A 1982 Roland G-505 | Christie's

A 1982 Roland G-505

Details

A 1982 Roland G-505
Serial No. K824044, in candy apple red metallic finish, body with double cutaways, maple neck with skunk-stripe routing, twenty-one fret fingerboard with dot inlays, three pickups, additional MIDI pickup, six rotary controls, two switches, tremolo bridge/tailblock and white pickguard; and a black contour hardshell case with black plush lining and Lee Dickson's handwritten adhesive paper label Roland Synth GTR C.Apple /?K 824044; and a GR-700 guitar synthesizer floor unit, Serial No. 400401, in a metallic grey finish, with eleven foot switches, memory, string select and dynamics controls and LEO display and multiple inputs/outputs and an additional PG 200 unit with multiple controls, both in a flight case; and a GR-300 polyphonic guitar synthesizer floor unit, Serial No. 314451, in a blue finish, five foot switches, eight rotary controls, ten switches, six jack inputs and guitar input, in original packaging

Eric Clapton said that he used this guitar synth. during the Edge of Darkness period ie. circa 1985.
Roland G-505/Candy Apple Red

Literature

FORTE, Dan The Interview - Eric Clapton, in Guitar Player, GPI Collectors Edition, Summer, 1986, p.22

Lot Essay

In an interview with Dan Forte in 1985, Clapton refers to this model as a source of inspiration:
Dan Forte:"If you come across a creative block, and you've had Blackie in your hands for a week, can you pick up another guitar and come up with a new idea?"
Eric Clapton:"Yes, it will happen like that. Usually, it happens with an acoustic guitar or a gut-string or, as was the case with the album [Behind The Sun] the Roland GR-700 [guitar synthesizer]. I got the pedalboard with the memory bank...I got one [guitar] with the old Strat shape, and the electronics are more or less identical. And that inspired me, just picking it up and playing a chord...."

The stage-shot illustrated shows Eric Clapton playing this Roland during the Behind The Sun Tour, at Erwin Events Center, Austin, Texas, April 11, 1985.

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