Welcome To Nerdville: Inside Joe Bonamassa's Museum and Vintage Guitar Collection | Reverb.com

66. That black spot on the pickguard is not a sticker. That would be the second layer of the pickguard because the guy used the first one. When I bought this, not only were the frets worn, but there were huge indentations in each string, through the fret to the wood. So this

guitar

almost has a festoon of its own. And I bought this

guitar

because I said, if I've liked something for so long, it had to be right and I plugged it. And it sounds. It just howls, you know? And I'm a big fan of Bonnie Raitt, so this is my Bonniecaster.

I've had this the longest, I bought it when I was a kid. I was 14 years old. I saved all my money and it was perfect when I bought it. And I played it throughout the beginning of my career, I took it on tour, even at this, that, that ill-advised time when I was, you know, young and I had a studded belt and I thought it was really cool. . I just realized that after leaving this huge mark on the guitar and looking in the mirror every day, I will never be great. (blues guitar solo) This is Carmelita, also known as The Claw.

See that, those three gallons? It looks like a claw, that's why they call it The Claw. And the guitar ended up in Hawaii in the early '80s and was sold, eventually it went to a friend of mine in Missouri, and then it went to a friend of mine here in California. And Carmelita is in a lot of books. She is in The Beauty of the Pop. And the thing about Carmelita, in this serial number range, I have three in this serial number range, I have 1948, 1951, which is the Skynyrd Burst, and the 1953, which is Carmelita. It's not the year, it's just the serial number after the nine.

And they all intrinsically have the same type of neck, indicating that they were built in batches. And a friend of mine has 1945, which is basically a two-piece top, right? Their top matches the bottom of this and then the bottom of this matches, you know, so it was basically the same piece of wood that was used to make them and we actually took pictures of it, you know? (rock guitar solo with

reverb

) The

reverb

softens the blackface. The old blues guys, you know, turned up the reverb. (rock guitar solo with reverb) That's the Mike Bloomfield thing, you know? (rock guitar solo with reverby) This guitar will end the show and tell the day.

This guitar is known as Amos. I named this guitar after this guy. Here is Amos Arthur, owner of Arthur's Music in Indianapolis, in 1958, holding this very modernist wedge-shaped guitar. He has this look on his face that says: Why the hell did Gibson send me this thing that I can never sell to anyone? You can barely sit and play. Here's the Amos guitar on the stand, in the store, 1958. Here's Kenny C., his guitar instructor, on the roof of a convenience store during a pole sitting competition, it was like a record-breaking event, like, this woman above here in the photo, she's sitting on a box, like 100 feet off the ground.

And I bought this guitar from Norm Harris of Norman's Rare Guitars. And Norman was very kind to sell me this because he had had it for forty years. He knew I wanted a real V, and I would only come to him because he knew that if he had sold me a V, it was real. And I didn't have to ask if it's real or not, and then digging up all this documentation was even better. I decided that I think one of the best guitar safaris you could go on is to do it, especially when the music store is still open and run by Amos Arthur's granddaughter and daughter.

Last year, Rick, Mike and I, quietly, it wasn't for publicity or anything else, it was just out of pure guitar geekdom and love of this kind of stuff. And for the love of a family-owned store that has been open since 1952, which is very rare. And we got it back and we got the case back and that guitar I hadn't seen that store and I hadn't seen those people in almost, I don't know, 57 years. It was the best day to put the guitar on the counter and watch them look at it. And it was a direct link with his grandfather and his father.

And that was what it was about. So they had this rickety staircase. And we're dragging this valuable guitar up the rickety ladder and I'm on the roof of the store. And I recreated the shot. And I have photos, whatever, bought and this cover for the soul. They were kind enough to lend me one of his father's personal guitars, it was an L-7. A friend of mine found a blank from the '50s, and it's one of those fancy things they sold in music stores and we had it recorded as Amos Arthur in tribute to him. So the idea of ​​this is not to look at it and say, wow, that's a really weird wedge-shaped guitar, the idea is to play music on it, and I play it every night. (blues guitar solo) Oh yeah, it was on Spinal Tap!

Norman lent all of his guitars to the film. And in the movie you could see it sitting on the stand, so this guitar was in Spinal Tap. So thank you to Norm and thank you to the people at Arthur's Music because ultimately this is a very special guitar with a very special story. I can't get over this. After all this today, I can't get over this. (blues guitar solo) If nobody knew me as a collector and I only used endorsement material, and, you know, I sat here in my little, my little hovel, you know, saying ha, ha, look what I have, to WHO?

There's no one here, you know, it's like my idea was to share. And you know, some people take it the wrong way, like I'm bragging, I'm not bragging, I'm just sharing it. It's about sharing the information and keeping it somewhat honest. When it comes to evaluating where you are as a musician, are you proud of it? Just because you have a guitar or a bass, are you proud of the work you did as a musician to become the musician you became? Ultimately, we could throw all this stuff in the trash and I'm still proud of the work, the 35 years of work that I did to become the musician that I am.

And whether you like the way I play or not, it took me 35 years of hard work and practice to maintain a career, create this dog and pony show, and ultimately, you know, learn how to learn. the instrument and trying to get as much as you can out of it, you know, and for me, that's what it's all about. And I'm not sure if I'm right or not, it's just my opinion. And hipster kids don't care about me, and they shouldn't care what I think. But I'm looking. Oh, I'm looking. (blues guitar solo)