A "badass" guitar designed for women is coming to market in March, Esquire notes, and female shredders have Annie Clark to thank for it. Clark, better known as alternative rocker St. Vincent, has designed a signature guitar for manufacturer Ernie Ball Music Man, and as Clark notes on Instagram, the instrument is "ergonomic, lightweight, and sleek"—and by "sleek" she means there's "room for a breast … or two." The guitar, which comes in black or "Vincent Blue" (which the artist hand-mixed herself), is made of African mahogany with a rosewood neck, has a slim and tapered waist, and weighs just over 7 pounds, per Guitar World. "For me a guitar that is not too heavy is really important because I'm not a very big person," she tells the magazine. "I can't even play a ['60s] Strat or ['70s] Les Paul. I would need to travel with a chiropractor on tour in order to play those guitars."
Clark, who notes she "really had total free reign" over the design, says she was approached by Ernie Ball in the early spring of 2015 and had worked up a first prototype within a week of visiting the factory (there have been many other versions since her collaboration with Ernie Ball engineers). While creating it, she took into account how its weight would be distributed, as well as the fact that she didn’t want it to cover up what she considers to be one of a female performer's best features: her waist. In the end, though, it’s all about the music. "If you have a great instrument you're going to play better," she says. "You're going to play up to the level of the instrument because it makes it easier for you to succeed." Her first public performance with the guitar? On stage at a Taylor Swift concert with Swift and Beck. (More guitar stories.)
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