JOAN ARMATRADING
Out Of Reach
“My father played the guitar, but he wouldn’t let me touch his. I think, because of that, I wanted to play it even more. That was the impetus, really: what is it about this thing that means I’ve got to stay away from it? I found my first guitar in a pawn shop. It cost three pounds and I said to my mum, ‘Can I have it?’ She said, ‘Well, we haven’t got the money, but if they’ll swap these two prams for it, you can have it’. I’ve still got that guitar. It’s a big-bodied, no-name guitar and I just started learning on that. And I’ll tell you something else. My father used to hide his guitar on the top shelf down in the cellar, which had a really heavy iron door on it, like one of those doors you see on great big bank safes. When we moved, he left his guitar there. He forgot it!”
Ain’t Nobody
“From there, I just started writing my own songs, either on the guitar or on the piano that my mother bought for the front room, which was a great piece of furniture. Everything I did back then was self-taught. I wasn’t buying any records
