Joanne Shaw Taylor

"I have my two staple guitars. One is a 1966 Esquire, which I’ve had for years and years—it’s my first guitar. When I was 15, I bought it in London on Denmark Street [a historic stretch of road known for its music shops and recording studios]. At the time I was real scared that my dad was going to beat the hell out of me for taking a train down to London at 15 and buying a ridiculously expensive guitar with all my pocket money. But I got it cheap because the previous owner had attacked it with a knife. It had a gaping hole near the neck, so I had a guitar tech dig it out and add a humbucker there. That made it kind of my dream Telecaster."

“I've got a 1991 Les Paul Classic, stock. That's been one of the main ones, but I've also got my 2007 Lemon Drop Les Paul Standard. I'm a little 'disabled' as a female as I don't have the largest hands in the world, so all my Les Pauls have the 1960s-profile necks. They're not chambered, but I do buy ones that are as light as possible. They're not your big 10lb boys! And when you're dragging them round an airport every day, Les Pauls seem to get heavier. But I love them."

"Those are my main three guitars. I’ve got a bunch of odds and sods, the kinds of things I go into pawnshops to find. They’re dirt cheap and I like them. I’ve got a Squier 51—Fender’s answer to a Telecaster/Strat hybrid—that’s worth about 100 bucks. I installed a Seymour Duncan Pearly Gates and pimped it out a little bit."

“I've got a 1991 Les Paul Classic, stock. That's been one of the main ones, but I've also got my 2007 Lemon Drop Les Paul Standard. I'm a little 'disabled' as a female as I don't have the largest hands in the world, so all my Les Pauls have the 1960s-profile necks. They're not chambered, but I do buy ones that are as light as possible. They're not your big 10lb boys! And when you're dragging them round an airport every day, Les Pauls seem to get heavier. But I love them."

She explains Joe Bonamassa put her onto a source for an Albert Collins Telecaster. She plays it often on stage.

"I think it was a J-45. So that’s what I played on those two songs. It was just funny that he found his dream acoustic guitar and some kid had put his name across it in giant orange letters. Karma. So Gordon is just an acoustic guitar, but you have to call it by its proper name."