God gave rock and roll to you steve vai how to#

We were driving around and we just sat there a while. It was a place where you'd go to think - to pour out what was in your mind and in your heart. The field sort of dipped down, almost as if it was a dry lake bed. SATRIANI: No, it was a field, part of an old farm where they'd built three schools. GUITAR WORLD: Are we talking about some kind of dump here? And I went back and they were around this big. VAI: I remember the sewer ramps used to seem so large. You know, I went back there when I was in New York a few months ago. SATRIANI: The Sea of Emotion? It's a place. GUITAR WORLD: All right, all right, what is the Sea of Emotion already? SATRIANI: Do that for a few months and then we'll start to get to notes and the strings. VAI: Sit for a while in the Sea of Emotion, drop some acid. SATRIANI: I immediately said, have some Coke, have some eggs. SATRIANI: But you played accordion, right?

God gave rock and roll to you steve vai how to#

I didn't know how to tune or string it or anything. VAI: Yeah, you could get an extra five bucks! I remember my first lesson with Joe. I can't recall exactly when it happened, but I do seem to remember suggesting that the lessons be separated - that more could be accomplished if we did.

SATRIANI: I'd say that would be pushing it. GUITAR WORLD: How long did that go on for? And he said, 'Well, you should see my teacher he can really play.' I couldn't really afford lessons, so I chipped in with another friend and Joe taught us both at the same time. My friend was actually able to hit notes on the guitar, and I thought that was phenomenal. It started out where Joe was teaching a friend of mine who lived a couple of houses away.

GUITAR WORLD: But you did have lessons together. At that age, when you're in high school, ninth grade and eleventh grade are a long way apart. GUITAR WORLD: So you two never actually worked together in a band? Which is probably why he's sick right now. In fact, someone told me that before each gig you guys used to go have Coca-Cola and eggs in the morning. VAI: I was telling about the mirror image band situation with Tarsus and Susrat. He does much of the talking, but always leaves Satch space to get his licks in. Vai is more outgoing, wheeling energetically around the cluttered control room, standing a head taller than his former teacher, his long limbs draped in the most wildly multicolored running suit you'd ever care to observe. Dressed in black from head to toe, Satriani is a compact, quiet man who radiates a sense of inner intensity –- like the eye of a hurricane. Standing side-by-side, Satch and Vai are a study in contrasts. And then there was the Sea of Emotions, which Joe will tell you about.'Īs if on cue, Joe Satriani steps through the door, guitar case in hand. The school and local pizza joint were right in back. In the Calavagnes' basement, which was just a crawl space under this big house in the middle of town. you know when you're growing up and you first experiment with drugs and sex and everything? That's where it all happened. The Calavagnes' house has so many memories for me, too. We used to play all the clubs and it was really cool. “Joe taught us all the songs that Tarsus used to do. We even named our band Susrat, which is Tarsus spelled backwards. And when I formed a band with the younger brother, Barry, we were like a carbon copy of those guys, only four years later. They used to do all the Led Zeppelin songs and stuff. One of the older ones was in a band with Joe. 'There was this family in town called the Calavagnes. I was hearing all the little squeaks and squeals and the big rhythms and solos instantly.'įrom Whitesnake, our talk turns to Carle Place: delicatessens and diners, the village psychopath, local kids at school. It was so exciting to hear this type of rock music. And they said 'do what you want.' I couldn't refuse. It was an open canvas - just bass and drums. 'But as soon as I heard the music, I was hooked. 'When the Whitesnake offer first came along, I was a little apprehensive,' Vai admits. His guitar tears through the tracks with fiery grace, opening up new perspectives on what we usually think of as Whitesnake. Vai's collection of axes stands in one corner, the various headstocks neatly ranked like a column of soldiers.Īs we wait for Joe to arrive, Steve plays for me a rough track from his forthcoming solo album, which he follows with the Slip Of The Tongue master. The room is comfortable, domestic - a creative disarray of recording gear. The scene of the get-together is the control room of Steve Vai's home studio in the Hollywood Hills. It is an ideal moment for a steel-string summit - Joe's Flying In A Blue Dream and Steve's debut with Whitesnake, Slip Of The Tongue, have just been released.