Opeth singer/guitarist Mikael Åkerfeldt once got to play a guitar owned by late Nirvana leader Kurt Cobain – and wasn’t at all taken with it.
Talking to Revolver, the frontman says that, along with fellow Opeth guitarist Fredrik Åkesson, he recently visited the Martin Guitars factory in Nazareth, Pennsylvania.
A connoisseur of all things six-stringed, he likens the experience to “visiting the Holy Land”, and got to see instruments once owned by Hank Williams, Johnny Cash, and Cobain.
Åkerfeldt even got to play one of Cobain’s old guitars, an unspecified Martin model, but admits it didn’t feel as special as many would assume.
“It was very beat up,” he says. “It didn’t feel that good. There was nothing special about it, other than it had belonged to Kurt. Someone told us that guitar was haunted, like people who had that guitar had accidents.
“I’m a Nirvana fan, but it was just a regular guitar to me.”
Luckily, not all of Åkerfeldt’s brushes with musical royalty have been lacklustre. In the same Revolver interview, he looks back on meeting fellow Swede and Abba icon Agnetha Fältskog while making the 2011 Opeth album Heritage.
“We did the Heritage record in the studio where Abba used to record, and the owners had their flat on top of the studio,” he remembers. “They invited us for dinner when the record was done, and Agnetha was there.
“We all got to sit down with her and have dinner, and she brought this expensive champagne.”
A devout Abba fan, Åkerfeldt admits he was starstruck during the interaction. “I’m a huge fan, so I got to ask her all these questions about their songs. She was super cool.
“But when she first came up as I was entering the flat, I froze […] After shaking her hand, I went out and had like five cigarettes in a row just to calm myself down. I get starstruck easily, I think.”
Opeth released their latest album, The Last Will And Testament, in November and are currently touring Europe. See dates and details via the band’s website.
