Joe Strummer - Musical Equipment

Musical Equipment

Strummer's main guitar throughout his career was a 1966 Fender Telecaster that originally came in a three-color sunburst with a white pickguard. Strummer acquired the guitar in middle of 1975 while playing with 101ers. After joining the Clash, the guitar's body and pickguard were refinished in grey auto primer and then painted black. By 1979, the word NOISE was stenciled on the upper part of the body, a rasta flag sticker was placed at the horn of the pickguard, and an "Ignore Alien Orders" sticker was placed above the bridge. By the release of Give ‘Em Enough Rope, the guitar was fitted with a bridge with individual saddles and the original Kluson tuners were replaced with later model tuners and a large question mark was spraypainted on its back. The guitar would remain in this configuration throughout his career with the addition of different stickers on its body. The guitar's black paint became worn down due to Strummer's playing and on many places the original sunburst finish and bare wood shines through, except for the square where Strummer taped his setlists. In 2012 modern artist Karl Haglund paid tribute to this guitar in one of his iconic guitar paintings. The Fender Custom Shop has created a Joe Strummer tribute Telecaster with a reliced flat black finish. Strummer was naturally left-handed, but learned to play guitar right-handed. He had attributed this as a drawback and claimed it caused him to be underdeveloped as a guitarist, although his style of playing was unique.

He also used three Fender Esquire models, one from 1952, a white blonde with slab fretboard from the mid 1950's and another from early to mid 1960s with a white pick guard and rosewood fingerboard. The Esquire is a one-pickup version of the Telecaster.

For amplification Strummer was known to use amplifiers such as a Roland Jazz Chorus, a Selmer Bassman while he was in the 101'ers, a Vox AC30 and various Marshall amplifiers, but his main amplifier was a Music Man HD 212 150. Strummer commented on his choice of amplifier with "I don't have time to search for those old Fender tube amps. The Music Man is the closest thing to that sound I've found." and that the "plastic motif on the front is repulsive."