Jason Isbell is a multifaceted guitar player who ranges from wielding a vintage Gibson Les Paul and hollering over a howling Dumble to becoming a whispering acoustic troubadour delivering deeply personal songs in a bedroom voice. The latter scenario is perfectly in play on his 2025 solo release, Foxes in the Snow.

Isbell has developed into a highly accomplished acoustic player, which he attributes to “a bunch of guitar playing” during the height of the pandemic. His fingerpicking and strumming are fluent throughout the album, although the guitar work is never flashy. It always serves the higher purpose of framing and coloring the highly respected singer/songwriter’s meticulously crafted tunes.

The former Drive-By Trucker and moonlighting movie star — Isbell appears in Martin’s Scorsese’s 2023 western thriller, Killers of the Flower Moon — currently spends most of his time leading his band, the 400 Unit, but he goes it alone for Foxes in the Snow.

His primary partner was a single vintage Martin acoustic that he acquired recently. Isbell’s playing on the small-bodied instrument sounds very distinct compared to the plethora of cannon-fire bluegrass players and heavy-handed singer/strummers on the modern Americana landscape. Isbell’s tone is focused more in the mid to upper range, which he often accentuates by capoing up a few frets. Check out the intro on “Ride to Robert’s” to hear his precision hybrid picking and the clarity of his 0 tone.

Martin responded quickly with a pair of just-released signature models, the 0-17 Jason Isbell and the 0-10E Retro Jason Isbell, as well as a signature set of Era strings, which have red silk-wrapped ball ends to protect precious tonewood bridges such as the Brazilian rosewood on his 0-17s.

GP caught up with Isbell via Zoom from Music City, and he let us know how the pursuit of a little acoustic to kick around with in the Big Apple led him down unforeseen avenues.

How did you wind up developing a unique acoustic approach for Foxes in the Snow?

I wrote most of the songs on the same guitar that wound up on the recordings. I was spending a lot of time in New York City at my girlfriend’s apartment. It's not like my home in Nashville, where I have plenty of space for all kinds of guitars. I needed something small, and RetroFret Vintage Guitars in Brooklyn had this 1940 0-17. So I got the guitar to have around the place, and when I started playing it, these songs began appearing.

When I went in the studio at Electric Lady in Greenwich Village I didn’t intend to have that one guitar on everything. I had a bunch of different acoustics and auditioned multiple guitars. My big D-18 sounded fantastic, but it wasn’t quite right for this project. It quickly became obvious I needed something that I could sort of manipulate dynamically and cover a wide frequency range, but also something that wasn’t going to eat up the entire frequency range of the record. The 0-17 worked perfectly.

It's interesting that a player known for having a signature dreadnought would choose to use the small 0 body size on a solo acoustic album. Players often go for a smaller guitar to cut through a mix with drums and bass, but then go with larger guitars to fill more space on their own. What do you think about that?

I don’t think of an 0-17 having a smaller sound but a quieter sound, and I think it pulls the listener in a way that a big dreadnought might not. If the record was more driven by the guitar playing rather than the songs, it might make sense to play a bigger, louder, more impactful guitar. For this project, everything had to work in balance. It was more important for me to not take the listener out of the experience. Even if there's something really cool being played, I don’t want the listener to have to pause in their mind to focus on the guitar. I would like it to be a singular experience of the story.

But there's a fine line there because you have to find an instrument that will reflect everything you need to do. You can’t have a ceiling imposed by the quality of the instrument you’re playing. Getting the wide dynamic range I was looking for was not going to be possible with a guitar that wasn’t put together right.

Can you elaborate?

Guitars from that era are very different from one example to another. Necks were shaped by hand. Mine has a pretty good V as you go further down toward the headstock of the guitar. As you come back toward the body that flattens out a bit, which makes it very playable, very comfortable.

Once I found that 0-17, which was maybe a couple of years ago, everything happened very quickly. I went into the studio for a week at the end of last winter and the album came out in March. I appreciate that because a lot of records I like were made in a similar fashion, like the early Dylan stuff. He had one guitar that he took everywhere with him. He took it into a studio in the Village with a notebook, sat down and made a record. Something about that strips away all the artifice, and you’re basically left with storytelling.

“Ride to Robert’s” is a fun story with a great guitar intro. Can you walk us through it musically?

It’s in the key of F#, and I’m tuned to DADGAD, using a capo at the fourth fret. It’s kind of a Richard Thompson–eque figure that I play. The intro is the hard part. There’s a little slide up you have to execute for the position change. The main part that I sing over is a pretty simple theme based on a V to VI chord progression. Somebody could probably figure out a way to play it in standard, but I needed to be in DADGAD to maneuver on the bottom two strings.

It sounds like a fingerpicking part, but I notice you play it with a pick.

Yeah, I play it in a hybrid picking style. I always use a Tortex 1.14mm.

In other videos when you drop the pick and play fingerstyle, it’s interesting how you maintain the digit pattern of a hybrid picker with your index finger out of the mix.

Yeah, I’ll use the index finger when I play slide, but for fingerstyle I leave the index finger out and use the middle one and the thumb. I don’t know why. Maybe I just dropped so many picks early on that I thought, “Well, we’re not using this finger. This one will just be on hold in case we have a pick.” Laughs

What’s the guitar playing story on “Crimson and Clay”?

It’s in the key of F# minor, and I’m tuned standard with a capo at the second fret. I’m mostly playing out of C-to-Em7 chord shapes while leaving my ring finger on the second string pretty much the whole song to add suspensions. I don’t think it ever really leaves there. I do that a ton where that ring finger stays put there [three frets above the nut or capo position] while I go through basic open chord shapes.

How about “Eileen?”

That’s in the key of G and I’m just playing in standard. The trick is that I’m playing a B minor shape while leaving the G string open. I keep that shape as I raise the bass note to C, and then drop it down to G. That chord is a bit of a finger twister. You can lift the ring finger off the F# on the fourth string for the second measure of that G chord to get a little relief without the suspension.

Do you perform material from Foxes in the Snow on tour with the 400 Unit?

I’ll play between four and six of these songs in a live set. We’ve worked up some pretty interesting full band arrangements, which is nice because I didn’t have that in mind from the beginning. We also do a couple with just me and my other guitar player, Sadler Vaden, on two acoustics, and I might even get up and do one by myself at some point.

I suppose you play one of the new Martin signature models based on your 1940 0-17?

Yes. I needed the 0-17 version to be as accurate to the original guitar as possible, which is a limited release [just 50 examples]. That has to cost more because of the materials and being so labor intensive. I think replicating the neck was probably the biggest challenge from a craftsman perspective. The body is made of sinker mahogany and Martin was able to use Brazilian rosewood for the bridge and fingerboard, which is like a dream for them to do for me. I didn’t even have to ask. They simply went ahead making it the best way possible and the most accurate to the original.

I had a Fishman Matrix piezo pickup installed under the bridge, and I run that signal through a Fishman Aura Spectrum DI pedal onstage. So, that guitar suits all my needs for sure, but I also wanted to have a second option that was more available to the public and less expensive, rather than split the difference between the two for a single signature model.

I believe that the Mexican produced guitars from major manufacturers are very underrated, which has more to do with player bias than the ability of the craftsmen in those factories. Once you get over that preconceived notion, you begin to understand that they’re doing the same kind of work down there.

The 0-10E Retro has the same vibe. It is also made of all mahogany and it looks very similar, but the finish is different and the neck is intentionally slimmer, so it’s going to be a bit more comfortable for players in their early stages or that might play a different style. I’ve spent lots of years making barre chords on big, fat guitar necks, so that doesn’t bother me at this point, but the 0-10E does play a little bit faster, which comes down to preference.

I didn’t want something that felt like trying to replicate a more expensive guitar with cheaper materials. I wanted them to be different choices, and I believe we accomplished that. The 0-10E has built-in electronics. I could take it out on stage, and I don’t think I would miss anything. I don’t think the audience would either.

I notice that the 10-year anniversary remaster of Something More Than Free just popped up on Spotify, and your playing seems to have evolved significantly. What’s your take?

I’m a much better guitar player now than I was 10 years ago. I spent a lot of time during the lockdown phase of the pandemic sitting on the floor playing guitar — everything from electric to acoustic… just a bunch of guitar playing. I had also written and recorded an album right before the lockdown started, and we went ahead and put it out, even though we couldn’t tour behind it or anything.

I sort of emptied the well at that point, so I didn’t really focus too much on writing new songs. I just played the guitar to keep myself from going crazy. Since then, I feel like I’ve shortened the distance between what's in my head and what happens in my hands. And the older I get, the more I want to play guitar. It might not be the coolest thing in the world to be a guitar player these days, but at this age, I just don’t care, you know? It’s what I want to do.

Where do you see the frontier right now?

I’d like to develop stronger fingerstyle techniques and keep working on my slide playing. That might be the thing I’m best at on guitar, but it’s not like riding a bike. If you don’t do it for a while, it takes a minute to get back into the swing of things. Slide playing is so rewarding because it has such a human vocal characteristic. My favorite types of guitar playing require the least number of notes to move you.

I remember hearing Warren Haynes talk about how when he first got a ’Burst [Les Paul Standard], he played fewer notes because he simply liked the way they sounded so much. He was listening to the guitar. So if the instrument is right and everything's working like it should, I wind up playing less and less notes as time goes on.

Jason Isbell says guitarists who hold a bias against Mexican guitars are missing out on quality gear.

The Americana guitar star has worked with two of America’s biggest guitar-building institutions, Fender and Martin, which also have factories south of the border. While many guitarists believe American-made electric and acoustic guitars are far superior to their more affordable Mexican cousins, Isbell says players shouldn’t be so quick to judge.

His words come from a recent Guitar.com interview about his two new releases with Martin: the U.S.-made 0-17 and the Mexican-made 0-10E, both of which are based on his pre-war Martin acoustic.

“I think people pay for their biases sometimes,” he says. “Not necessarily with Martin but with a lot of companies. I think people will pay more to reinforce the incorrect opinions that they already have.”

The cost difference can be substantial. Consider Fender guitars: American-made models can cost up to twice as much as Mexican models, which can be priced lower due to the reduced labor costs and use of less expensive parts and materials.

While many guitarists see a big divide in quality between the two, Isbell says it's not necessarily so. As an example, he points to his two new Martin acoustics: the premium 0-17, which costs $4,999, and the wallet-friendly, Mexico-made 0-10E, at $1,049.

“I could take this Mexican-made version out and play it on tour, and nobody would know the difference,” he says. “I don’t think anybody could have done a better job on a guitar at that price point at making it reminiscent of the pre-war Martin, for sure. It definitely has that vibe to it.”

Then, of course, there are the people who believe the price of a guitar doesn’t directly correlate to quality, like the guitarist who played a $40 Harley Benton Strat every night of a 113-date arena tour. And as Guitar Player has proven, you can get a lot of bang for 500 of your bucks, or less.

Isbell's 2021 Fender collab, which released the four-star-rated Jason Isbell Custom Telecaster, is another fine example of a high-quality instrument from Mexico. And he pushed Fender hard on it, too.

“Fender did a great job on that guitar,” Isbell says. “I think it was the first double-bound Tele that they had made in the factory, and they knocked it out of the park.”

“It’s great that Fender is still coming up with ways to improve one of the greatest electric guitars ever made,” GP said of the axe. “The fact that the Jason Isbell Custom Telecaster is priced within reach of working players should make Isbell feel pretty stoked about his new signature Tele.”

Isbell's words about Mexican-made guitars take on extra import when you remember that he's a connoisseur of fine instruments. He went to extreme lengths to buy Ed King’s infamous “Red Eye” Les Paul. But that shows how value can be found at both extremes of the scale.

Elsewhere, the Tim Shaw-voiced pickups in Isbell's Tele have now been launched in their own right, and the guitarist has offered some important buying advice for newbie players to make learning easier.

And for more from Isbell, check out these nifty slide guitar and blues tricks, direct from the man himself.

Jason Isbell, the celebrated Americana guitarist and current owner of Ed King’s famed “Red Eye” 1959 Les Paul Standard, has expert advice to offer players who are buying their first guitar.

Guesting on Matt Sweeney’s Guitar Moves podcast, the six-time Grammy winner says the best investment a new guitar owner can make should happen before leaving the store.

“Spend the 50, 80 or 100 bucks before you leave the music store and let them set it up for you,” he says. “Let them set the action right, make sure the frets are level, make sure it’ll stay in tune.”

He adds that it’s a tip he wishes he received when he was starting his guitar journey. Newbie players have a lot to contend with — from getting their fingers used to the fretboard to learning basic chords and scales and beyond. As such, basic guitar management skills are often overlooked.

That’s understandable. With so much else to learn, it’s unfair to expect new guitarists to be know how to adjust their truss rod with great precision or fix minor intonation issues, just two things that can ruin a budget guitar's performance.

But unless you’re a player like Keith Urban, who likes a guitar with a bit of fight in it, Isbell understands the benefits of players plying their trade on an instrument set up to be a little more forgiving.

“That is so huge,” he continues. “Because of course you’re not gonna be able to afford an incredible instrument when you’re that age. But if you spend the extra time, the extra money, you get home and you can play it. It makes all the difference in the world.”

In response, Matt Sweeney, best known for his work in Skunk, Chavez and alt-rock supergroup Zwan, notes how players new to electric and acoustic guitars may experience pain in their fingers.

“The old guys will say, ‘It’s supposed to, you’ll get the calluses,’” he notes.

“You don’t want people to stop playing because it hurts,” Isbell responds. “You don’t wanna quit.”

The podcast and the important talking points it presents for beginner guitarists came shortly after Joe Bonamassa stressed the importance of being selfish in guitar stores. This is particularly valid for new players who, it could be argued, are more likely to buy a guitar based on its reputation rather than for how it performs specifically lfor them.

“Buy the stuff that speaks to you before you buy the stuff that you think is going to impress your friends,” he tells Guitarist.

“My suggestion is — if you’re a collector, a hobbyist or a professional musician — to buy things that make you happy,” he continues. “If you’re sitting on the couch and you can’t stop grabbing a guitar, it doesn't matter what it says on the headstock. It doesn’t matter how much you paid for it.”

He's also busted the myth that buying the right amp is a costly endeavor.

Meanwhile, Yvette Young has detailed her biggest case of buyer’s remorse, revealing she bought an instrument while third wheeling on a date.

Isbell grew up on a farm in North Alabama, and benefitted from the musical tutelage of his grandfather and uncle, learning to play multiple instruments by their hands. It was a foundation upon which he built his career.

He came into the possession of Lynyrd Skynyrd guitarist Ed King's unique "Red Eye" Les Paul after Carter Vintage Guitars in Nashville invited him to play some of King's electric guitars for the store’s YouTube channel. The guitarist passed away in 2018.

“Ed had a beautiful collection of instruments,” Isbell told Guitar Player in 2020. “He didn’t just get good vintage guitars — he got the best versions of pretty much everything.”

The guitar got its "red eye" marking as a result of sunlight bleaching its finish while the guitar sat in a storefront window for an extended period. However, the price tag dangling off the Les Paul's toggle switch, kept a portion of the guitar out of the sun's reach. The guitar received a Gibson Murphy Lab’s reissue last year.

Fender has released a Tim Shaw-designed Jason Isbell signature Telecaster pickup set for players looking to mod their favorite Teles.

The pickups were designed back in 2021 as part of the modern Americana great’s signature Tele, and the release marks the first time the two single-coil pickups have been available outside of that guitar.

Based on one of Isbell’s favorite guitars, a ’65 Candy Apple Red Telecaster, the bridge, Fender says, delivers “the twang, sparkle, and fire,” that Isbell is known for. Plain-enamel wire has been chosen here for a ‘60s tonality to ensure that twang is suitably pronounced.

Shaw expands on that description, with Fender's in-house pickup guru saying players can expect “classic fat, full Tele tones,” but for the neck pickup, things get interesting.

Its partner pickup has been designed with a slightly taller bobbin and what Shaw calls a “twisted Tele” template. The increased bobbin height allows for more winds, ultimately sculpting a more “Stratocaster-esque” character with its output.

What’s left is “the best of both worlds” from Fender’s two flagship six-strings and their tonal character, with formvar-coated magnet wire helping accentuate its brightness.

Both pickups come loaded with Alnico 5 magnets for “focused and enhanced” dynamics and are wax-potted with a light, road-worn aging aesthetic.

The release follows on the heels of Gibson's painstaking recreation of Isbell's legendary "Red Eye" Les Paul, which formerly belonged to Lynyrd Skynyrd's Ed King.

Two years after King's passing in 2018, Guitar Player detailed how Isbell came to own the iconic, sunlight-blotted guitar, with Isbell saying that its former owner “got the best versions of pretty much everything” he owned.

The Les Paul’s iconic release, as a limited edition run of just 59 builds, puts Isbell in the unique position of having signature guitars with both Fender and Gibson, and that is no mere coincidence.

The former Drive-By-Truckers guitarist and solo star has forged a sizable reputation for his powerful but tender chops and dynamic blend of roots and rock playing styles.

That’s propelled him to six Grammy wins – with 2023's Weathervanes taking Best Americana Album, and its track Iron Skillet taking home the Best American Roots Song – accolades as his most recent triumphs.

“This collaboration with Fender is huge for me," Isbell said at the time of his signature Telecaster's launch. "I’ve owned and played Fender guitars since I was 12 years old and I consider their instruments to be a big part of my musical journey.”

Now, a key part of its character is available for modders and tone chasers, without needing to purchase the full guitar.

Handily for Fender, it also puts the spotlight back onto that side of his playing after his headline-grabbing Gibson collaboration earlier this year.

The Jason Isbell Telecaster signature pickup set costs $149.99 and is available today.

Head to Fender to learn more.

R.E.M. performed together publicly for the first time in over 15 years Thursday night (June 13) to celebrate their induction into the prestigious Songwriters Hall of Fame. Acoustic instruments in hand, vocalist Michael Stipe, guitarist Peter Buck, bassist Mike Mills, and drummer Bill Berry treated the audience to a spirited rendition of their massive 1991 hit, Losing My Religion.

“We are R.E.M.” Stipe said, before the band took the stage. “And this is what we did.”

Peter Buck switched to mandolin for the performance, laying out the song’s introspective intro melody, while Mike Mills handled acoustic guitar duties. Bill Berry, who left the band in 1997 after suffering a brain aneurysm, was back onstage, providing light percussion that accented frontman Michael Stipe’s melancholy vocals.

Other inductees at the star-studded event, held at the Marriott Marquis in New York City, included Donald Fagen and the late Walter Becker of Steely Dan, Dean Pitchford (Footloose, Fame, Holding Out for a Hero), Hillary Lindsey (Girl Crush, Jesus, Take the Wheel), and producer Timbaland, with special awards presented to Diane Warren (Johnny Mercer Award) and SZA (Hal David Starlight Award). 

Presenters, performers and guests included Keith Urban, Jason Isbell, Nile Rodgers, Richie Sambora, and Kevin and Michael Bacon.

Trey Anastasio had the lofty task of recreating two iconic Steely Dan guitar classics, Kid Charlemagne and Reelin’ in the Years, to kick off the celebration. 

Backed by a stellar house band featuring leader Rob Mathes, guitarist Erick Walls, bassist James Genus, and drummer Shawn Pelton, the Phish guitarist handled both lead vocal and guitar duties. Anastasio's performance paid homage to the memorable riffs created by Fagen, Becker, and studio guitarists Larry Carlton and Elliott Randall on the original versions, while adding his own unique flair to the songs.

“I loved them when I was a kid, I have all their albums. They’re probably some of the first guitar solos I ever learned,” he noted in his speech. “It is my great honor to induct them into the Songwriters Hall of Fame. I can’t tell you how much it means to me. I am a true fan.”

After watching Anastasio perform the medley, Donald Fagen joked, “We need more guitar players!” Fagen’s time at the podium was succinct, clocking in at under one minute. “I’d like to thank Walter Becker,” he noted, “wherever he may be.” 

Jason Isbell channeled his inner teenager when he hit the stage, tackling R.EM.’s It’s the End of the World as We Know It (And I Feel Fine) with reckless abandon, stabbing the rhythm out on his signature Fender Telecaster.

The song’s non-stop volley of words prompted him to exclaim “I’ve never said that many words so quickly in my life!”

“R.E.M. moved like a single instrument,” Isbell said in his speech. “The songs they created served a real purpose for kids like me growing up in a small Southern town. Somebody out there reluctantly clawing their way into the mainstream, who was just as strange and out of place as I was. I heard those songs on the radio all the time. I think it’s safe to say that thousands of outcast kids in the ‘80s had that same experience.”

On the red carpet prior to the ceremony, Isbell spoke of the band’s importance to his songwriting craft.

“Their song Nightswimming was huge for me – the melody and the way they worked on writing that song. When I was a kid and these songs were out, I was studying them. ‘How did this happen? How did it get created?’ 

“Michael wrote the lyric and Mills wrote the piano part, which is very symphonic in a way, almost classical. Classical as a genre, not an era. I think it’s amazing that they can collaborate like that, almost in an Elton and Bernie way. They worked together to make something that was stronger than the sum of its parts.

“I’ve known Mike Mills for a long time, and every time I see him, I try to tell him how important his counterpoint, background singing, and his ear for melody is. The way he played the bass. To be that busy and that far up past the fourth or fifth fret that often and not get in anybody’s way. If any of them had done anything different, it would have been a train wreck. But it wound up perfect.”

Mills also discussed his role in the band in a red-carpet interview.

“Because of the way Peter plays guitar, it leaves a lot of room for me to influence the direction of the song. Because he’s not bashing out chords, it leaves open space that I can fill with melodies that will determine the direction of the song. That’s been a constant since the beginning and the part I’ve enjoyed most about songwriting in terms of my bass playing. I get to steer the song the way I want it to go.

“I play guitar on a bunch of songs on the records but I’m seldom the guitar player. We have one of the best in the world with Peter, so we leave it to him.”

Buck, who rarely gives interviews, spoke to GP before the ceremony and discussed how his guitar style and love of using the right instruments for the song worked in tandem to enhance the band’s songwriting process. 

“I knew I wasn’t a shredder,” he said, “so I had to work with the skills and strengths I had as a player.”

Gibson has unveiled its latest high-end Les Paul, an exacting Custom Shop recreation of Ed King’s famed “Red Eye” 1959 Les Paul Standard. 

The guitar is named after the bright red area of finish near its toggleswitch. It's an eye-catching example of Gibson’s famous ‘Burst era of Les Pauls and has been in the possession of six-time Grammy winner Jason Isbell since shortly after the Lynyrd Skynyrd guitarist passed in 2018. 

Given that the “Red Eye” model is a part of the company's very-top-of-the-line Collector’s Edition line of guitars, Gibson utilized 3D scanning and “ultra-precise Murphy Lab aging techniques,” to translate every fragment of wear, tear, and personality of the original into the copy. This is a limited run, with only 59 models being produced. 

Legend has it that the guitar had been displayed in a store window, causing the finish to fade. However, the price-tag hung off the toggleswitch, obscuring a portion of the guitar’s body from sunlight.

Consequently, that left much of the pigment behind it unblemished, resulting in the guitar’s dramatic ‘red eye’ visage. The bold red of the original finish also remains beneath the pickguard.  

That’s a quirk that Gibson was eager to reproduce with these faithful replicas. It even went one step further by having Isbell, who was involved with “every step of the process,” hand-select the figured maple tops for the builds. 

The guitar even comes with its own history-honoring Gibson cost, with the company sparing no expense in ensuring that every nuance of the guitars stayed as true to the original as possible. That goes some distance in explaining its weighty $22,000 price tag. 

Ed King purchased the guitar in 1982, and it remained a cherished part of his collection until his passing. 

Several months later, as told by Guitar Player, Christie Carter of Carter Vintage Guitars in Nashville invited Isbell to play King’s guitars for the shop’s YouTube channel. 

That included strumming the ’73 Strat that starred in Sweet Home Alabama, and a host of gold-top Les Pauls. Then he spotted the “Red Eye” – which was famously stolen from King at gunpoint in 1987 – on a stand. King's mission to retrieve the guitar took him a decade. 

“Ed had a beautiful collection of instruments,” Isbell told GP in a 2020 interview. “He didn’t just get good vintage guitars – he got the best versions of pretty much everything.”

“I never thought I would need a ’Burst,” the one-time Drive-by Truckers guitarist continued. “I mean, nobody needs a ’Burst, but I never thought that I would want one, as expensive as they are. I’ve got a ’61 [Gibson ES-] 335 that’s just incredible, and I’ve never heard a Les Paul that could beat it.”

But there was a steely determination from the guitarist to gather the required funds, leading to him asking his manager to find some methods of getting the necessary money that didn't involve touring the world four times over. 

“I said [to my manager] ‘Can you book me some private shows? No war criminals.’ It just so happened that BitCoin was taking off that year, so I wound up at a bunch of weird BitCoin birthday parties and paid for that guitar without having to dip into anyone else's life. 

“I met some interesting people,” he adds, “and went to some parts of the Hamptons that I’ve not been to before.” 

Some choice changes have since been made to the guitar to preserve its original hardware. The tuners and tailpiece have been replaced with retrofits, and Isbell suspects the pickup covers to be New Old Stock. 

He has also refretted the guitar – King was rumored to have undertaken a partial refret himself – but otherwise, the original guitar remains largely intact. Indeed, the pickups and wiring harness are from February 1959.  

That beloved spec is what Gibson has painstakingly set to deliver here. It features a lightweight one-piece mahogany body, a mahogany neck, and a Brazillian rosewood fretboard – a key feature of the original. 

The 24.75" scale length build delivers 22 medium jumbo frets and aged cellulose nitrate trapezoid inlays, with four Gold Butyrate pots split evenly between Volume and Tone. 

It’s stocked with two un-potted Custombucker pickups, their wear mirroring the original, with an ABR-1 No-Wire bridge, lightweight aluminium stop bar, and Kluson tuners.  

The Custom Shop “Red Eye” ships in a Les Paul Protector Series hardshell case that is packed with extra treats to make that sizable price tag feel a little less frightening.

Those extras include a Jason Isbell guitar strap – made by Savas from Midnight Blue Wild Alligator leather with a chain stitched and an inlaid Red Eye emblem – two rubber “beer bottle” style strap locks, a certificate of authenticity booklet, and reproduction hangtags. 

Isbell says he instinctively knows when a guitar is going to be good or not, and that was the case during his first encounter with the “Red Eye” – even before plugging it in. 

“When I was a kid me and my dad would go shopping for fishing tackle. He’d take the rod and say ‘go stand over there, put the end of the rod on your throat’ and he would hold the handle of the rod and I would talk,” Isbell remembers. “If he could feel it in his hand, it was a pretty good fishing rod. 

“It’s that way with a good guitar. Every point that you touch on that instrument, you feel the vibration moving. I would know if the ‘Red Eye’ was a good guitar even if I was stone deaf, just because you can feel it vibrating.”

Only 59 examples of the ultra-limited edition guitar made, and each will be sold for $21,999.  

Head to Gibson for more information. 

Jason Isbell is no stranger to a great guitar, and in Gibson TV’s new episode of The Collection the four-time Grammy Award winner gives host and Director of Brand Experience at Gibson, Mark Agnesi, a close look at his hoard of six-string treasures.

“Jason’s episode of The Collection is possibly my favorite episode of the show to date,” says Agnesi. “I see him as more of a guitar curator than a guitar collector. Every guitar in his collection is there for a reason and helps him tell a musical story.”

From his formative musical days to his current approach as one of the guitar world’s leading players, Isbell shares stories and gives insights with an intimate tour of his extensive cache of classic instruments.

Recalling his memories of being a guitar-obsessed teenager, Isbell says: “I stopped playing sports in school and just played the guitar all the time. And so any time I had any money (when I was 16 I worked at Walmart pushing buggies) I spent it all on Chandler Tube Drivers and Cry Baby [wah wahs] and all that kind of stuff.”

Since then, Isbell as amassed an impressive collection of vintage guitars that would “make any guitar nerd jealous.” And though they may be rare, collectible pieces they are also the guitarist’s tools of the trade – instruments he takes out on the road to perform with.

Making up this stockpile of Holy Grail axes are a bunch of incredible vintage Gibsons, including a ‘64 Firebird III, ‘61 Les Paul SG Standard, ‘56 Les Paul TV Special Tenor, ‘61 ES-335TD, ‘46 Gibson J-45, ‘60 Les Paul Custom, ‘53 Les Paul Goldtop, ‘59 Les Paul Standard “Red Eye” and 2019 Custom Shop “Red Eye” Replica.

“Two pickups and that middle position – that’s the magic thing for me, because you’ve got so much versatility,” says Isbell cradling his famous ’59 ‘Burst. “If you’ve got good, old pots and your wiring harness works like it should then you can get a lot of different tones.”

Of course, Isbell’s world-class collection doesn’t just end there. He also gives us a look at a ‘34 Martin 000-28, ‘65 Fender Telecaster, ‘58 Fender Stratocaster, ‘53 Blackguard Fender Telecaster, ‘60 Fender Stratocaster, ‘30s National Style 3, 70s Gretsch White Falcon, and a ‘59 Gretsch 6131 Jet Fire Bird.

This year sees the tenth anniversary of Isbell’s landmark album Southeastern and on September 29, a “reimagined and reamplified” edition is set for release via Southeastern Records/Thirty Tigers.

In addition to a remastered LP, this special ten-year anniversary reissue appears as 3CD and 4LP Deluxe box sets. A selection of Southeastern apparel is also available.

Catch Jason Isbell and the 400 Unit on tour now.

It doesn’t happen often, but every once in a while, Sadler Vaden feels like his guitar playing needs a bit of a recharge. Not that he’s ever at a loss for opportunities to play. Between his main gig as lead guitarist with Jason Isbell and the 400 Unit and a burgeoning solo career, the Grammy-winning musician happily notes that his dance card is usually full. Even so, he occasionally notices that some of his licks need a little sprucing up.

“It happens to everybody,” Vaden says. “I was talking to Butch Walker the other day, and he was like, ‘I feel like I’m playing the same licks for years.’”

One of Vaden’s tricks to shake off the cobwebs involves learning the solo of a song he loves but has never attempted to play before. “A couple of weeks ago, I started doing that with ‘Kid Charlemagne’ by Steely Dan,” he reveals. “I’ve been crazy about the song since forever, so I said, ‘It’s finally time I learned that solo.’ I haven’t gotten to the end yet, but I feel like it’s already opened my brain a bit. I had a gig the other night, and I was slipping little things from Larry Carlton’s soloing into what I was doing. Sometimes you have to force your mind into going new places – and your fingers will follow.”

He has other helpful suggestions as well, like knowing when to put the guitar down. “There are times when you come to a brick wall,” he says. “Your first instinct is to try to smash through it, but sometimes the best option is to look for a way around it, and the answer isn’t always obvious. Allow yourself a moment to assess and reflect.”

1. Play Things You Know on Acoustic Guitar

“This tip is for electric guitar players, of course. If you have things you know – solos, riffs, what have you – try playing them on an acoustic guitar. Right away, you’ll spot some weaknesses in your style and ability. It’ll improve your chops, as in your facility on the fretboard, as well as your timing.

“Playing the electric is fun, no doubt, but we tend to hide behind the power of the amp and our effects pedals. It’s like, ‘Okay, I can play this part a little sloppy. Nobody will notice.’ But guess what? When you get in a studio situation, a producer or engineer will notice. You might be asked to play a part clean, without a loud amp or distortion, and if you’re not articulating a passage precisely, you’ll get some comments you might not want to hear.”

2. Put the Guitar Down

“I’ve said this on some podcasts, and people were like, ‘What’s this guy talking about? That doesn’t make any sense!’ But I’ll say it again: Put the guitar down for a while. Stop playing, stop practicing. Whether it’s a few days, a week, two weeks even. Just give yourself a break already. It won’t be the end of the world, trust me.

“I do it all the time. I’ll come off tour and the last thing I want to do is play the guitar. I need to let my brain take in other information. I want to take in some regular life again. Since I’ve played professionally, the longest I’ve gone without playing is probably two weeks, and at that point I feel like I really want to play again.

“Sometimes I have to get back into it and make my fingers do what I want them to – my muscle memory is gone a little bit. But I find that it helps me. I feel fresh and excited again, and I’m not playing those same patterns.”

3. Work on the Sound of Your Amp Before You Use Pedals

“I’ve seen guitarists get all their pedals going before they’ve even played a note through an amp. That strikes me as counterintuitive. Pedals should enhance a sound that’s already good; they shouldn’t have to mask a problem. It’s like southern barbecue: My favorite barbecue doesn’t need any sauce; if I put sauce on it, it’s because I want to make something good a little better.

“There are singular players like The Edge. The way he uses pedals is part of his art, and it’s a large part of U2’s sound. He’s a very special type of player, though, and I’ve heard him rock out without effects. He knows how to get it going just fine.

“For practically everybody else, though, I would say try to get a really good sound with just your guitar and amp. Pedals shouldn’t be your first go-to. If you’re looking for some power, get it out of your amp’s gain before you go stomping on distortion pedals. I used to be an offender. I thought my pedals were everything. Once I started working with people in studios, I found that pedals sometimes made my sound seem smaller.

“Dialing up a really nice full sound with just my amp gave me something good to work with. That’s the other thing: If you’re playing a part and it’s not happening, maybe you need to work on that part a little more – a pedal won’t improve it.”

4. Learn to Play Vocal Lines

“Let’s face it: Guitarists are enamored of solos and riffs. It’s all we play, and it becomes our vocabulary. But something I’ve found that really helps is when I learn how to play vocal lines of songs. There’s just certain things the human voice can do that an instrument can’t. It’s almost like another language.

“I stumbled onto this about five years ago and found it allowed me to get out of a rut. It opened me up melodically and sonically, but I think it helped my compositional abilities, too. If you can see where the vocal melody lives inside a scale, then you’re thinking differently. Maybe you can come up with different chord inversions to work under the vocal. It’s just a really good practice to get into.”

5. Learn Songs That Are Rhythmic

“Rhythm guitar is an often neglected and maligned aspect of playing. It’s a great idea to learn songs in which the lead lines are rhythmic riffs instead of lead lines. I’m talking ‘Substitute’ by the Who, ‘All Right Now’ by Free, ‘What I Like About You’ by the Romantics or Bachman-Turner Overdrive’s ‘Let it Ride.’ Rhythm guitar is the bedrock of everything. If you can play great rhythm guitar, you’re going to be a real asset in a band.

“I’m always working on my rhythm playing. Sometimes I’m like, ‘Man, I’m ahead of the beat!’ Other times, I feel like I’m dragging. I don’t know if you ever master it. To me, it’s a constant work in progress. Live, I take plenty of solos, but I also love to just hold down the rhythm. When you’re not playing solos, you should think of the guitar as part of the rhythm section with the bass and drums.

“In a studio, this is key. I’ve been in situations where someone didn’t nail the rhythm part, and it’s like, ‘We’re going to have to redo that.’ John Lennon knew how to play rhythm – talk about an underrated player. George Harrison, too. And Pete Townshend, obviously – one of the best. Keith Richards! He’s one of the most well-known and respected players of all time. He’s a legend, and he’s a rhythm player. He doesn’t even need all the strings. Take a cue from those guys and get your rhythm going.”

A quartet of Grammy Awards underscores Jason Isbell’s reputation as a singer/songwriter, but his extensive catalog also finds him flexing his six-string strengths.

Along the way to mastering his mix of melody, ferocity, and restraint, Isbell’s journey intersected some serious guitar techniques.

Here are the five riffs that changed his life...

1. “The Bells of St. Mary’s” by Chet Atkins

“My uncle was into the Chet Atkins/Merle Travis style of picking,” says Isbell, “and this song was a big deal for me when I was seven years old.

“When I started writing singer/songwriter stuff, and I was depending on an acoustic guitar to accompany myself, having an understanding of these alternating thumb-picking patterns really helped me out.”

2. “Cortez the Killer” by Neil Young

“When I started coming up with melodies and chord changes on my own, this song kept coming back to me, because of the tension and release created when you hold that D note from one chord to the next.

“It creates this kind of cool suspension.”

3. “I Know a Little” by Lynrd Skynrd

“In my house, there was a big love of early Lynyrd Skynyrd – especially the guitar playing of Steve Gaines – because the band took pride in playing things that were complicated.

“This intro blew my mind, and it still does. In fact, my wife [songwriter/fiddle player Amanda Shires] showed me how similar it is to a lot of jazz-influenced Texas swing. 

"If you work up to a point where you can play that kind of guitar, you can do a whole lot of stuff.”

4. “Salt Creek” by Bill Monroe and the Bluegrass Boys

“From a very early age, my grandfather would have me play rhythm guitar for him while he played mandolin, banjo, or fiddle. I got interested in bluegrass music that way, but I have my own bastardized version of it.

“I thought I had a handle on bluegrass flat picking before I moved to Nashville and discovered the checker at the grocery store is probably a better picker than you are!”

5. “Running On Empty” by Jackson Browne With David Lindley

“I started out playing slide guitar listening to people like Duane Allman, and then going back and listening to Elmore James.

“But when I heard David Lindley’s lap-steel part on this song, it really opened my eyes to a different, more melodic way of playing slide that wasn’t based of the standard licks I’d heard in blues music.”

The guitar players who most influenced Browan Lollar serve as bookends of a sort. In style and tone, the guitarist for horn-heavy soul purveyors St. Paul and the Broken Bones hangs out somewhere between Steve Cropper and Radiohead, and never more so than on his band’s latest album, The Alien Coast (ATO).

“I’m so impressed with somebody like [Radiohead’s] Jonny Greenwood or Ed O’Brien, because those guys were guitar players in the biggest band on Earth,” he explains. “Then they were like, ‘We don’t want to be a guitar band anymore; we want to be an electronic band.’”

Lollar says he and his bandmates can relate, although he’s reluctant to make the comparison.

“Our band is sort of at the same point, where we’re like, ‘We don’t want to make that type of music or be known for one type of music,’” says the guitarist, who previously played in Jason Isbell’s 400 Unit band in the early aughts.

“We want to explore and really press ourselves. I find myself thinking about those guys a lot and what they would do in certain situations.”

After forming in Birmingham, Alabama in 2012, the octet became darlings of the festival and club circuits for its throwback look and sound. It didn’t take long for the band members to grow out of their matching suits, though.

Once their experimental streak began to show, they tugged on that thread and kept pulling it forward.

“A lot of times, especially these days, we’ll bring in something that’s totally written on a synthesizer,” Lollar says. 

Once the other band members get ahold of an idea, though, that synth phrase could end up as a guitar riff or horn blast. And for Lollar, that’s the fun of it. 

On the eve of releasing The Alien Coast, he talked with us about finding his place in an eight-piece band and coming of age in a music town with a backstory all its own.

You grew up near FAME Recording Studio. What was it like to develop around so many great musicians?

I lived over in Florence, which is just across the river from Fame. Everybody knew exactly what Fame had done back in the day.

I grew up going to bars and seeing people like Kelvin Holly, who was Little Richard’s guitar player for a long time, play to people who were just ignoring them. I thought you had to be that good to play at a bar.

Years later, after I started touring, I realized how special what we have there is.

How did your early recording sessions impact you as a young player?

We recorded the Jason Isbell and the 400 Unit [2009] record at FAME. That was the first time I’d actually been able to set up camp in there with a band, where we had the studio for a week and got to move in.

It was also my first real opportunity to get into the studio with all the toys and have time to experiment and do things that Jason didn’t have planned out before going into the studio. I still think about that session a lot.

Which players were you most impressed by growing up?

I loved Chet Atkins and Mark Knopfler, and people from the old style of playing. Then I got into more band-oriented players like Steve Cropper and David Gilmour. I felt those players knew their role and the spot in the music they needed to fill, and they filled it perfectly.

Steve Cropper isn’t flashy, but he would come in with a really raw sound. It was just crazy to me how he was able to make that Telecaster sound work in that setting.

For a long time I’ve been interested in guitar as an instrument that adds to a band instead of overtakes it, especially with St. Paul and the Broken Bones, because we’ve got so much stuff going on, and it’s so important to be dynamic in the band.

How did you find your place in such a large ensemble?

I had to discover that I didn’t have to go in there and be “guitar guy” and come up with riffs and stuff. When we first started, before [2014’s] Half the City, I told the guys I didn’t want to take a bunch of guitar solos. I didn’t think that this band needed to be a guitar solo-y band.

At that point in my life, I was pretty tired of it. I just wanted to focus on writing songs. Luckily, it doesn’t really lend itself to that, anyway.

Do you lean on any music theory tips or lessons to find complementary notes to what the horns are playing?

Very little. I’m the one guy in the band that isn’t great at music theory. I know it enough to have a grudging respect, because I have to. All our horn players can just spout the stuff off, and Al [Gamble], too, our organ player. I know what works and doesn’t over a certain chord.

What do you find most challenging about playing in this band?

There’s eight guys onstage, okay? All the low-frequency stuff is organ and bass. All the mid- to high-frequency stuff is pretty much covered by the horns, and all the high-frequency stuff with our singer.

Where does that leave the guitar player? For a long time, I was experimenting to find what kind of guitar tone really suited us.

Where did that journey take you?

I went from a [Gibson] ES-335 to an old [Gibson] Trini Lopez that I really love. It didn’t really work, though, so I went to a [Fender] Jazzmaster and finally settled on a [Southside Custom Guitars] T-style, because it’s got that Steve Cropper thing where it kind of threads the needle between all those other very rounded, beautiful instruments.

You’ve been upheld as a plug-and-play guitar player. Considering how far out you get on The Alien Coast, has that reputation held?

Yeah. Actually, it’s gotten a little better. When we fly, we’ve got 1,000 bags to get from point A to point B. Right now on my pedalboard, I’ve got one of those Cry Baby Mini Wahs, and I really like it a lot.

I’ve got a Boss ES-5 multi-effects processor; that’s what I use for flange and a little bit of echo. That goes into a Strata reverb pedal, and from there I go out.

I don’t have a lot of pedals because I have to focus on what I’m playing with my hands. If I start tap dancing too much, I can’t play well.

Your playing in this band is well suited to a combo amp. What are you using?

For a long time, I was playing the Supro Thunderbolt Plus, but our horn player Allen [Branstetter] is playing a lot of secondary guitar parts on the new record, and he’s going through the Thunderbolt now, and I’ve moved back over to a Fender Twin.

I can’t seem to get away from a Fender amp. Most of the time, if it’s not a Fender amp, I’m just trying to make it sound like a Fender amp.

As a band, it sounds like you threw out the rule book this time.

We have been evolving in that way ever since the second record. With this album, we asked about every single part of this record, “Does this song need this?” We didn’t just throw guitar on a track if it didn’t need it, and honestly that went for anything.

There’s barely any horns. We really just wanted it to be a challenge for us. We wanted it to be out of our comfort zone.

Order The Alien Coast here.

Telecasters with customized hardware, electronics, finishes, and so on have been a big part of Fender’s product line for years. The Jason Isbell Custom Telecaster is the latest model to be hybridized by mixing components from different eras, while also bringing all-new elements into the mix when deemed necessary by Isbell and the Fender design team. 

“I went with a few different Teles I really like and sort of put together my favorite features of each one for this guitar,” says the guitarist/singer/songwriter and beacon of the Americana scene. “I liked the look of the double-bound body on my Tele Custom from ’59 or ’60, and I have a Custom Shop version of it that I put a black pickguard on. We went with those things purely for the look. 

“We also used a traditional bridge with brass saddles, but the edges of the bridge are cut away to make it easier to mute with your right hand and play that much closer to the saddles. We also put a truss-rod access on the headstock to make it easier to adjust the neck, because you don’t have to take it apart.” 

The Jason Isbell Custom Telecaster features a Road Worn Chocolate sunburst lacquer finish and aged hardware. For the most part, it resembles a well-used vintage Tele, except for the engraved neck plate and aforementioned headstock rout.

Although not readily visible unless you take off the chromed switch plate, the wiring in the control cavity is modern-style vinyl insulated, not cloth-covered. 

The JICT came set up with low action and sweet-sounding intonation, however, the fret ends were a little ragged, the nut corners were sharp, and the zipper on the gig bag failed right off the bat. Otherwise, it plays well and there’s plenty to like about its acoustic tone, which rings out clearly and has good sustain.

Plugged into a Fender Deluxe Reverb and a Vox AC10 C1, and with a Fulltone OCD pedal for grind, the JICT sounded deep and rich and had a balanced presentation of fatness and top-end bite. The brightness and presence of the neck pickup was immediately noticeable for how it stands on its own and how it combines with the bridge pickup to deliver an open and articulate sound.

“The neck pickup is basically a Twisted Tele, but it breaks up a little quicker than they have in the past,” Isbell explains. “Tim Shaw [Fender’s chief engineer] has been working on that pickup design, and it sounds a little more like a Strat pickup, which makes it more useful and musical to me. In fact, I could play this guitar on the neck pickup and convince people that it was a Stratocaster.

"One of the things about a Telecaster that didn’t lend itself to my style of playing was that the traditional neck pickup is much darker. I like that sound, but it wasn’t as useful to me as something that was a little more scooped and had more high-end bite. It handles the fuzz pedal well and just makes a lot of sense, because it gives you an option you haven’t typically had with a Telecaster.”

The Jason Isbell Custom Telecaster certainly delivers enough clarity and punch in the neck setting to deploy it as an alternate texture for rhythm and lead work, and it brings more girth and sparkle to the dual-pickup position.

Coupled with the excellent bridge pickup, this new signature Telecaster gives country-rockers a potent new weapon that looks as cool as it sounds. It’s great that Fender is still coming up with ways to improve one of the greatest electric guitars ever made, and the fact that the JICT is priced within reach of working players should make Jason Isbell feel pretty stoked about his new signature Tele.

Specifications

• PRICE: $1,499 street, gig bag included
• NUT WIDTH: 1.65” synthetic bone
• NECK: Maple, bolt-on
• FRETBOARD: Rosewood, 25.5” scale, 7.25” radius
• FRETS: 21 Vintage Tall
• TUNERS: Vintage style
• BODY: Alder
• BRIDGE: String-through-body Tele with brass saddles
• PICKUPS: Specially voiced Jason Isbell Telecaster single-coils
• CONTROLS: Volume, tone, three-way selector,
• FACTORY STRINGS: Fender 250R Nickel Plated Steel .010–.046
• WEIGHT: 7.62 lbs (as tested)
• BUILT: Mexico
• CONTACT: Fender

First teased back in January, Fender has launched its latest signature model, the Jason Isbell Custom Telecaster.

Inspired by two of the ever-popular singer/songwriter's own Telecasters, the Jason Isbell Custom Tele features a double-bound, ‘59-style Telecaster Custom alder body, and a vintage-inspired mid-’60s “C”-shaped maple neck with a 21-fret rosewood fingerboard.

Sounds on the guitar come by way of a pair of custom, Tim Shaw-designed pickups, controlled by individual volume and tone knobs, and a three-way blade switch.

Additionally, the guitar boasts a road-worn finish, aged hardware, a synthetic bone nut, and a custom-modified bridge with vintage brass barrel saddles.

“This collaboration with Fender is huge for me," Isbell said in a statement. "I’ve owned and played Fender guitars since I was 12 years old and I consider their instruments to be a big part of my musical journey. 

“I wanted to create a road-worn version of my go-to Telecaster guitar because you can enjoy the instrument without worrying so much about scratching it up! When I was a kid and got my brand-new Fender for Christmas, just holding the thing terrified me until it had a few dings and scratches on it. Then I felt more comfortable with it.” 

The Fender Jason Isbell Custom Telecaster is available now – in a Road Worn Chocolate sunburst lacquer finish – for $1,499.

For more info on the guitar, stop by fender.com.

Back in January, Jason Isbell teamed up with Fender to create a new signature Telecaster.

Asked recently by Music Radar why the guitar – like many of his Telecasters of choice – sports a rosewood fingerboard, Isbell discussed what he sees as the "forgiving" quality of rosewood. He also pointed out why – in his opinion – this very sonic quality makes it a better choice for beginner guitarists than guitars with maple fingerboards. 

"I love maple fingerboards too, but there’s something very forgiving about rosewood," Isbell said. "If I was a beginner guitar player I wouldn’t use a maple fingerboard Tele, because whatever you play is what you’re going to hear. 

"It’s very precise, and if you make a mistake you’re going to hear it. The rosewood just softens things up a little, rounds it off. For this particular profile [his signature Telecaster] it felt right, plus you’ve gotta have a rosewood board for a Telecaster Custom!"

Of course, as with so many age-old gear-related debates, fingerboard choice comes down to personal preference. As we all know though, these same debates will continue to rage on, matters of preference or not!

Fender has unveiled its latest slate of signature model electric and acoustic guitars.

Headlined by new signature Telecasters for the Pretenders’ Chrissie Hynde and Jason Isbell, the lineup also features a new signature Mustang for Death Cab for Cutie's Ben Gibbard and a new signature Campfire acoustic for late Clash frontman Joe Strummer.

You can read more about each of the models – the first three of which are Mexican-made – below.

Chrissie Hynde Telecaster

Built with an alder body and finished in a Faded Ice Blue Metallic Road Worn lacquer, this new Tele is a near-perfect replica of the ’65 Tele Hynde relied on to make her indelible musical mark with The Pretenders. 

Its vintage-style ‘50s single-coil Tele pickups are precisely voiced to match those on Hynde's original, while its six-stainless steel barrel saddle bridge and chrome mirror pickguard also match those found on the '65 model. The only difference from Hynde's original, in fact, is the addition of vintage-style locking tuners.

The guitar's mid-’60s C-shaped maple neck boasts a 7.25”-radius rosewood fingerboard, while the guitar's hardware has also been given the Road Worn treatment.

The Fender Chrissie Hynde Telecaster will be available in February for $1,399.

Jason Isbell Custom Telecaster

Though he made headlines last year for his acquisition of Ed King's "Red Eye" Les Paul, Jason Isbell certainly knows his way around a Telecaster as well. His gorgeous new signature Tele boasts a ’59-style Tele Custom alder body with cream double binding and a Chocolate Sunburst Road Worn finish.

The guitar also features a vintage-inspired mid-‘60s C-shaped maple neck and 21-fret rosewood fretboard, and vintage-style tuners. 

Sonically, the Tele is outfitted with a pair of specially-voiced Telecaster single coils, while other Isbell-specific mods include a custom bridge with three vintage brass barrel saddles and a modern "Ashtray" bridge cover.

The Fender Jason Isbell Custom Telecaster will be available in May for $1,499.

Ben Gibbard Mustang

Based on the modified '70s Mustangs he uses onstage with Death Cab for Cutie, Ben Gibbard's new signature Mustang boasts a lightweight chambered ash body – with a beautiful Natural finish – for increased resonance, and a one-piece, modern C-shaped maple neck with a 9.5” radius fingerboard and 22 medium jumbo frets.

The electronics, however, are where things get quite interesting. On his modified Mustangs, Gibbard removes the tone knob and pickup slider switches, leaving them permanently wired to the middle position. Therefore, the Gibbard Mustang lacks a tone circuit. As Gibbard explains though, the guitar does feature a pickup-switching option still.

“I took out the phase switchers, and instead of a tone knob, the knob is a pickup switcher,” Gibbard told Guitar World. “So there’s a rolled volume knob, but where the tone knob is, it clicks into different positions. So you still have the access of shifting amongst the positions, but it doesn’t have a Strat switcher or anything.”

The guitar also features a vintage-style Mustang tremolo that's been modified for a hardtail setup and vintage-style tuners.

The Fender Ben Gibbard Mustang will be available – with strap locks and a Fender gig bag – in March for $1,099.

Joe Strummer Campfire Acoustic

Inspired by the instrument the Clash frontman would use during his legendary "campfires" at England's Glastonbury festival, this acoustic-electric features a solid spruce top with mahogany back and sides.

The guitar's visual appointments include a matte black finish, nickel hardware, and star inlays.

The Fender Joe Strummer Campfire Acoustic will be available in March for $499.

For more info on all of Fender's new models, stop by fender.com.

When looking at the ways in which the COVID-19 pandemic has affected the world around us, there are very, very few positive things that come to mind. 

One of those rare positives though, has been the number of guitar heroes - Eric Johnson and Brian May among them - that have taken the opportunity to go on social media to teach their fans a few tricks of the trade. 

A few days back, acclaimed singer/songwriter and highly underrated guitarist Jason Isbell decided to hop on the social media lesson bandwagon with some great, bite-size slide and blues guitar tips of his own. Even better, he did so using a few of his finest vintage guitars.

First, Isbell - gorgeous 1953 Blackguard Tele in hand - demonstrated an absolutely killer slide lick in standard tuning. Coming from a slide specialist, this lick is perfect for anyone looking for a place to start with slide technique.

Next up is another slide lick that Isbell plays with an equally beautiful sunburst Strat. A bit more technical and advanced than the first slide lick, this line is a bit of a “pedal steel imitation,” in Isbell's words.

Finally, as an added bonus, we have a non-slide blues triplet in the key of C. For this, Isbell uses a stunning, Bigsby-equipped Les Paul.

For more on Isbell, follow along on his Instagram page.

Jason Isbell is seated at a small table inside the Barn, his cavernous rehearsal compound far outside of the Nashville sprawl, where the freeways and touristy honky-tonks yield to pastures of electric green. 

Outside, a drizzling rain hangs in the early spring air. “If I’m in a big room like this, I’m thinking, 'Man, I could write about anything in the whole world.' The world is so huge.” He gestures, revealing seven hash marks tattooed onto his forearm, one for each year of sobriety. It’s easy to see how someone could get distracted here, even this far from Nashville’s rowdy Broadway strip. 

Duesenbergs, Stratocasters and Telecasters of varying vintage hang from the charcoal-hued walls. Amp heads galore, including Sommatones and Magnatones, are stacked on road cases, and a 1972 Marshall gifted by Dave Cobb, who produced Isbell’s last four albums, rests on a matching ’72 cab that once belonged to Neil Young. 

It’s one hell of a guitarist’s playground, and it’s the place where Isbell cranked out the riffs on Reunions (Southeastern/Thirty Tigers), his new album with his muscular backing band, the 400 Unit.  

Isbell has always been a guitar player first, but his once-in-a-generation songwriting talent has often overshadowed his fretboard work. After beginning his career with the Drive-By Truckers in the early aughts, penning rootsy classics like “Outfit” and anchoring the third guitar in the band’s caterwauling attack, he started over with the 400 Unit in 2007. 

It was a slow build to his breakthrough, 2013’s Southeastern, which put his experiences falling in love and getting sober in sharp relief. On Reunions, he’s finally laying down the guitar chops that are usually reserved for his live audiences. This moment is a long time coming.

Over the past year and a half, Isbell has played sideman to Tommy Emmanuel, Sheryl Crow and the Highwomen, the country supergroup featuring his wife, Amanda Shires, who moonlights in the 400 Unit on fiddle when she’s not fronting her own band. 

He even quietly played guitar on the theme song for the Monday Night Football opener that aired throughout the 2019–2020 NFL season. In his own shows, Isbell and co-guitarist Sadler Vaden have taken to nightly duels, usually on his blistering Truckers-era jam, “Never Gonna Change,” or a cover of the Peter Green/Fleetwood Mac song “Oh Well.” 

For a while following Gregg Allman’s passing, they closed every show with a take on “Whipping Post” worthy of its southern-rock lineage. Reunions is vintage Isbell, a collection of tightly spun, plainspoken story songs from the four-time Grammy winner, but with a few important new twists.

Influences ranging from Strat-wielding heroes Eric Clapton and Mark Knopfler to the Cure’s Porl Thompson weave around his trademark slide licks and riffs. And the 400 Unit, Isbell’s secret weapon, shows up ready to lay waste. 

Bassist Jimbo Hart anchors the melodic underpinnings of the polyrhythmic “What’ve I Done to Help,” and plays Mike Mills to Isbell’s Peter Buck on songs like the roaring “Be Afraid.” From his home base outside of Music City, Isbell gives us a tour of the tones and inspirations behind Reunions.      

You’ve been a guitar player all your life, but you’re more widely known as a songwriter.

Yeah, they didn’t give me the Grammy for playing guitar. [laughs] I’m glad that I can write songs, because the guitar player in me could not afford the guitars that the songwriter has purchased on his behalf. But originally, it was just like all my interests aligned. I read a lot when I was a kid, and I loved good songs. At some point it just made perfect sense to me to try to write lyrics.

Reunions features a lot of those guitars. “Overseas” might be the most guitar you’ve played on a song since “Decoration Day” with Drive-By Truckers.

There are a lot of guitar solos on this album, but it’s a tightrope, because you don’t want things to be gratuitous unless you’re working within that framework. If you’re making gratuitous guitar music, by all means, go for it. But listen to AC/DC. That’s some of the best guitar ever recorded, and none of it is extraneous.

Those riffs and solos are so memorable.

They’re singable and melodic and they’re just perfect, for the most part. Even though what we do is not a whole lot like AC/DC, I think that approach is the right one for song-driven music.

You want to serve the song, and once you’ve gone past that line, you’re making a different type of music, or you’re doing a poor job making the type of music you set out to do. I consider myself a guitar player first and foremost. That’s the thing I started doing first and the thing I still enjoy the most. But I’m here to tell stories, so the song is what’s most important.

That being said, we were able to find ways to make the guitar an important part of the record, and I think that happened because I started out writing that way. I didn’t use a capo anywhere on this album. That was harder than getting sober, making a whole record without a capo. [laughs] 

But I wanted to do that, because if I’m playing something live one night and one of the guitars feels particularly good, I’d like to keep it for a few more songs, and I don’t like to tune onstage. If I’m using different capos or different tunings, then I’ll have a different guitar every time, and I wanted it to be like, If this Strat feels really good, I’ll just keep it for three or four songs.

Did you set out with a particular direction in mind for the album?

As the process goes on, you can’t help but see certain themes and certain sonic collections within the songs themselves. It became a really melodic album that I pictured from the start as having a higher fidelity and sounding like a lot of my favorite pop records. 

There was something about the way location affected those records. It’s hard to put a finger on it, but I was in Alabama in the ’90s listening to Rolling Stones records from England in the ’70s, or from the south of France, and I went somewhere completely different. 

That was really my ultimate goal on this record. I wanted people to listen to it and think, I’m not in my room right now; I’m not in my car right now; I’m in a different place in a different time in somebody else’s life.

You’re known for playing Les Pauls and semihollows, like your ES-335. But Strat tones are all over the new album. That’s a new thing for you.

That was a blast, man. It’s not just a tone - it’s a direction. That’s the signature guitar tone for the record, if you ask me. I have a 1960 slab-board Strat that I got at Carter’s [Carter Vintage Guitars in Nashville], and it hadn’t been played a whole lot, so we had to do quite a bit to get it set up. Took a few months of moving and letting it adjust. 

But there’s something about the out-of-phase position on a ’60 in particular, and I don’t know if it’s because the wind on the pickups was reversed from ’59 to ’60. It had a three-position switch when I got it, but I went ahead and put a five-position switch in so it would be easier, because I was getting tired of slipping out of the Knopfler spot.

I have a ’64 Vibroverb that Amanda got me for Christmas a few years ago that already had the [Cesar] Diaz mod, so the vibrato was disconnected. It’s the best-sounding amp that I have. We split that signal with, of all things, a 120- watt, solid-state Roland Jazz Chorus, and it was so clean and so bright and so present that it almost hurts. 

If you’re going through a Jazz Chorus with a Strat, you better play the way you intend to play, because you can’t do any damn string rakes and make it sound cool, use the overtones or feedback - none of that. There’s nothing to hide behind.

Mark Knopfler was the first name that came to mind when I heard that tone.

It’s time for that to come back. I think what really kicked it off was The Highwomen album. I feel like Reggie Young was doing a Mark Knopfler impersonation on that first Highwaymen record [the 1985 debut release from Johnny Cash, Willie Nelson, Waylon Jennings and Kris Kristofferson], because it sounds so much like Mark. 

When the Highwomen recut the title track from Highwaymen [as “Highwomen”], it just made sense to try to play like Reggie Young trying to play like Mark Knopfler. Sometimes I forget how great Knopfler was at doing the thing I’m trying to do, which is write really beautiful songs and still find a way to use rock and roll guitar tastefully, technically and beautifully.

You acquired the famous “Red Eye” 1959 Gibson Les Paul last year. Did you give it a good workout on Reunions?

It has one standout moment on “What’ve I Done to Help.” The song is pretty long, and it comes in late for the slide solo. On “St. Peter’s Autograph,” I did some George Harrison–style parts that he probably would have played on Lucy [Harrison’s 1957 Les Paul gifted to him by Eric Clapton] back in the day. That’s a double-slide part, and we even did the Automatic Double-Tracking effect, like the Beatles used.

Listening back through your records, slide has been one of your signatures.

That’s the thing I’m best at. As a slide player, I feel like I have something to add to the conversation, at the very least. Like, I went to play on Tommy Emmanuel’s record [2018’s Accomplice One], and I said, “I’ll sing and I’ll play slide, and I’m not doing anything else. Anything else will just be you being nice to me.” 

And that’s not to say that I’m even the best slide player on the street, but I feel like I can express myself in a way that’s individual.

Did any solos from cutting live basic tracks survive to the final mix?

“Overseas” was the take that I played live. I had a really fun signal chain on that one, too, because I got a ’58 Bassman from Rudy’s [Music, in New York City] last year that I think had been part of George Alessandro’s collection at one point, so it had all the work he had done himself to the amp, and it’s a killer. 

It doesn’t have too much midrange honk. We ran a Strat through the Klon Centaur and into that amp, and, man, there’s some overtones on that solo that I don’t know how we got. Sometimes when I bend a note on the neck pickup on that Strat, you can hear another octave up.

Despite the beefed-up lead guitar presence, acoustic guitar is the backbone of Reunions. What did you gravitate to this time?

I believe it’s a Gibson J-35 but it’s a ’46, so it’s the year after the banner [headstock logo]. It’s basically the same exact guitar, but the banner is just not as expensive. But it’s this script logo, and I guess in ’47 or so they went to the standard Gibson logo that they still use today. But this is all over that record. I think this guitar is on almost every song, maybe with the exception of “Overseas.”

How did you develop the fingerpicking style you use on “Only Children”?

It’s really a hybrid thing. I can’t nail the Chet Atkins–Merle Travis style, because I can’t disconnect my thumb from the rest of my hand like those guys could. “Windy and Warm,” “Cloudy and Cool” and “The Bells of St. Mary’s” - that stuff was around the house a lot when I was a kid. 

But I was always just too obsessed with rock and roll guitar to learn how to do it right. And when I got to Jimmy Page, it was like, 'Okay, I’m good.' I can figure out enough to make this work without learning how to do a proper alternating thumb.

On “Be Afraid,” there’s a chiming pattern on the verses that reminds me of Peter Buck with Mike Mills playing behind him.

Oh, yeah. The 12-string is Sadler. I think I played that alternating pattern on an early ’65 Tele, and then Sadler echoed that with a Rickenbacker 12-string. That’s a real Peter Buck style on that. He played some of the coolest guitar parts that are simple to learn once they exist, but not simple to come up with in the first place. 

That was his trip. He never claimed to be a technical player, but you try writing something that cool. Even “The One I Love” - that is the simplest guitar part on earth, but nobody thought of it before he did.

With the guitars and amps you have at your disposal, you must have fun even during your downtime.

Whenever I don’t have anything else that I have to do, I play the guitar. Like yesterday: I had an hour between the time I finished doing everything and the baby woke up from a nap, so I sat down and played the guitar for an hour.

I just love doing that so much now - even more than when I was a kid, because I’ve got all the cool shit that I wished I had then. If I want to play Led Zeppelin riffs, I can play a 1959 Les Paul through a 50-watt Marshall turned all the way up. Nobody makes me stop.

When Ed King passed away in August 2018, the Lynyrd Skynyrd guitarist left more than classic songs like “Sweet Home Alabama” and “Saturday Night Special” as his legacy. “Ed had a beautiful collection of instruments,” Isbell says. “He didn’t just get good vintage guitars - he got the best versions of pretty much everything.”

Over the holidays that year, Christie Carter of Carter Vintage Guitars in Nashville called Isbell to see if he would play some of the late guitar-slinger’s collection for the shop’s YouTube channel. Isbell worked his way through the ’73 Strat that King used on “Sweet Home Alabama” and a parcel of gold-top Les Pauls before spying the 1959 Les Paul nicknamed Red Eye on a stand. 

Isbell wasn’t sure it was the real one. King and Gibson had collaborated on a Collector’s Choice edition, and he had multiple versions. But Carter confirmed it was indeed the real deal, which was famously stolen from King at gunpoint in 1987 and remained at large until he recovered it a decade later.

“I never thought I would need a ’Burst,” Isbell says. “I mean, nobody needs a ’Burst, but I never thought that I would want one, as expensive as they are. I’ve got a ’61 [Gibson ES-] 335 that’s just incredible, and I’ve never heard a Les Paul that could beat it.”

By his own account, this one did. “I couldn’t think about anything else,” he says. “I got lost on the way home from the store. I bought a bottle of water, and when I got home, I still hadn’t opened it. I couldn’t sleep that night.”

Isbell asked his manager to find a way for him to afford it without taking gigs away from his band or pulling him away from home for too long. He played a lot of gigs he normally wouldn’t take, from birthday parties to other private engagements. “I met some interesting people and went to some parts of the Hamptons that I’ve not been to before,” he says.

Although he’s made a few changes to preserve the original hardware, including replacing the tuners and tailpiece with retrofits, the guitar is largely intact from the moment it was made. He thinks the pickup covers may be New Old Stock, and it’s rumored King had a partial refret up to the 12th fret, but the pickups and wiring harness are from February 1959.

Isbell started 2019 with Red Eye in his hands and jokes that producer Dave Cobb called him to play so often last year, he figured he was hiring the guitar more than him. “I knew it was going to be a big guitar year.”