Tom Petty's Guitars, Amps & Gear List

Tom Petty’s 1964 Fender Stratocaster was one of his earliest and most important electric guitars. The guitar was actually bought by Mike Campbell in the early 1970s, reportedly for around $200, at a time when Petty did not have an electric guitar of his own. Campbell let him use it, and it soon became closely tied to the early sound of Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers.

This guitar has been the hearbreakers guitar for 30 years. It’s been on lots of songs. Tom used it a lot in the studio for rythm when he was singing and playing at the same time. Tom also played it live quite a bit, and belt buckle wore of most of the paint [on the back].

On first two albums especially, Tom played rythm on this guitar on almost every song. We used it on our last album, we used it on every album. Full Moon Fever, which was Tom’s first solo album, this guitar was the main guitar on every song

Mike Campbell [1]

The guitar itself is also interesting because of its year. Being a 1964 Stratocaster, it sits in the same general era as some other famous Stratocasters associated with players like Bob Dylan, Jimi Hendrix, and David Gilmour.

Tom Petty played this 1965 Gibson SG Junior in Polaris White during live performances of “Good Enough” and “Refugee” in the early 2010s. The guitar was also among the instruments stolen from the Heartbreakers’ rehearsal space in 2012 and later recovered.

Tom Petty bought this Tele-style custom guitar from Norman’s Rare Guitars in 1980. It was built by Toru Nittono of L.A. Guitar Works, which is where the “Torucaster” name comes from. From a distance, the guitar looks like like a lighter butterscotch blonde ’52 Fender Telecaster, but it’s not really a standard Fender. It had its own feel, and Petty clearly took to it almost immediately.

Petty once said that after he got the guitar, “I haven’t stopped playing it since.” That was not much of an exaggeration. The Torucaster became one of his main stage guitars, and probably the electric guitar he used live more than any other.

Over the years, he played it on songs including “American Girl,” “Breakdown,” “Listen to Her Heart,” “Refugee,” “Here Comes My Girl,” “Even the Losers,” “Don’t Do Me Like That,” “King’s Highway,” “Mary Jane’s Last Dance,” “You Don’t Know How It Feels,” “You Wreck Me,” “It’s Good to Be King,” “Honey Bee,” and “Swingin’.”

Petty acquired the guitar around 2007 or 2008 through Norman Harris of Norman’s Rare Guitars. He later described it as his favorite 12-string, saying that it sounded “like an organ,” with a deep and rich tone.

Tom Petty’s Rickenbacker was a 1964 Rose Morris Model 1993 12-string in Fireglo. Built for the British export market, the Model 1993 differed from standard Rickenbacker 12-strings by using a traditional F-hole instead of the company’s usual slash-style soundhole.

Petty played the guitar live at the 2008 Super Bowl halftime show, using it on “American Girl” and “I Won’t Back Down.” Aside from that, he also used it on live performances of “The Waiting,” “Rebels,” and “Saving Grace.”

Tom Petty bought this Mapleglo 1967 Rickenbacker 360/12 from Norman’s Rare Guitars in 1980. It became one of the main 12-string Rickenbackers people associate with him, especially from the early 1980s onward.

The guitar shows up in the music videos for “The Waiting” and “A Woman in Love (It’s Not Me),” so it was clearly around during the Hard Promises period. It also saw live use on songs like “American Girl,” “The Waiting,” “Rebels,” and later “Saving Grace.”

In 2012, the guitar was stolen from the band’s rehearsal space along with several other Heartbreakers instruments. It was later recovered, which made it one of the more publicly documented guitars in Petty’s collection.