That's not quite what happened. Pete has stated many times that the guitars in The Observer shot were given to a roadie, who had high hopes of fixing them for Pete's later use. The roadie continued to be employed long after he took the guitars, and the topic was never talked about until way later...when people asked Pete what happened to the guitars in those photos, and he had to retrace it to the fact that they were all disposed of years ago. There's a big difference between that and outright theft.JakeK wrote:Don't forget, George Harrison had his 425 stolen, too, but it was recovered in one hour after being stolen.
Pete Townshend had the Rics from the famous "Smashed Rics on the Wall" pic stolen from him. He took them to some guy to get repaired. After the repairs were done, the man stole them. The 360S/12OS and a 1993/12 were sold, according to Paul Griggs, who bought the 1993.
Now...Paul Griggs has no actual records proving that his 1993 was indeed Pete's, other than the slight comment made by a salesman at the time (possibly to help sell it despite an obvious repair). It is quite likely that the aforementioned 1993 was Townshend's, as there were few imported, but if that's the case....wouldn't all five of those guitars have resurfaced somewhere at some point (at least three were salvageable).
Cheers,
-Collin
