FOR THE PAST two decades, Joe Bonamassa has been a familiar face in these pages, as a widely appreciated, virtuosic blues guitarist, as well as an avid caretaker of the instrument’s legacy, who has collected and preserved not only hundreds of guitars, but also mountains of classic amplifiers and guitar ephemera.
As such, it might be difficult for readers today to imagine a time when he was just another struggling guitarist trying to make his mark in music. But after being ushered into the ranks of B.B. King and Danny Gatton before age 13, and forming the band Bloodline with Waylon Krieger, Erin Davis and Berry Oakley Jr. — the sons of Robby Krieger of the Doors, Miles Davis and the Allman Brothers Band bassist — Smokin’ Joe Bonamassa, as he was known then, tanked as a solo artist.
And what was his plan B when his high-profile 2000 debut, A New Day Yesterday, and its 2002 follow-up, So, It’s, failed to meet expectations? “Uh, I don’t know, become a cop?” he says today, drolly. Instead of trading his love of the beat for a life on the beat, though, he took the experience as a call to follow his own instincts.
