What makes a guitar worth $14.6 million?

Last week, while attending the Jim Irsay Collection auction at Christies in New York, I watched a series of mystery bidders one-up each other for 20 solid minutes in a frenzied battle to acquire David Gilmour's famed Black Strat. $6 million became $8 million, which became $10 million. Then $12 million. The final price tag of $14.6 million left all attendees – myself included – gobsmacked.

The previous record for the most expensive guitar to ever sell at auction was set in 2020 – with the $6 million sale of Kurt Cobain’s MTV Unplugged Martin D-18E. For his part, the late Irsay thought that was far too high a price. This sale more than doubled that, and truly represented a new epoch in the value of the guitar.

This is an opportune moment to point out that when Guitar World asked Gilmour himself if he missed the Black Strat – which was originally auctioned for $3.975 million for charity in 2019 – in a 2024 interview, the Pink Floyd legend shrugged, “I mean, Fender did a David Gilmour model [launched in 2008], so now I’ve got the Black Cat Strat. And it’s the same, you know? It does what it says on the tin.”

So, wherever you fall on the “man, I wish I had $14.6 million to get the Black Strat” to “there's a sucker born every minute” spectrum, what do you think makes a guitar worth that much money to someone? You may never splurge on it if you had the means, but someone did. Why?

Let us know in the comments below.