had an early '60s Fender Bassman amp Duane really liked so we took it out to California with us. As loud as we were playing at that time, the speakers in the amp were going and not quite loud enough so we put JBLs in it. I kept that amp until my friend, Butch Owens, borrowed it and it was stolen. He later replaced it with something as good as or maybe even better than what I had. It's a good amp and I still have it. I think it was one he got from Joe Walk. Paul played an A-100 with a leslie cut down to be portable. It wasn't a B-2 but it was close to it and we had a Wurlitzer piano that Gregg played. When Pete joined the band he played a Jazz bass with a custom amp. The amp belonged to a guy who lived in Decatur. We had a Fender 12-string Gregg would use sometimes and maybe an acoustic/electric guitar. Gregg didn't play guitar very often but he wrote a lot of songs on one. He became friends with Jackson Browne when we were out there and Gregg learned a lot from him. I think they learned from each other. Gregg went through a folk phase with his writing but his style changed with different instruments. I've still got the Wurlitzer from the band and it has a story that came with it. Several of us went to a music store in L.A. and picked out this particular Wurlitzer for Paul to play since he was playing most of the Wurlitzer parts then. Actually, Gregg and Paul set up close together so they could swap between the Wurlitzer and B-3 when they needed to but Paul was primarily on the Wurlitzer. The salesman showed us how to hook it up to an amp which was essential because you couldn't play it off the little speaker that came in it. Once we figured it out, it sounded great. The Wurlitzer is still my favorite keyboard. Duane had borrowed a '59 gold top Les Paul from Tommy Compton, who still lives in Decatur, and he didn't want to give it back to Tommy. And Tommy definitely wanted it back. Eventually it worked around to Gregg trading the Wurlitzer for the guitar. The guitar was worth more than the piano but Tommy had a use for it and was trying to keep Duane from getting busted because Tommy's dad was ready to go after Duane to get the guitar back. So, the piano was sent back to Decatur and Duane kept the guitar. Of course that guitar would be worth a fortune now, certainly more than the piano is worth. Tommy eventually sold the piano to a guy who sold it to Eddie Hinton. After Eddie died in '95, his mother sent the piano back to the guy who'd sold it to Eddie and I bought it back from him a year or so later to use in my studio."

Duane preferred playing straight through the amp, but he did use two different fuzz effects. First one was a custom built fuzz box which was attached to his Telecaster (see above), and the second one was Dallas Arbiter Fuzz Face, which he playing during early session work, and used old 9V batteries in it because he argued that they make a special sound.

These Fender Rock N’ Roll 150 strings were used by Duane Allman.

Duane used them for slide playing like many other guitar players do.