He might play around with a Gibson SG on occasion but Gary Clark Jr’s first love is the Epiphone Casino, a guitar made famous by The Beatles and Paul Weller.
“Getting my first Casino changed my life,” said Clark, and now Epiphone have made his dream come true with their new ‘Blak & Blu’ Signature guitar. First unveiled in 1961, the Epiphone Casino (model designation E230TD) was the brand’s version of parent company Gibson’s ES-330 slimline hollow body. The Gibson original was overshadowed forever more when Beatle Paul McCartney bought a ’61 Casino in 1965, using it for his guitar solos on Drive My Car and Taxman. John Lennon and George Harrison soon followed Macca’s lead and ditched their Rickenbacker and Gretsch guitars for ’65 Casinos. Anything associated with The Beatles pulls in the big numbers and a Lennon-spec 60s Casino will leave a £4,000-shaped hole in your savings. Gary Clark Jr’s Epiphone signature model delivers a lot of that cool for a lot less money.
The list price for the Blak & Blu is £649 (with Bigsby vibrato) or £619 (with trapeze tailpiece). See bit.ly/epiphone-casino for details.
