Two months after her now-iconic Saturday Night Live performance, Phoebe Bridgers’ smashed guitar has sold for a whopping USD $101,500.
In case you’re wondering why someone would be keen on owning a broken musical instrument, it turns out that it was all for a worthy cause.
The guitar was put up for auction to raise money for the Gay & Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation (GLAAD). The auction was tied in with the GLAAD Media Awards, where Bridgers, who identifies as bisexual, was nominated for outstanding breakthrough music artist.
Speaking to Variety, the GLAAD Media Awards supervising producer Anthony Ramos revealed they were “pleasantly surprised” by the results of the action.
“I know she has a loyal fan base… Saturday night when I went to bed, it was around $18,000, and I was like, ‘That’s a great number!’ I was kind of hoping we would get to 25. Then I woke up and it was 40, then 50, then 80, and finally over 100,” Ramos said.
“Obviously we were very pleasantly surprised. I’m so thankful someone wanted to support our work and wanted that guitar so badly.”
While GLAAD has to protect the winning bidder’s privacy, Ramos said: “obviously it’s someone who’s either a huge Phoebe Bridgers fan or someone who is really into broken guitars or someone who really wants to help us accelerate our work for the LGBTQ community, and hopefully it’s someone who checks all three of those boxes.”
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“The other side of it is that we’re so grateful to Phoebe for donating the guitar but also for being someone who’s a visible and out part of the community in rock music. She made a great album, and we love all she’s doing and love working with her,” he said.
Bridgers’ decision to smash her guitar while performing ‘I Know the End’ on SNL was met with a mixed response, with David Crosby of Crosby, Stills and Nash fame labelling the move was “pathetic”.
“Guitars are for playing ..making music …..not stupidly bashing them on a fake monitor for childish stage drama …..I really do NOT give a flying F if others have done it before It’s still STUPID,” he tweeted.
In contrast, Dave Grohl said he supported Bridgers during an appearance on The Howard Stern Show.
“My drums had holes in them from Kurt [Cobain] fucking chopping my drums. I’ve seen enough smashed guitars. It feels fucking good to do it,” he said.
For more on this topic, check out the Indie Observer.
Check out Phoebe Bridgers’ original guitar-smashing performance:
