Article and photos: bit.ly/JoanJettRR
Premier Guitar’s Shawn Hammond met with Zach Nagy, guitar tech for Joan Jett, lead guitarist Dougie Needles, and bassist Hal Salzer before the Blackhearts’ show at the U.S. Cellular Center in Cedar Rapids, Iowa, on March 21, 2015.
Joan Jett’s Gear
Guitars
Jett’s primary guitar for most of her shows for the last 20 years is a battered and sticker-bedecked Gibson Melody Maker with a single Red Rhodes Velvet Hammer humbucker. For her spring 2015 tour opening for Heart, she’s also been playing a brand-new signature Melody Maker prototype with a Burstbucker 3 pickup, a metallic redburst finish, and red dot inlays. A black-finished 2011 signature Melody Maker with a Velvet Hammer that was a gift of the late Brian Farmer (guitar tech for Warren Haynes) serves as yet another backup. The volume knobs on all her guitars are wrapped with the hooked side of a piece of Velcro to increase their grip-ability, and each instrument features D’Addario .010-.046 string sets. Nagy says that a big part of Jett’s sound comes from using the broad, serrated edge of her D’Andrea Delrex Sharkfin 1.0 mm picks.
Amps
Since her breakout years in the early ’80s, Jett has relied on a Music Man HD-130 2x12 combo with JJ EL34 power tubes and Electro-Voice speakers. She plugs into input 1 of the rhythm channel and cranks the volume all the way up. An HD-130 head comes along as backup.
Effects
Jett’s sole effect is an Ibanez TS9DX Turbo Tube Screamer that sits atop her Music Man combo. It’s set to turbo mode, with drive and level at 9 o’clock, and tone at 3 o’clock. Her only other onstage gear is a can of Tone Finger Ease string-lubricant spray, which is Velcro’d to the top of her amp alongside a tin of black-currant-flavored Grether’s Pastilles throat lozenges, and a cup full of unwrapped pieces of gum.
To continue learning about the gear behind Joan Jett and the Blackhearts, visit: bit.ly/JoanJettRR