Rock stars and their cars

Whether it's a drop-dead gorgeous Italian supercar or a walnut and leather luxury British barge, rare and exclusive cars have always been an integral part of the rock star's armoury.

This was probably never truer than during the 1970s, when rock 'n' roll excess was at its height – and there were some truly fantastic cars available to the discerning rock god.

These are some of our favourite car and star pairings.

Whether you've set your heart on one of these cast-iron classics or something a little more affordable, be sure to protect your investment with some specialist classic car cover.

John Lennon: Rolls Royce Phantom V Touring Limousine

If we tell you that John Lennon had his Rolls Royce Phantom V redecorated in 1967, around the time of the Beatles' psychedelic classic Sergeant Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band, you can probably guess what sort of colour scheme we're talking about.

Yes indeed, when he had his Rolls resprayed during the Summer of Love, Lennon asked artist Steve Weaver to create a lavish, technicolour, Romany-inspired floral design – something similar to the horse-drawn gypsy caravan that the Beatles singer had already taken out and about that year. Weaver duly obliged, and Lennon's Rolls now featured a wonderful array of flowery tendrils, Zodiac signs and gypsy patterns. Very late 1960s.

The musician had originally ordered the car back in December 1964, when the Beatles were riding high on the success of their third album, A Hard Day's Night. Originally in Valentine Black, the customised Roller came with a host of rock-star features including a record player, telephone and tinted windows – the latter still cutting-edge technology at the time. Lennon's 1967 modifications also included a TV and a back seat that turned into a bed. Groovy, baby.

Elvis Presley: De Tomaso Pantera

Alongside the Countach, Merak, Miura and the Iso Grifo, the De Tomaso Pantera is one of those utterly iconic 1970s Italian cars – symbols of an era where Italian car design led the way with its combination of space-age adventurousness and mind-melting classical elegance.

The Pantera is, like these other halo models, a thing of sublime beauty. However, that's evidently not the way it felt to Elvis Presley one angry morning in the mid-1970s. The Pantera may have been a looker, but it famously wasn't the most reliable sports car of its era – many owners complained of breakdowns, electrical and overheating issues, and fast-spreading rust.

Undaunted, Elvis bought a bright yellow '71 Pantera as a present for his then-girlfriend, Linda Thompson. Well, legend has it that Elvis and Linda had an angry argument one day. Elvis decided to make a swift exit and, for maximum effect, to get away fast in the Pantera. But the car wouldn't start (another common issue, to be fair).

An enraged Elvis promptly put a bullet through the steering wheel, and another through the driver's door. The luckless Pantera in question is now on show, bullet holes and all, in Los Angeles' Petersen Automotive Museum.

Keith Moon: Ferrari Dino 246 GTS

Seeing the name Keith Moon in our list, you might be expecting to read about a certain Rolls Royce.

That was the car that The Who's notoriously mercurial drummer famously / allegedly drove into a Michigan swimming pool on his 21st birthday party in 1967. In fact, it may have been a Lincoln Continental… or the whole thing may not have happened at all. No one seems to remember the night very clearly, for some strange reason.

In any case, the image of a Rolls crashed into a swimming pool became a lucid symbol of rock 'n' roll excess – famously imitated by Oasis on the cover of their third album Be Here Now.

But no, here we're interested in another Keith Moon automobile: the elegant Ferrari Dino 246 GTS that he bought brand new in 1972. Sadly, this one came to another messy end, albeit not at the drummer's own hands this time. Instead, the story goes that, after a few ales in his local pub in Surrey, the magnanimous Moon handed the Ferrari's keys to a biker gang. They promptly drove the car into a ditch and then ran away.

Moral: don't hand your car keys to people you meet in a pub. We'll also add: invest in some good classic Ferrari insurance to cover you against theft or accident!

Janis Joplin: Porsche 356 Cabriolet

The car most indelibly associated with 1960s chanteuse Janis Joplin is, of course, a Mercedes Benz. The gravel-voiced crooner memorably implores the Lord to buy her one in the famous song of the same name. The car she actually acquired, though, was a grey Porsche 356 Cabriolet.

The predecessor to the iconic and long-lasting 911, the 356 was the German firm's very first production car. Already bearing the distinctive clamshell shape that would serve the 911 so well for decades, it became a well-liked and much-treasured sports car.

A little like Lennon and his gypsy paint job, Joplin had some design ideas for the car. She handed it to Dave Richards, a roadie with her band Big Brother and the Holding Company, along with $500. Richards gave it a unique psychedelic paint job which became known as ‘The History of the Universe’.

Alas, Joplin only got two years of open-top motoring in her 356 before her untimely death. The car was later passed to her brother and sister – and stayed in the family until 2015, when it fetched a cool £1.2m at auction.

Remember, if you do decide to give your classic a unique paint job, it might affect your classic car insurance premiums. Ask the Lancaster team for more information when you get a quote.

Bill Wyman: Citroen SM

If any group crystallised the 1960s era of rock 'n' roll hedonism, that group was probably the Stones. And their lavish lifestyles could be seen in the car collections they amassed. Keith Richards and Mick Jagger went big, brash and British with a Bentley: guitarist Bill Wyman and drummer Charlie Watts, meanwhile, both went a little Gallic with a Citroen SM.

The fruit of Citroen's recent acquisition of Maserati, the SM was an awesome mix of Gallic and Italianate style. It also boasted all the tech that the late 1960s could throw at it, including hydropneumatic, self-levelling suspension. The front headlights, meanwhile, turned with the steering wheel, giving the driver greater forward vision around bends.

Bill Wyman acquired his SM in 1971, while living in Grasse in the south of France. For the next decade Bill would drive the car from his home in Provence to Paris to record several classic Stones albums – as well as to Keith Richards' place down the coast at Cap Ferrat, for the legendarily wild recording sessions for the band's seminal Exile on Main Street.

Ginger Baker: Jensen FF

Ginger Baker was the drummer with the 1960s rock supergroup Cream, alongside Jack Bruce and Eric Clapton (another one for the fast cars). Baker was, famously, a hot-headed fellow whom you didn't want to get on the wrong side of. Well, we can only hope that his regular excursions in his beloved Jensen FFs did something to bring down his stress levels.

The drummer bought his first FF during Cream's brief period in the sun (1966-68) and went on to own two more. And who can blame him – big, powerful and beautiful, the FF was an extraordinary car. It was closely related to the better-known Jensen Interceptor, sharing the same swooping GT looks and 6.3-litre American V8 engine.

To this winning formula, Jensen added four-wheel drive. Indeed, when it launched in 1966, the car was the world’s first production four-wheel drive vehicle to come with anti-skid brakes. A useful feature, we'd imagine, for any wild, impulsive young rock-star owner.

Rod Stewart: Lamborghini Miura

Often dubbed the most beautiful car ever made, the Miura wasn't short of admirers from the rock 'n' roll firmament.

Rod Stewart, always one for the rock lifestyle and all its trappings, owned a couple (along with a Marcos, a 911 Turbo Carrera and other Lambos).

In 1971, with his band The Faces making it big, Stewart splashed out on his first Miura, a P400 S supplied by Lamborghini Concessionaires of Alie Street in Aldgate, London. The following year, with his solo single 'Maggie May' topping the charts, Stewart rewarded himself with a top-of-the-range Miura SV. Finished in yellow, this flagship model included air conditioning and a cutting-edge Phillips radio/cassette player.

David Bowie: Volvo 262C

We're intrigued by this one. Bowie: one of the coolest figures in rock history and the Volvo 262C (or so we'd always thought): not quite one of the coolest cars in automotive history. But maybe we were wrong?

Volvo's first luxury coupé, the 262C was spun out of the wildly successful 240 / 260 platform, a fixture on Europe's roads for many years. Volvo had a rather different target market with the 262C, however: it was largely intended for the US market, and most resembled big, blocky 1970s/80s US exec coupes such as the tenth-generation Cadillac Eldorado.

With styling by Bertone, the 262C had a rather captivating mix of Italian elegance and Scandi sturdiness. It clearly worked for Bowie, who ordered one to be delivered to his villa in Switzerland in June 1981. This late 262C went without the distinctive vinyl roof that graced earlier cars, but it has plenty else to recommend it, including a peppy 2.8-litre, V6 engine.

The latter, a Volvo / Peugeot / Renault co-production, also found its way into the Renault 30, Peugeot 504 and even, improbably, the DMC DeLorean.

It was a well-appointed car, too, featuring a leather interior, cruise control and alloy wheels. Quite the thing for the thrusting young late-70s sales exec – or, as it turned out, the enigmatic rock colossus.

With just 33,000 miles on the clock, Bowie's Volvo went up for sale in 2017 with a £160,000 price tag. Quite a lot for an old Volvo. Then again, this was a rare car – and a unique owner.

Nick Mason: Ferrari 250 GTO

We end with a car that played a rather important role in musical history. Pink Floyd had been one of the greatest and most influential bands of the late 1960s and 1970s, but by the mid-to-late 80s their star seemed to be on the wane. There had been tensions in the band, which saw bassist/founding member Roger Waters leave the group.

The remaining trio – guitarist/singer David Gilmour, keyboardist Rick Wright and drummer and classic car enthusiast Nick Mason – soldiered on for the 1987 album A Momentary Lapse of Reason. Among the cars in Mason's fleet at the time was a beautiful, original Ferrari 250 GTO, which he'd acquired for just £35,000 in 1978.

The band were keen to head out on a world tour to promote their new album, but this looked like a financial headache: Floyd live shows were always extravagant and expensive, and Waters was mounting potentially ruinous legal challenges over the use of the band name. Frankly, a tour looked unfeasible – until Mason offered to use his beloved GTO as collateral.

A good decision, it turns out, as the album was a huge success, and the two-year, 197-date tour that followed it became the highest-grossing world tour of the 1980s, announcing that Pink Floyd were back among the titans of rock.

All hail the GTO – which recently confirmed its status as the most valuable car in the world, with one example fetching an eye-watering £52 million.

Classic car insurance from Lancaster

While you don't have to be a rock star to own one of these classics, it's undeniable that owning any of these automotive icons will require deep pockets.

The good news is that there are hundreds of other far more affordable classics out there that can make fantastic ownership prospects.

Whether you have your eye on a Ford Cortina, an Austin Montego or a Mazda MX-5, you can have a lot of fun for relatively little outlay. Just make sure you protect your investment with some classic car insurance.

Here at Lancaster, we can insure a vast range of classics. Contact us to find out more.

Policy benefits, features and discounts offered may very between insurance schemes or cover selected and are subject to underwriting criteria. Information contained within this article is accurate at the time of publishing but may be subject to change.