The 'Lost' Keef/Mick Taylor '59 LP Gets 'Found' At The Metropolitan Museum Of Art

[specialk]

^ Heroin. 😁

[DarkHammer]

Do we think the collector-owner didn't know about background of guitar? It's hard to believe he didn't considering how famous this guitar is and story of the robbery. Makes you also guess what other stolen guitars are in his collection (the part that wasn't given to Met).

[scottcald]

On 7/15/2025 at 8:03 AM, Steve Haynie said:

It would be nice if Mick Taylor gets his guitar back.  

If the collector who had it knew what it was, why did he not offer to give back the guitar?  He was willing to give it to a museum.  

He wouldn't have gotten a tax break by handing it back to Mick?

[ARM OF HAMER]

                                                            Who knew what that guitar would be worth someday................ believe this photo is from the Stones concert at Hyde Park............with the 
"BURST" resting up against a stack of Hiwatts. YIKES!               

Edited July 29, 2025 by ARM OF HAMER

[burningyen]

You think that's an ugly story, how about a $5 million Strad stolen from a Berlin bank vault after WW2, resurfacing in '95 and trading hands under bogus papers, ending up with a Japanese violinist who's now refusing to deal with the family who are the rightful owners:

https://www.nytimes.com/2025/07/06/arts/music/the-hunt-for-a-316-year-old-stradivarius-stolen-in-the-fog-of-war.html?unlocked_article_code=1.XE8.CJFM.bbkAFp2JQzjB&smid=url-share

[kizanski]

45 minutes ago, burningyen said:

You think that's an ugly story, how about a $5 million Strad stolen from a Berlin bank vault after WW2, resurfacing in '95 and trading hands under bogus papers, ending up with a Japanese violinist who's now refusing to deal with the family who are the rightful owners:

Yeah, but the sustain!!

[DarkHammer]

3 hours ago, burningyen said:

You think that's an ugly story, how about a $5 million Strad stolen from a Berlin bank vault after WW2, resurfacing in '95 and trading hands under bogus papers, ending up with a Japanese violinist who's now refusing to deal with the family who are the rightful owners:

https://www.nytimes.com/2025/07/06/arts/music/the-hunt-for-a-316-year-old-stradivarius-stolen-in-the-fog-of-war.html?unlocked_article_code=1.XE8.CJFM.bbkAFp2JQzjB&smid=url-share

After reading the article, I didn't really see solid proof that violin belonged to this family. Perhaps it's not mentioned, but there's this "The case of the Mendelssohn Stradivarius highlights the opaque trade for rare instruments, in which details about provenance, or the history of previous ownership, are often not well documented or, in some cases, intentionally obscured." 

On the other hand, Mick Taylor's guitar is well documented, there are photographs, he has much better chance of getting his instrument back.

 

[burningyen]

1 hour ago, DarkHammer said:

After reading the article, I didn't really see solid proof that violin belonged to this family. Perhaps it's not mentioned, but there's this "The case of the Mendelssohn Stradivarius highlights the opaque trade for rare instruments, in which details about provenance, or the history of previous ownership, are often not well documented or, in some cases, intentionally obscured." 

On the other hand, Mick Taylor's guitar is well documented, there are photographs, he has much better chance of getting his instrument back.

 

The pictures seemed like pretty clear proof to me. The grain lines, mineral streaks, nicks and scratches are exact matches, like matching fingerprints.

[DarkHammer]

2 hours ago, burningyen said:

The pictures seemed like pretty clear proof to me. The grain lines, mineral streaks, nicks and scratches are exact matches, like matching fingerprints.

yes, there are pictures, but what exactly do they prove? Article says that supposed owner in 1930s was a collector. Well, many of us are collectors and as such we buy/sell/trade/give away guitars. We also have pictures of the guitars we don't own anymore. If there were records of ownership I suppose they didn't survive Nazi rule, the war and post war chaos.   

[hamerican gigolo]

On 7/15/2025 at 8:47 PM, Jakeboy said:

Such BS. Taylor should have police escort him to retrieve his fucking property.

Not that easy. The guitar is in one country. The aggrieved party is in another. International laws are murky at best when it comes to property rights. Did MT file a police report, etc. ???  Him walking into the Met & just taking the instrument is a fantasy, police or no... 😞

[ARM OF HAMER]

8 hours ago, hamerican gigolo said:

Not that easy. The guitar is in one country. The aggrieved party is in another. International laws are murky at best when it comes to property rights. Did MT file a police report, etc. ???  Him walking into the Met & just taking the instrument is a fantasy, police or no... 😞

                             Yeah Ronnie Montrose found out just how difficult it would be to get his stolen "Burst" back again. Different set of circumstances yeah but it was still stolen property. There are other examples like Craig Chaquico from the Airplane/Starship his "Burst" was stolen off the stage in Germany and now resides with Joe Bonamassa.. You would think something like this would be cut and dried but they never are.

[Jakeboy]

12 hours ago, hamerican gigolo said:

Not that easy. The guitar is in one country. The aggrieved party is in another. International laws are murky at best when it comes to property rights. Did MT file a police report, etc. ???  Him walking into the Met & just taking the instrument is a fantasy, police or no... 😞

I was being a bit hyperbolic and thought  that MT resided in the good Ol’ USA. All that aside, one would think that MT would want a real burst back that he can prove was his at least at one point in time. Has he even stated he wants it back?

Further, one would think that the Met, once apprised of the circumstances, would gladly offer the guitar back to Taylor and make a huge celebratory deal out of the fact that that they have at long last returned the Ya-Ya’s burst to its rightful owner. I bet Taylor would let them keep it on display, but who knows?  Things are never as easy as they seem but the Met should give him his guitar back at the end of the day.

If memory serves, the  Stones filed a police report at the time but they weren’t exactly the favorites of the local coppers. 

 

[Disturber]

" But in recent weeks, the “Keithburst” guitar’s provenance has been called into question. A representative for Mick Taylor, who played for the Stones from 1969 to 1974 and is regarded as one of the greatest guitarists of all time, has said that the instrument is rightfully his. He claims to have purchased it from one of the Stones’ tour managers in 1967 and regularly used it over the next several years, according to Guitar World’s Phil Weller.

Taylor’s team claims the guitar was stolen in the summer of 1971, when the Rolling Stones rented a mansion at Villa Nellcôte on the French Riviera and recorded the album Exile on Main St. These sessions were marked by heavy drug use, general chaos and escalating tensions amongst some of the band members. When the theft occurred in broad daylight, the band members didn’t notice. “That’s how loose and stupid it was out there,” Bill Wyman, the Stones’ bassist from 1962 to 1993, told the Observer’s Sean O’Hagan when discussing the incident in 2010.

The thieves made away with a saxophone, a bass and several guitars. Taylor claims that until the “Keithburst” turned up at the Met, that was the last time he saw it.

But the Met has disputed Taylor’s claims, saying that he used the “Keithburst” but never officially owned it. The museum also argues that the instrument was never taken in the 1971 burglary, and that its recent whereabouts have been well-known. Christie’s put the guitar up for sale in 2004, and it went on display in a Met exhibition in 2019.

'This guitar has a long and well-documented history of ownership,' the museum tells the New York Times’ Michaela Towfighi in a statement.

 

Subsequent owners have included Cosmo Verrico, a guitarist for the rock band Heavy Metal Kids; Peter Svensson, a Swedish producer; and Dirk Ziff, the billionaire collector who lent the guitar for the 2019 exhibition and made the recent donation to the Met.
"

https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/former-rolling-stones-musician-mick-taylor-claims-his-stolen-guitar-is-at-the-met-180987096/?fbclid=IwY2xjawMAMShleHRuA2FlbQIxMQABHsB04b13KYbDDtL5E4PisNEq6a7ADsp9RrJlBzlMN6ydq1AHHlkWnZwGg1S0_aem_McolICWoaQRPxSIMCLy76g

 

Interesting list of subsequent owners. Peter Svensson is the guitarplayer in The Cardigans. He has several bursts. 

[kizanski]

2 minutes ago, Disturber said:

https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/former-rolling-stones-musician-mick-taylor-claims-his-stolen-guitar-is-at-the-met-180987096/?fbclid=IwY2xjawMAMShleHRuA2FlbQIxMQABHsB04b13KYbDDtL5E4PisNEq6a7ADsp9RrJlBzlMN6ydq1AHHlkWnZwGg1S0_aem_McolICWoaQRPxSIMCLy76g

From the same article (see the caption):

 

Pretty much decided for me that I don't need to read the whole article.

 

[velorush]

FTCFThem: Keith Richards performing with the a five or six year-older-than-the-article-subject Les Paul guitar Robert Knight Archive / Redferns via Getty Images 

[Steve Haynie]

Was Mick Taylor expected to keep up with every auction and exhibit for the last half century?  

[Tortious]

"New York City’s Met Museum is contesting claims made by former Rolling Stones guitarist Mick Taylor that he owns the “Keithburst” Les Paul"

...

"Met officials contest Taylor's claims that he owned the guitar in their collection, and say the instrument was not among those stolen from Nellcôte.

The museum states that a man named Adrian Miller became the guitar’s owner in 1971, but doesn’t explain how he came to take ownership of it.

It’s believed that Miller ultimately sold the guitar to Heavy Metal Kids founder Cosmo Verrico, who, as per an interview with the New York Times, “can’t recall how Miller acquired the guitar.”"

 

Well that should settle it! 🤪