It’s said that a guitarist’s tone is his fingerprint — the ultimate signpost of his identity. Moore’s tone was, at its foundation, a derivation of his British blues influences: Peter Green and Bluesbreakers-and-Cream-era Eric Clapton. But the most distinctive part of Moore’s character as a player was in his head and his hands. Moore’s picking speed and attack were ferocious, and his vibrato was equal to that of Green and Clapton — among the world’s finest.
Nonetheless, in purely mechanical terms, it’s possible to get close to Moore’s immense tone. The ideal tools are a Gibson Les Paul Standard and a Marshall amp or its high-gain equivalent. Like Green and Clapton, Moore made his mark initially with a classic Sunburst. In fact, his primary guitar was the classic Sunburst: the so-called Holy Grail Les Paul that belonged to Green during the latter’s heyday with the original Fleetwood Mac and John Mayall’s Bluesbreakers.
Moore first saw Green in the Bluesbreakers when he was 14 and heard his calling in the distinctive throaty voice of Green’s 1959 ’Burst, a guitar with a singular and magical tone. There’s been a lot of speculation over the years on just how Green’s instrument achieved it’s super-warm trebly sound. Green says he reversed a magnet in the neck position humbucker while tinkering with the guitar. Another tale has a repairman accidentally re-winding the pickup in reverse.
Moore acquired the guitar in 1969, after Green became his mentor. That year “Greenie” quit Fleetwood Mac and began his long estrangement from the music business. Moore used the guitar throughout his musical evolution, which veered into hard rock with his first solo disc in 1973, then on to artier but no less heavy turf with bassist/singer Phil Lynott in Thin Lizzy, and to the fusion based Coliseum II. The guitar makes several prominent and extended appearances on Moore’s last DVD and CD releases, 2007’s Live At Montreux DVD — The Definitive Montreux Collection and 2009’s five-CD Essential Montreux.
After 37 years in Moore’s hands the guitar was auctioned in 2006 beginning with an asking price of $2-million and made its post-auction debut on display at the Dallas Guitar Show in 2007.
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