A Noel Gallagher-owned guitar that his brother Liam used as a weapon as the band fell apart has been auctioned for nearly £300,000.
The 1960, red Gibson ES-355 was one of Noel’s favourites. On the night of August 28, 2009, backstage at the Rock en Seine festival in Paris, a row escalated into a guitar-armed attack from Liam. It resulted in a broken guitar, a cancelled show, and ultimately a 16-year break in Oasis’s career that only ended this year.
PropStoreAuction sold the instrument on the first day of the Music Memorabilia Live Auction London on October 23.
It was listed with a £250,000 to £500,000 estimate and was described as PropStore as “arguably one of the most significant guitars associated with Oasis, as it was the catalyst for one of the most famous splits in music history, and symbolises the turbulent relationship of a band that shaped the 1990s.”
Naming the guilty party, this note from Noel Gallagher describes how his brother “smashed up” his favourite guitar. Image courtesy of PropStoreAuction.
Noel had the guitar fixed and used it extensively in his post–Oasis career
It had previously been sold in 2022 in Paris for 385,000 euros ($445,000, currently around £335,000).
The reformation of Oasis for a huge world tour in 2025 has sparked considerable interest in the band and helped buoy prices of memorabilia.
In 2024, Noel’s favourite ever guitar, a Silver Sparkle Gibson Les Paul, sold for £226,000.
Elsewhere in the two-day sale that continues into Friday, a hat worn by Michael Jackson for the shooting of the Smooth Criminal video in 1988 made £50,400, surpassing its opening estimate of £40,000. A pair of Elvis’s sunglasses easily surpassed their top estimate of £16,000 to bring in £75,600. Banksy artwork from Blur’s Think Tank album realised £107,100 against a £70,000 estimate.
