INTERVIEW: A Conversation with Joe Satriani Ahead of SATCHVAI’s Albany Stop
05/21 @ Palace Theatre, Albany
Photo by Christie Goodwin
“I want every album to have a collection of songs that expands my horizons and that’s what this one has done so far. That’s what I live for — to just keep moving forward.”
Terms like ‘guitar god,’ ‘legend,’ and other such labels can be hyperbolic and are often overused in most cases. However, when it comes to musicians Joe Satriani, Steve Vai, and their supporting band, it’d be hard to argue that those terms don’t apply. Satriani and Vai have rewritten the book on electric guitar throughout their extensive careers — whether as solo acts or in concert with others — and they continue to push instrumental boundaries. On May 21, they’re bringing their latest offering of mind-blowing guitar work to the Palace Theatre as part of their SATCHVAI Band’s North American tour. In anticipation of the show, I had the chance to speak with Satriani.
If you’re not familiar with his performances, some say he carried the torch for Eddie Van Halen insofar as taking the electric guitar to new heights — a massive feat in itself. He’s also had 15 Grammy nominations, a list of students that includes Vai himself, Larry LaLonde (Primus), Kirk Hammett (Metallica),and has inspired or influenced countless other guitarists. Add to the list that he’s also the best-selling instrumental rock guitarist of all time and you might think he’d be phoning it in at this point. With this new band, a tour, and a forthcoming album however, he’s still looking toward the future.
“Every record I do, every project, I push myself to go into some different territory. It’s par for the course that I'd be forced by not only myself, but by another creative agent to try something different,” Satriani admits.
The creative agent he’s referring to is Steve Vai, former student of Satriani and now long-time friend. Satriani started what was known as the G3 tour in 1995, a guitarist-driven concert that featured himself and others, all performing solo and then joining together for some choice covers. The first ever tour featured the two along with fellow musician Eric Johnson. To celebrate the 30th anniversary last year, they played with the original G3 lineup. Upon the tour’s completion, Satriani and his team decided to extend it. However, while Vai was on board, Johnson couldn’t continue due to scheduling conflicts.
“Steve and I said, ‘We’ll go out together, we’ll just keep moving.’ So that’s what we wound up doing. We decided it’s not gonna be G3, we’re not gonna call it G2. We’ll just call it SATCHVAI.”
With the plan in place, Satriani’s manager suggested that they should release a new track. He wrote a few new songs, they finished them quickly, and released the debut single “Sea of Emotion, pt. I” in March of 2024. This marked the first time the two wrote a song together in their 50-year friendship. Then, while out on their European tour, things evolved into the idea of releasing an entire album together. It’s something Satriani said they’d always wanted to do, but never knew when.
“Typical of Steve and I, we were taking on these crazy challenges as they would pop up. I had been first embroiled and then happily involved in the Sammy Hagar/Eddie Van Halen tribute tornado thing that happened, and I would join up with him and Michael Anthony doing the ‘Best of all Worlds’ tour. I’m still doing them; I'll be doing them through the fall off and on. That kept me away from joining Steve at one location. And Steve at the same time took on the incredible job of replacing Robert Fripp on the Beat [King Crimson Supergroup] tour, and he’ll also be continuing that through the fall.”
That led to both of them having to write and record remotely, working in between those tours on their own, creating tracks and sending them to each other. In the middle of both men is their producer Eric Caudieux, who was also the collector of all of the studio performances. He was tasked with collating the tracks that were recorded from all around the world, pulling the album together with Greg Collar doing the mixing. The process was unusual for Satriani — not usually awarded the time to let ideas develop due to high studio costs and release date expectations, there was a freedom to truly explore their sound.
“It was really a great process in a way, because had we been just in a room together, there would’ve been more emphasis on the kind of performances that we’ve done before,” Satriani says. “You’re spending thousands of dollars per hour [in the studio]. You feel it and it affects your performance and your creative decisions, but we were able to try a million ideas until we found the right one. That’s what happened with this album.”
Satriani points to the single they just released in April called “Dancing.” What Vai brought to him was a weird Italian pop song from the early ‘80s that wasn’t on Satriani’s shortlist of songs he’d ever record. While Vai is known for being eccentric, Satriani just went with it and beamed about the results.
“It’s really great because I wound up creating some new ways of playing for myself that I wouldn’t normally have,” he says. ”I want every album to have a collection of songs that expands my horizons and that’s what this one has done so far. That’s what I live for — to just keep moving forward.”
And forward they go as they make their way through this tour on their way to the Palace Theatre. While Satriani and Vai are both incredibly talented, the band had to match. With Stockbridge-native and multi-platinum recording drummer Kenny Aronoff being a no-brainer having just finished the G3 tour with them, Satriani approached Marco Mendoza to play bass and Peter Thorn to play rhythm guitar, the latter of which was a decision that wasn’t necessarily easy.
“The most difficult part for Steve and I was deciding whether we bring a keyboard player or a rhythm guitar player — we have some songs with keys, but we have a lot of songs with rhythm guitar,” he notes. “Pete came to mind right away as both a shredder and someone who can get the most out of any pedal, modeler, etc. to really pull off layered sounds when it's needed.”
Opening the show will be instrumental progressive metal band Animals as Leaders. The band features lead guitarist, Tosin Abasi who has received acclaim for his playing since the band debuted in 2012. To Satriani, having them on the tour was a way of featuring the past, present, and future of guitar playing.
“I certainly wanted them to be on the tour,” he tells me. “When you start the planning, you want to bring along people who will be really inspiring every night.” He laughs, adding, “Maybe I was being a little selfish, but I thought, ’Wouldn’t it be cool to listen to stuff that is frightening and enjoyable all at the same time every night?’ It would be the perfect thing to get me excited to jump on stage.”
Tickets are still available for SATCHVAI Band here.