Filed under: Americana, Exclusive, Country News

Joe Ely has no doubt things come full circle, in his case again and again. When the singer-songwriter played in San Francisco on April 25, 1986, the band's instrument trailer was broken into and all of their equipment was stolen, including a custom-made guitar that belonged to Joe.

Joe had given up on finding his guitar until recently, when a man who bought the instrument in a pawn shop 20 years ago found out the guitar had been stolen. Just this week, Matt Wright, a musician from Merced, Calif., returned the guitar to its rightful owner when Joe played Slim's in San Francisco, just three blocks from where the instrument was stolen. (See a photo of the two backstage above.) But the story doesn't end there.