Geddy Lee

Geddy Lee is the proud owner of the Rickenbacker 331 "Light Show" Electric Guitar, as confirmed by a photo shared by Elderly Instruments on Instagram.

IE: You played the pink paisley [Telecaster Bass] on the R40 tour, didn’t you?

GL: Yes, I did. And I had the guitar version, which I loaned to Alex [Lifeson] so he would match. He’s a reluctant vintage guy. I have to provide all the best vintage instruments to him to use (laughs). Anyway, there are a few things out there that I’m still looking for.

When Joe Bonamassa was in town a few weeks ago, he came over for dinner and we had a gathering of the Toronto guitar geeks at my house and had a great time. Joe brought it to his soundcheck the next day and gave it his thumbs up! I like guitars, too, but I don’t play them. I can play guitar and I use it from time to time as a writing tool, but I’m a bass player and sometimes I feel like having these amazing guitars is a bit of a waste in my hands, and they should be with players like Joe. But I do have a mad passion for certain guitars. I always said Alex, my partner in crime for all these years, sounds best with a 335 or a Les Paul in his hands. His white 355 is such a killer, great-sounding instrument!

geddy can be seen with this guitar alongside several basses in this photo.

I have a 1963 Strat that required an unbelievable amount of detective work and is an example of something like that. It has a matching headstock, which is very rare, and the factory numbers and etchings under the pickguard are all there, but it turned out not to be so straightforward and the guitar is a whole story unto itself. That is really fun to discern for me, and the seriousness of that all comes down to what the sale price is at the end and if you’re buying something that someone is trying to deceive you into thinking is all original when in reality it’s original-ish. That said, another thing I avoided in the book is talking about the cost or value of these things. I really try to seperate that side from the simple celebration of these instruments.

Geddy Lee used this guitar durning Rushs 2005 R30 world tour on the song Resist.