“Every Gretsch from the mid-’90s onwards is a copy of one I had in my collection”: How Randy Bachman saved Gretsch after its factory burned down

Randy Bachman.

Randy Bachman has explained how his obsession with hunting down his stolen Gretsch 6120 electric guitar inadvertently saved the company from an uncertain fate.

The tale of Bachman’s 1957 Gretsch Chet Atkins 6120 is the stuff of guitar legend. The six-string, Bachman’s most cherished possession, was stolen from a hotel room in Toronto in 1976, and its whereabouts remained a mystery until, in 2021, it was recovered and returned to the Bachman-Turner Overdrive leader.