Cloud Guitar

Co-written with jooZt of Prince Vault and Edgar Kruize

The "Cloud" guitar is a custom guitar played by Prince. The first one was built for the Purple Rain movie. It became Prince's preferred guitar for live performances from 1984 to 1994, and again from 1998 to 2002. Prince had multiple copies of the Cloud guitar made and a production guitar was built by Schecter. The design is based the Sardonyx F bass, designed by Jeff Levin, that was bought by Prince in the late 1970s. The Sardonyx design is further derived from the Gibson F-Type Mandolin. 

The origin of the name is unclear. It is rumoured to be taken from the suit Prince wore in the Raspberry Beret video and the Around The World In A Day record cover, where a character wearing the suit can be seen playing the guitar. This has never been confirmed, and the original agreement with Knut Koupeé referred to the guitar as the "Customized Guitar". By the 1990s however, when the guitars were made for retail, Paisley Park and Schecter both used the "Cloud" name to describe the instrument.

The first Cloud was a custom guitar built by Dave Rusan of Knut Koupeé Music in Minneapolis in 1983. Tommy Stinson (not of Minneapolis band The Replacements) also worked on it. This is the guitar that appears in the Purple Rain film. Knut Koupeé had taken in a shipment of guitar parts from another defunct guitar builder, Jerry O’Hagan, and the first Cloud was built from left over parts from their "Shark" model. Dave Rusan builds reproductions of the original Cloud guitars. For more information, please visit Dave Rusan's website.

Three more Cloud guitars were built for Prince by Knut Koupeé for the Purple Rain tour. (A fifth Cloud was made in 1985 for a competition - it was never played or owned by Prince). All of these guitars were refinished multiple times. The fretmarkers are decals rather than inlays and were also changed over the years. See below for a full list of their finishes. After the Parade tour, the original Cloud was used taken on the road less frequently. Clouds 2 and 3 were used on the Sign O The Times and Lovsexy tours, whilst Cloud 4 was bought back for Batman and Graffiti Bridge. These three Clouds appear in the Nude tourbook.

Further copies were made by Andy Beech, Kurt Nelson and Zeke Clarke in the 1990s. Andy Beech and Zeke Clarke also built Cloud guitars for retail in Prince's NPG Stores. Schecter later made a number of production models based on the second Cloud guitar, with the first run issued in 1998.

Knut Koupeé Cloud Guitars

Cloud 1

Luthier: Dave Rusan, Tommy Stinson
Serial Number: Unknown
Year: 1983
Finish: White (1983), Peach (1987), Yellow (1991)
Location: Smithsonian

The original Cloud guitar made for the Purple Rain movie. It was broken and repaired many times during the Purple Rain tour. It is also the guitar in the Raspberry Beret video that is linked to the “Cloud” nickname. It was deliberately smashed at the end of the Parade tour. It was later painted peach and yellow, although its use live was scarce after 1986. This Cloud was donated to the Smithsonian in 1993, where it remains.

Cloud 2

Also known as: The Blue Angel, 1
Luthier: Dave Rusan (build), Mark Sampson (finish), Barry Haugan (finish, repairs)
Serial Number: None (Later given number PM16549 after repair)
Year: 1984
Finish: White (1984), Peach (1987), Light Blue (1988), Light Blue with Batman decals (1989), Yellow (1991), Blue/Purple (1993)
Location: Rock and Roll Hall Of Fame

An additional Cloud guitar made for the Purple Rain tour, commissioned in spring 1984. This time, Prince asked Knut Koupeé co-founder Karl Dedolph to sign a contract asserting his rights to the design. Cloud 2 was made in from another O’Hagan guitar - a "Nightwatch". Like the Cloud 1, it was smashed at the end of the Parade tour, then repaired and painted peach for the Sign O' The Times tour by Barry Haugen. In 1988 it was repainted blue and acquired the nickname of "Blue Angel" (mentioned by Prince in I Wish U Heaven (Part 1, 2 & 3)) and in 1989 it was given Batman-style fret markers. In 1991, it was repainted yellow and had it's fret markers changed to symbols for the Diamonds & Pearls Tour. It was Prince's preferred guitar and has "Number One" on the truss rod cover. It was refurbished in blue/purple by Andy Beech in the early 1990s and given the serial number PM16549. Its headstock was broken in the 1990s, and was sanded down and refinished. When Schecter started making copies in 1997, it was this headstock that they copied rather than the older pointed version. It is unknown what happened to the guitar after 1997, although it became badly damaged in this time. It was auctioned for $563,500 in June 2020 and is on display at the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.

Cloud 3

Luthier: Dave Rusan (build), Mark Sampson (finish), Barry Haugan (finish, repairs)
Year: 1984
Finish: White (1984), Black (1986), Yellow (1991)
Location: Private Collection

An additional Cloud guitar built by Dave Rusan for the Purple Rain tour in 1985. It was refinished in peach in 1987 and in yellow in 1991 by Barry Haugen. It was given away in a competition by the Z100 radio station in 1993 and was auctioned for $910,000 in May 2024.

Cloud 4

Also known as: 4
Luthier: Knut Koupeé
Year: 1985
Finish: White (1985), Black (1986), Black with Batman decals (1989), Black with Roman Numeral decals (1990)

An additional Cloud guitar made for the Purple Rain tour in spring 1985. By 1986, it was so badly damaged that it needed a complete new neck. A new neck was fitted by Barry Haugen, with a plain maple fingerboard. The guitar was also refinished in black. Later the guitar had Batman decals and appears in the Batdance video, which were then replaced with Roman Numeral for the Graffiti Bridge movie. There is a mistake in the fret markers - VII appears again at the ninth fret instead of IX. After appearing in the Act II tour book, the guitar was given away in a competition by MTV Europe in 1993. It was sold at auction in December 2016 for £87,000 (around $110,000). The auction misattributed the guitar to Andy Beech - it appears to have been part of the original run from Knut Koupeé.

Competition Cloud

Luthier: Dave Rusan (build), Mark Sampson (finish)
Year: 1985
Finish: White (1985)
Location: Private Collection

A fourth Cloud was built in 1985 and given away by Warner Bros UK in a competition. It was never owned or played by Prince.

Other Cloud Guitars

By the 1990s, luthiers Andy Beech (of D'Haitre Guitars), Kurt Nelson and, later, Zeke Clarke, began building a new run of Cloud guitars. The first three were built by Andy Beech in early 1993 for Prince. Then Andy Beech and Kurt Nelson started building a longer run of Clouds. Some of these were taken on the road by Prince, others were sold in the NPG retail stores (sometimes with claims that Prince had played them, albeit briefly). These new Clouds are usually marked "Property Of PRN Music Corp" with a serial number, usually following the format PM16XXX.

In 1995, Zeke Clarke documented thirteen Clouds with serial numbers, with a further three in production. Cloud 2 is included in this list with a serial number, but not Clouds 1, 3 & 4 as they had been given away at this point. Clarke attests that they were built between November 1993 - January 1995 (with Cloud 2 dating back to 1984).[1]

The known Clouds are listed below with their serial numbers where possible. Schecter also developed a production model of the Cloud in the late 1990s. A number of prototypes and early models probably passed through Prince/Paisley Park as the guitar was developed. This list omits any further production models.

Serial	Year	Luthier	Finish	Description
C5	1993	Beech	Yellow	Played by Prince. Whereabouts unknown.
C6	1993	Beech	Blue	Played by Prince. Whereabouts unknown.
C7	1993	Beech	Blue	Played by Prince. Whereabouts unknown. Refinished purple in 1999.
PM16164	1993	Beech	Purple/Blue	Possibly taken on tour. Donated to an auction in 1994 to benefit Los Angeles Earthquake Relief. Originally purple/blue, discoloured to teal with yellowed pickups. Auctioned in for $700,000 in 2017, with some publicity that it was Cloud 2.
PM16212	1993	Beech	Yellow	Used in "rehearsals and performances". Sold in December 1993 and auctioned for $225,000 in September 2017.
PM162160	1993	Beech	Unknown, later Purple	The third Cloud built by Andy Beech, although missing from the Zeke Clarke list. Is possibly one of the other early Beech Clouds (PM16218?) with a new serial number (serial number doesn't follow the same format as the others). Was refinished in purple around 1999 and given away or sold, sold again in 2010.
PM16218	1993-95	Beech	Yellow	Details unknown
PM16185	1993-95	Beech	Yellow	Details unknown
PM16220	1992/93	Nelson	Purple/Blue	Possibly taken on tour as a backup guitar. Ended up in private ownership and auctioned for $192,000 in November 2022.
PM16200	1993-95	Nelson	Yellow	Possibly taken on tour. Ended up in private ownership and auctioned for around $60,000 in March 2021.
PM16222	1993-95	Beech	Yellow	Used in "rehearsals and performances". Sold in 1994 and later donated to a church in 2007 along with PM16187. Sold again for $51,000 in 2016.
PM16219	1993-95	Beech	Yellow	Details unknown
PM16217	1993-95	Beech	Yellow	Details unknown
PM16228	1993-95	Beech	Yellow	Details unknown
PM16229	1993-95	Beech	Yellow	Details unknown
PM16187	1993-95	Beech	Purple/Blue	Used in "rehearsals and performances" (less extensively than PM16222). Sold in 1994 and later donated to a church in 2007 along with PM16222.
PM16186	1994	Beech (Clarke finish)	Purple/Blue	Built to order and sold straight to a customer at the London NPG store for £3,500. Not used by Prince. Auctioned for £185,000 in December 2020.
PM16643	1995	Clarke	Unknown	First Cloud built by Zeke Clarke. Details unknown but assumed it was one of the retail guitars Prince commissioned.
PM16644	1995	Clarke	Yellow	Either an earlier guitar repaired with a new serial number or a new guitar. Claims to be the first Floyd Rose Prince played, although there is no evidence of Prince touring or recording with this guitar so is likely an experiment or prototype. Auctioned in June 2016.
PM167?8	~1997	Beech	Purple/Blue	Possibly built by Beech as a prototype for Schecter, based on the Cloud 2's condition in 1997. Currently in a private collection.
PM19158	1999-07	Unknown	Orange	One of the Clouds refinished under a new serial number. First seen around the Superbowl in 2007, currently in the collection at Paisley Park.

There are a number of Cloud guitars on display in Hard Rock Cafés around the world. Some of these may be original Andy Beeche or Zeke Clarke retail models, some appear to be Schecters and others appear to be unofficial copies. There is no confirmation that any of these were owned or played by Prince.

Some of the production Schecters are also known to have belonged to Prince.