During Nirvana's MTV Unplugged performance in 1994, Kurt Cobain told a story about one of Leadbelly's guitars that was for sale. The price tag made him balk.
"This guy representing the Leadbelly estate wants to sell me Leadbelly's guitar for five-hundred thousand dollars. I even asked David Geffen personally if he'd buy it for me," he told the laughing crowd. Presumably, Geffen—the fantastically wealthy president of Nirvana's record label—also declined.
Today, a custom-built 1993 Fender Mustang sold at Julien's Auctions for $340,000. The guitar appeared in a large auction of instruments and celebrity memorabilia, including Cobain's Unplugged cardigan, which sold for nearly the same price as his guitar, at $334,000.
The sky blue mustang was commissioned by Fender and Cobain—and built by FujiGen's Scott Zimmerman—in 1993. According to Julien's Auctions, Zimmerman had previously been responsible for fashioning the neck prototypes for Cobain's Jagstang signature model.
"When this guitar arrived in the United States, Cobain’s guitar tech further customized it, adding a black Seymour Duncan JB pickup instead of the stock single-coil, and a Gotoh Tune-o-Matic bridge. This guitar was known as 'Skystang III,' as reflected by a label on the original case," the auction house writes.
In total, FujiGen ended up building six Skystangs for Cobain, with the specific model sold today being one of two sent to him on October 22, 1993.
Cobain was seen playing the guitar and other Skystangs often during the In Utero tour.