Johnny Marr to auction guitars he played with The Smiths and Billie Eilish

Johnny Marr to auction guitars he played with The Smiths and Billie Eilish 2 hours ago Share Save Add as preferred on Google Mark Savage Music correspondent Getty Images Johnny Marr has more than 100 guitars - and he says the auction will be 'emotional' but 'cathartic' Johnny Marr is to auction almost 100 of his guitars, including the ones he played on The Smiths' This Charming Man and the Billie Eilish song No Time To Die. The sale also includes a 1960 Cherry Red Gibson ES-355, given to Marr by music mogul Seymour Stein as an incentive for The Smiths to sign to his label, Sire Records. The first song Smith played on it was the classic indie anthem Heaven Knows I'm Miserable Now. Speaking to the BBC, Marr said he was letting go of his guitars because, "I didn't like the idea of my studio space becoming a museum". Getty Images The auction includes the Gibson Les Paul that Marr played in early TV appearances with The Smiths, including this performance on The Tube. It's estimated at £80,000 - £120,000 He received his first guitar - "a little wooden toy thing, bought in a haberdashery shop in Manchester" - when he was just four years old. He went on to form The Smiths with Morrissey in 1982, defining an entire era of indie music with his intricate, chiming tones - rooted in British pop, while stubbornly avoiding cliché. Since the group disbanded in 1987, he has become a serial collaborator, working with everyone from The Pretenders and Talking Heads to Bryan Ferry, Oasis, Blondie, Beck, Modest Mouse, The Cribs and Franz Ferdinand. This weekend, he was a special guest at The Gorillaz' kaleidoscopic, one-off stadium concert . Later this year, he'll release fifth solo album, The Age Of Everything. Getty Images The star will also sell the guitar he played on Billie Eilish's James Bond theme No Time To Die It was while writing the 2023 book Marr's Guitars that he first decided to offload some of his treasured possessions. "Making that book gave me an excuse to take all the guitars out and photograph them and take them to a few events. When that came to an end, that period, the idea of them all just going back into storage just seemed very weird," he said. He realised it would be better if the instruments could continue to provide inspiration for other musicians. "I thought about people in Belfast or in Dundee or Tokyo owning one of these guitars for the rest of their lives - coming down to breakfast in the morning and really loving and cherishing this instrument. "Once I got that idea in my head, I thought it was really much, much more, more appealing than them being in some glass case." And if the auction clears some space to fill with new guitars, all the better. "I like your thinking," he laughs. "I wasn't going to say that, but I like your thinking." Christie's The guitars will go on display in New York this summer, before travelling back to London for the September auction The 95 lots will go on display at Christie's in New York and London over the s