“I’m a big Metallica fan. I’ve seen Kirk playing it over the years and know what a big deal that guitar is”: Biffy Clyro's Simon Neil is a Strat player through and through – but here's why he couldn't say no to Gibson's ‘Greeny’ reissue

Biffy Clyro’s Simon Neil is a self-confessed Stratocaster fiend – he even launched a Squier signature model back in 2009. But his love of Metallica, and the allure of the legendary ‘Greeny’ Les Paul now in the hands of Kirk Hammett, has seen its reissue model make its way onto the band’s latest album.

“The Strat is everything to me,” he says in the new issue of Guitar World. “My favorite model is the Michael Landau signature. I stumbled across one about 10 years ago, and it just spoke to me. That's the guitar I usually play in the studio, a reissue of his 1968 original.”

But it’s another reissue that is giving that Fender model a run for its money: a Gibson Custom Shop ‘Greeny’ Les Paul reissue.

Hammett and Gibson's finest luthiers had put the legendary electric guitar – made famous by Fleetwood Mac's Peter Green, who then entrusted it to Gary Moore – under the microscope. A detailed and highly costly reissue was the result, and, when in Nashville, where Gibson is based, Neil was seduced.

“I hummed and hawed because it was a lot of money [around $20K],” Neil reflects. “I'm a Fender Strat man through and through, but I'm also a big Metallica fan. I've seen Kirk playing it over the years and know what a big deal that guitar is.”

He also had other reservations, away from its heavier-than-Meshuggah price tag. “I do like the sound of Les Pauls and find them extremely useful in the studio,” he confesses, “but the act of putting one on feels wrong for me. It's like I'm wearing someone else's clothes.”

Across the band’s tenth album, Futique, he says the electric guitar “pops up on a few tunes,” as he put his hard-earned pocket money to good use.

“A Thousand And One, It's Chemical! and Woe Is Me, Wow Is You,” he notes of the songs it appears on. “But I'm nervous of that guitar because it's so expensive. I can barely look at it. I don't know if I've overstepped my limit. But I love that middle pickup position where it goes out of phase. It's so fucked up and cool, it's almost Strat-y.”

A more budget-friendly Epiphone version of Greeny arrived in late 2023. At $1.5K, it might be a worthy investment for when the Gibson feels too prestigious to play.

As for the legendary guitar itself, Hammett has revealed he had no intention of owning Greeny at first, but, since making the (very expensive) decision, he's been playing it regularly onstage with Metallica, bringing it to some of the biggest audiences it's ever seen.

You can read Neil's interview in full, alongside chats with Slash and more, in the new issue of Guitar World. Head to Magazines Direct to pick up a copy.