Elliot Easton

No photo exists of Elliot actually playing the Lead II but he does own one. I happened to capture one of his guitars (the one used on Shake It Up for the title track and the song "Cruiser") before the Hard Rock Cafe took the images of those guitars offline (they had at least 3 of Elliot's leads - one red Fender Lead 1 1/2 that looks like a survivor of a house fire, the red Lead II I posted the link to below, and a white Fender Lead I that was used to record the solo to "Touch and Go" on Panorama).

Here's the picture of EE's straight off of Pinterest - I saved it from the Hard Rock Website when it was still there https://s-media-cache-ak0.pinimg.com/736x/5e/13/19/5e13198f3fe0d9b01861b547cffb8bc3--the-shakes-shake-it.jpg

The Daily Event's Book Blog also lists out the Lead II's use on "Shake It Up" in a interview taken from Musician Magazine in 1982 done during the release of that album http://dailyeventsbookpagethree.blogspot.com/2007/04/cars-musician-magazine-shake-it-up-1982.html

Let's start with Easton's short-form guitar list. The Fender guitars he used on the album were mostly the Telecaster and the Lead II. "I didn't play the Stratocaster on the whole album, except for 'Cruiser,' that crazy thing where it ends slamming the door."

Despite his appreciation for the Telecaster, Easton’s eyes (and ears) soon wandered to Les Pauls. “I was a Mike Bloomfield freak, and that Les Paul tone on the Super Session album was just the greatest thing I ever heard,” he says. “My high school band won a countywide battle of the bands, and our prize was a $500 gift certificate to Sam Ash. There were five guys in the group, so we each got $100 to spend. For whatever reason, there were several left-handed Gibsons in the store at the time, and I settled on a Les Paul Deluxe. I sold my Telecaster for $150, so that was $250 with the winnings, and my mom made up the rest. That Les Paul cost $297 with the case out the door, and I regretted buying it almost immediately because you couldn’t do all the pedal-steel bends and stuff you could do on a Telecaster. I wanted a Fender again, but because I could only afford to have one guitar at a time, I just went back and forth like that for years.”

By the time the newly signed Cars traveled to England to record their 1978 self-titled debut album with producer Roy Thomas Baker, they were generating enough cash from their Boston area gigs for Easton to have assembled a three-guitar arsenal: a Martin D-35 acoustic, a 1977 Les Paul Standard that he had refinished in red, and a new Fender Telecaster fitted with a Bartolini Hi-A mini-humbucker in the neck position. Armed with those, a Morley Echo Volume pedal and Roland Chorus Ensemble, the guitarist cut all of his tracks, including the impeccably composed and executed solos to “Just What I Needed” and “My Best Friend’s Girl” in less than two days. “That record took 12 days to make in total,” Easton says. “It was our club set and we knew what we were going to do, so we just went in there and regurgitated our parts onto tape.”

In a photo provided by Vintage Guitar, Elliot Easton is seen with a Gibson Les Paul Custom Electric Guitar.

Can be seen with a candy red and with a white one in this video.

In this video, Elliot Easton discusses his Gibson SG Inspired By Elliot Easton guitar, highlighting its features and his personal connection to the instrument.

" I have this pedal from Australia that I’m really crazy about called the MI Audio Crunch Box"

Elliot Easton used a new reissue of the 1958 Gibson Flying V at the US Festival in 1982 in this performance of "Good Times Roll".

Seen playing live with it in this picture.

Elliot uses the Line 6 Spider IV 75 75W 1x12 Guitar Combo Amp for a number of his guitar solos, including Best Friend's Girl, Just What I Needed, Touch and Go, and Keep on Knocking.

"#TBT 1984 Heartbeat City Tour. Pink paisley Telecaster. Blue taffeta Antony Price suit. #ElliotEaston #TheCars Wahoo!"

Sometime around 1980, The Cars appeared to get into Fender in a big way. Elliot Easton started playing new Fender Lead models (which some sources say he had a hand in - like the Lead fansite), Elliot used a few Stratocasters on the Panorama tour, Ric used a Jazzmaster and a Jaguar - and then there's this 1965' Fender Jazzmaster owned by Elliot Easton. This photo is from the Panorama tour. Here's another shot along side Ric Ocasek playing the pink 74' Jazzmaster he used a lot - https://s-media-cache-ak0.pinimg.com/736x/4e/50/43/4e5043a3981d91a1a4fa9118f12eccd3.jpg

Another shot of it post-Elliot's ownership is here from a Fender Calendar - http://gretschpages.com/media/img/fretboard/2015/8/FenderJazzmaster-1.jpg.540x540_q85_autocrop.jpg

Elliot Easton even mentions it on the Gretsch forum himself - http://gretschpages.com/forum/other-guitars/a-jazzmaster-without-a-vibrato/51410/page3/

Elliot Easton 1 year ago

This one used to be mine. Again, note the righty tailpiece. When I got it, in 1980, it had a cracked body and nails holding in the pickups. Paid next to nothing for it!

Elliot also had another mid 60's Jazzmaster for sale for awhile. A sunburst model. Something I read a lot - especially on offsetguitars.com - is that Elliot has owned a crazy lot of Left Handed and/or High Quality and/or vintage guitars.

In 1978, Elliot Easton briefly played a B.C. Rich Mockingbird, as evidenced by his appearance in an advertisement for the guitar.

Easton spoke with Vintage Guitar about the reissues and recounted the gear he used to help create the band’s first music. His setup for The Cars was simple – a Les Paul Standard, Telecaster, and a D-35. He plugged the Les Paul and Tele into a Fender Twin and one of three Ampegs – a VT-22, V2, and V4 – and recalls how at the time there was a limited aftermarket for hardware and pickups.

Used in the recording of the album "Move Like This" as explained by the guitarist.

Used in the recording of the album "Move Like This" as explained by the guitarist.

"I also brought a reissue Princeton Reverb, a reissue Deluxe Reverb, and my Peavey Penta—that’s a wild amp."

"And there was a Martin HD-28V."

"I’ve been playing through a Marshall JCM 800 half-stack, plugged into the low-sensitivity input and with the tone set up to be big, fat, clean and twangy"

In 1980, Elliot Easton of The Cars started using Fender Lead series guitars, including the Lead I, Lead II, and a custom hybrid of his own custom built for him by Fender called the Fender Lead 1 1/2.

The Fender Lead 1 1/2 is a creation of Elliot's that mates the bridge humbucker of the Fender Lead I with the angled neck pickup of the Fender Lead II. It was NEVER a production instrument, just a custom job made for Elliot. The picture for the product provided is one of Elliot Easton's actual guitars owned by the Hard Rock Cafe currently.

Elliot had at least 2 if not 3 Fender Lead 1 1/2's that he has been seen with..

#1 - This one - which is a 1979 model in red with matching headstock that looks like it suffered some kind of fire or water damage.

#2 - a better known example in Olympic white with a white pickguard and black pickups that Elliot was seen using for most of the Panorama tour in 1980.

#3 - There was another white one, a cream white one from circa 1980-1982 with a Kahler Whammy bridge. It is unknown if this may have been the above Panorama guitar modified further by Fender in the early 80's, but it was said it was used on "HEartbeat City" for the guitar solo on "Magic". It was sold by Route 66' guitars in the late 1990's.

in the main website of pure salem you can see elliot using a classic creep

"Built For Elliot Easton 2005 All Korina Body & Neck, Jason Lollar Pickups, Ebony Fingerboard Gold Hardware, Tone Pros Bridge." -Ed Roman

Used in the recording of the album "Move Like This" as explained by the guitarist.

"Alfonso sought me out a long time ago to try out the Zendrive—a great pedal—and we stayed friends."

In an interview with Premier Guitar, Elliot Easton mentions using D'Addario NYXL 1059 strings, as highlighted in the gearbox section.

In a user-uploaded photo on Photobucket, Elliot Easton is pictured with a Dean ML BFH Electric Guitar, indicating his use of this instrument.

Elliot Easton is seen with his signature Gibson Elliot Easton "Tikibird" Firebird guitar, a unique variation of the Gibson Firebird, in a user-uploaded photo.

In the mid 1980's Kramer was the hottest guitar brand on the planet at the time, and they had a huge roster of celebrity endorsers.....some well known like Ritchie Sambora, George Lynch, Eddie Van-Halen......but they also had a lot of other guys outside the realm of "big rock/hair rock" guitar like Paul Dean (Loverboy), Paul Reynolds (A Flock of Seagulls), and obviously Elliot Easton of The Cars.

However, Elliot Easton, or so it seems, never actually used the Kramer built version. The prototype for the Kramer EE-Pro 1 and EE Pro-2, he used a ghost-built prototype version made by esteemed luthier Tom Anderson. The guitar above is one of Elliot's actual guitars he likely used with The Cars which was originally posted to "Route 66'" guitars website in the late 1990's.

"Interview Excerpt from Elliot Easton

Elliot had this to say about the signature line in this interview.

From Vintage Guitar Magazine By Willie G. Moseley

At one time, you had a Kramer signature model guitar.

That was something that I designed with Tom Anderson, who's a fine builder. The guy who was running Kramer at the time, Dennis Berardi, loved to hang around rock bands; I don't know any other way to put it. He was a nice guy, and he offered me the opportunity to design my own signature instrument. I took it as a challenge to come up with something for Kramer that had more of a traditional vibe. At the time, they didn't offer a guitar that didn't have a Floyd Rose. So I designed a guitar with a Tele-style bridge. It was available in two models: The Tele bridge and Seymour Duncan Quarter-Pounder system with a five-way switch for a lot of sounds, or with a humbucking-single-single pickup setup with a Floyd Rose. I thought such a guitar might have some appeal to country players and roots rockers who might go for the Tele configuration.

Looks-wise, I was inspired at the time by that orange Jackson guitar Jeff Beck was playing around the time of his Flash album. I wanted something that looked like it could have existed, but didn't. The pickguard on the Kramer is an example; Fender could have done that with their Tele, but didn't.

Mick Jagger played one of the Tom Anderson-built prototypes in the Mixed Emotions video. Tom built fabulous guitars, and I can't honestly say that the production guitars had the "magic" of the Anderson-built ones. That's not to put Kramer down, but you're talking about two completely different setups; one is an artist in a small shop, building one guitar at a time, the other is a huge factory, which by its very definition has to turn out a lot of instruments. In effect, Fender has gotten around the same potential problem by offering the Custom Shop; they don't ask you to expect the same thing out of a Mexican-built Strat as one that Jay Black builds for you (chuckles).:"

From the video "Cars, Guitars, and Elliot Easton" - here's a strange and unique prototype guitar that Elliot started working on with Dean in the early 1980's. This is about the only time this guitar is seen or mentioned as far as I know.

He has it in this picture. Also it's his signature model.

Used in the recording of the album "Move Like This" as explained by the guitarist.