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Nirvana Equipment Information

All of this information came from Chris Lawrence.


GUITARS:

1. '65 Jaguar. Tobacco Sunburst color with a black pickguard and 2 humbucking pickups. This guitar had 2 volumes and one tone.
2. Ferrington Mustang that was designed by Daniel Ferrington for his book. It was baby blue with a tortoise shell pickguard, one humbucking pickup and one single-coil angled in the middle and another one(single coil)strait in the neck position. The pickups were Bartolini pickups. Also had heart-shaped fret inlays.
3. Japanese Statocaster. Kurt had a whole lot of these. These are just a few:-

A. Black Strat Special. Had 2 white single-coils and one black humbucker. It had a black pickguard and a white and black bumber sticker on it.
B. Whute Stratocaster with big black Humbucking pickups and a K Records sticker on it. Visible on the inside cover of Wishkah.
C. White Japanese Strats. Kurt had two of them. Used one on MTV 1992 Music Awards.
D. Black Strat with white pickguard and a black humbucker. Chrome hardware and tune-o-matic bridge. Kurt smashed this durning Endless, Nameless
E. Sunburst Strat. Used at Reading 1992.
F. Candy Apple Red Strat. A Japanese '57 Reissue that had a white pickguard.
** Kurt received about 5 Mexican Stratocasters to smash for the In Utero Tour. **


4. Univox Mosrite Copy. Called "Hi-Flyers"
5. White Univox not a custom. Maple fingerboard. Used in Heart-Shaped Box video. Kurt had another one that was the same except the string trees were different.
6. Sunburst Univox Custom that was used on SNL in 1993. It had a nailed logo to it that said "Univox Custom" The bridge was a Ibanez Badass bridge. It was bought for $150. This was Kurt's favorite Univox.
7. Univox Hi-Flyer with a mahogany neck and stock single-coils. This was used at Sao Paulo show. Later the Univox got a Humbucker in the bridge position.
8. Natural Univox Hi-Flyer. Kurt had two of these in the Fall of '93. It had stock humbuckers, a Badass bridge, and a maple neck and fingerboard.
9. Black Univox Les Paul Custom copy that was given to Kurt during the Europe tour in 1991. It had a bolt on neck, stock hardware, and Kurt drew a flipper fish over the logo.
10. Univox with pink and green stickers all over it. It also had a monkey sticker and this: "WASP: we are scary posers" on it.

11. '69 Blue (Lake Placid?) Mustang with a pearloid pickguard and a black Seymour Duncan Hot Rail in the bridge position.
12. Fiesta Red Mustang. Used for In Utero. Fender sent out four Mustangs; three sonic blue ones and this one. The pickguard was replaced with a Pearloid pickguard and it was routed for a full size Seymour Duncan JB Humbucker.

**The four Japanese Left-handed Mustags that Fender sent Kurt were heavily modified. The bridge, tremolo system, and necks were all changed or modified.

13. Two Sonic Blue (Daphne blue) These were the other two Japanese. One had a Tortoise Shell pickguard and the other had a matte red pickguard. They looked like they were white in the light. But they were blue. The guitar with the Tortoise pickguard was used on MTV Live and Loud show.
14. Early 60's Mustang. Sonic/Daphne blue with stock hardware.
15. Unpainted Mustang. Early 60's.
16. Sunburst Mustang with a black pickguard. Mid 70's.
17. 60's Sunburst Jaguar with a dot neck.
18. Sunburst Fender Telecaster. Kurt scratched off the paint in a shape of a heart and scratched the word "Courtney" on it.
19. Sunburst Fender Telecaster Custom. This was Kurt's last guitar. It had Duncan JB pickups.
20. Fender Jag-Stag. The "famous" guitar that Kurt designed himself. A cross between a Jaguar and a Mustang. The Jag-Stag had Mustang hardware with Jaguar-type of body.
21. Fender Electric 12-string. Mid 60's. It was a sunburst color with a dot neck, and it was right handed.
22. Black Epiphone Les Paul. This was used for the Nevermind underwater photo shoot.
23. Vantage orange Les Paul copy. This guitar was bought and smashed the same day!
24. Mosrite Gospel Sunburst with white pickguard.25. Gibson SG Standard, a blueish color. The pickups were taped in. It was used in Tijuana.
26. Epiphone Red ET270(?) This was Kurt's main guitar during the Bleach years. It can be seen in the Sup Pop video of In Bloom.
27. Blonde F-hole Archtop Harmony had a maple fret board. It can be seen in the video Come As You Are.
28. National Map Body with seafoam green color, two pickups, tremolo, right-handed, and it never toured.
29. Hagstrom Blue Glitter. This guitar is 3/4 sive of a Les Paul copy. It was purchased in December 1992 for $500. It had a Pearloid fingerboard and back.
30. Ibanez Les Paul custom copy, cherry suuburst with DiMarzio X2N pickups, two coil taped mini switches and a black pickguard that may hve been removed.
31. Blue Mosrite Mark IV. Givin to Pat on SNL 1993. It was damaged in the bathtub incedent.
32. Martin D18-E. Used in MTV Unplugged. This was purchased at Voltage Guitar in Los Angeles. Was factory equipped with 2 DeArmond pickups that were designed for bronze strings. Kurt's guitar techs attatched another pickup on the top, a Bartolini model 3AV, so it could pickup the nickle strings. Sounded like crap with all of the metal bolted to the spruce top.
33. Cutaway in body that was rented for a radio show.
34. Ibanez Vantage(Vintage?) Played at Tower Records in-store performance.
35. Stella 12-string acoustic. It was strung with 5 nylon strings. Bought at Edgewater Pawn Shop and Sheridan Jewelry October 12, 1989. The receipt reads: Stella Harmony Guitar, $29.00 and $2.23 tax, coming to $31.23. Stella was a flat-top sunburst guitar with a white screw-on pickguard.
36. Harmony 12-string. Same as Stella only in a natural finish.


AMPS:

1. Fender Twin Reverb 'Ultra Linear' model. 120 watts with 2 Peavey 6L6's.
2. Mesa/Boogie Studio Two(Tube?) preamp, Crest 4801 power amp. Powered 8 cabinets. The speakers were: 25 watt Greenbacks, 75 watt Celestions, and Vintage 30's (Kurt's favorite). These were used most of the Nevermind tour.
3. Randall head used early to power cabs.
4. Sunn Beta-Lead head driving Peavey 4x12 cabs for Bleach tour.
5. 70's Peavey Vintage 4x12. Kurt's first amp.
6. Fender Champ.


EFFECTS:

Go to Chris Lawrence's page for more details on effects.

1. Boss DS-1 Distortion - Used for Bleach and most of Nevermind. Kurt's main fuzz box for the whole Bleach album.
2. Boss DS-2 - Switched to DS-2 for Nevermind tour because the DS-1 broke in Hawaii.
3. Arion Stage Tuner. Very chep and crappy. Broke on tour.
4. ProCo Rat - used for some of the fuzz on Nevermind.
5. Electro-Harmonix Big Muff - Used for some fuzz on Nevermind.
6. Univox Super Fuzz
7. Electro-Harmonix Small Clone Chorus - Used for chorus effect on Nevermind and Aneurysm.
8. Electro-Harmonix Echo Flanger
9. Electro-Harmonix Polychorus - Used for In Utero.
10. DOD Grunge - Used as a complete joke at MTV Live and Loud. Kurt hated it.
11. Tech 21 Classic SansAmp Amp/Cab simulator - Used for distortion.

That's it. But I know that there is a whole lot more because from what I've heard Kurt got a little "effect happy" towards the end of his career.


I'd like to thank Chris Lawrence for this information on Complete Nirvana.


Complete Nirvana is a fan resource site and is in no way affiliated with the Band 'Nirvana' or related Record Companies © 2005