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Gary Rossington gets his wings onstage at the Bethel Woods Center for the Arts in Bethel, New York, in 2013.

Photo by Frank White

The guitarist’s brawny Les Paul tones helped create the Lynyrd Skynyrd legacy on hits like “Free Bird” and “That Smell,” and made him a 6-string hero in his own right.

Gary Rossington—the guitarist who inspired Lynyrd Skynyrd’s song “That Smell” and then played the hell out of it, with sailing, melodramatic feedback and a corpulent, grizzly-bear tone decorated by squealing pinch harmonics—died on Sunday, March 5, after at least a decade of coronary issues, including bypass surgeries and a reported heart attack in 2015. Rossington, who held the reins of Skynyrd ’til the end, was the band’s last surviving original member.

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When Louis Cato received this Univox LP-style as a gift in high school, it needed some major TLC. A few years later, it got some practical upgrades and now makes regular appearances with Cato on The Late Show.

Photo by Scott Kowalchyk

The self-described “utility knife” played drums with John Scofield and Marcus Miller and spent time in the studio with Q-Tip before landing on Stephen Colbert’s show as a multi-instrumentalist member of the house band. Now, he’s taken over as the show’s guitar-wielding bandleader and is making his mark.

It’s a classic old-school-show-biz move: Bring out the band, introduce them one by one, and build up the song to its explosive beginning. It’s fun, dramatic, audiences love it, and that’s how every The Late Show with Stephen Colbert taping starts.

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The Seabee is a multi-chorus pedal designed to deliver the finest analog bucket brigade chorus tones.

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This signature Pro-Mod So-Cal model features a lightweight alder body with scalloped lower back bout and shredder’s cut heel offering easier access to the higher frets.

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Based on the Eastsider T, the Eastsider Custom has a set neck and humbucker pickups for more effortless playability and a fatter, thicker tone.

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