Instead of burning money with a large-scale festival gadget, Studio Brussel wanted to offer the crowd a souvenir that money can’t buy.

We started from the insight that signed guitars are the Holy Grail of rock ‘n’ roll. Since the rise of rock music, stars have been putting their autograph on guitars, upon which these instantly become true collector’s items.

At Rock Werchter, we opened up a new side to guitar signing by turning this tradition around: the reverse guitar signing. We invited listeners of Studio Brussel on the festival ground to put their autograph on a guitar from Mister Rock Star himself: Dave Grohl from the Foo Fighters.

Throughout the 4 days of the festival, visitors could stop by the Studio Brussel booth and sign a Gibson ES 335 guitar for none other than Foo Fighters frontman Dave Grohl. Hundreds of people passed by the booth to put their autograph on the guitar. Right before their closing concert on the main stage, a Studio Brussel host handed Dave Grohl’s first fully fan-signed guitar during an exclusive interview.

Clearly moved by the gift, Dave stated that “no one had ever done this for me”. What happened afterwards however, went beyond our expectation. Appearing on the main stage in front of 80.000 music fans, Dave took our guitar and explained the whole idea in front of the crowd. Following which he played a 15-minute version of Monkey Wrench on the guitar, one of his biggest hits.

So, while other media brands were confined to their big budget booths, Studio Brussel made it to the festival’s main stage. Proving that no one else understands music better.

Our fan-signed guitar even made it beyond the main stage. It was featured on the most important Belgian news media and different music blogs worldwide. Even Loudwire – the web’s biggest hard rock and metal site with over 1.3 million fans – covered the story.