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Billie Joe's leopard skin-lined case has as much wow factor as his new guitar

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Upon cranking the Billie Joe Junior through a Marshall (the frontman's amp of choice), that explanation makes a lot more sense. When you dial up a mild distortion there's an organic sound to this guitar that seems to bypass the H-90 pickup and give you the unadulterated tone of the mahogany body and neck instead. Push the gain dial a little harder, meanwhile, and you will bring in the ragged quality that Junior nuts have always raved about. Granted it's not a smooth or subtle tone, doesn't get close to the sustain of the full-size Les Paul and wouldn't be much use to anyone interested in starting up an Allman Brothers tribute band. But for a gig in a sweatbox venue, or slicing through a murky mixing board, you won't find anything better.

Let's not pop the champagne quite yet, though. As we feared, the Billie Joe Junior is not a particularly versatile guitar. The tone control tries its best to add diversity (and a decent amp helps in this respect), but the lack of a neck pickup inevitably means that you will find other axes 'fill the room' more convincingly.

And with surprisingly few tips of the hat to the Green Day frontman your audience might not even realise that you're rocking a signature model. To the naked eye, it's a textbook Les Paul Junior. Very cool, of course, but hardly the stuff of revolution.

Still, this as an instrument rather than a fashion accessory. And, although expensive, for tone, build and comfort that you'd have to be a basket case not to appreciate it.