For Joe Satriani, the last year has come with a lot of “Unstoppable Momentum” including a new album of the same name, touring, and more, but what does it all mean? Atlantic Canada Rocks caught up with Satriani on tour to find out. Joe Satriani will bring his world tour to Moncton and Halifax from Oct 4-5th. Full text of the interview is below.
C– Unstoppable Momentum – What does that mean for you?
J– I came to the realization that I have been doing this for an extremely long time and that I was still excited about the big things and the little things. For example, getting to sit down to work on a record. I was so excited about completing so many different tours. I’ve been working on designing new guitars and pickups. I was working also, on my new art book. It’s just been more work than I’ve ever been involved with before creatively and yet, I was just like a little kid. It was like I was 14 again and I could go and play guitars in basement. I was just so excited about it. I thought, “This is crazy!!!” It’s something that just keeps getting bigger and bigger and not slowing down. It’s got that kinda of unstoppable thing going onto it. Although it was a bit of a tongue twister, that’s the title that stuck in my mind. So, I just wrote it down and looked at it and thought that I was going to have to come up with something easier to pronounce. But, eventually, it just stuck.
C– It’s definitely an incredible album, that’s for sure. It seems that with many tours artists do, they like to change things up a little bit. Would you say that with this tour anything is different? I know in Halifax, especially you’re playing in quite a small venue of about 800 seats.
J– When you tour the world, you play the most unusual variety of venues. So, by the time we’re done with this tour in about a year we’ll have played some of the smallest to the ridiculously large venues. We’ll probably wind up in South America or Asia somewhere where we’ll play in from of 20,000 people in a soccer field, or a cricket field in India. But we’ll be able to play some of our favorite places as well. I never discriminate against that. We’re protected by the fact that we don’t travel with 20 dancers and 15 trucks. If you’re Lady Gaga you would have to play a really big place and sell an enormous amount of tickets just to break even because the operation is so big. But, we’re an instrumental Rock and Roll band and although we have a really cool light show, we’re also more flexible in how we put on a great show. We can have our show in an 800 seat venue, and we’re still going to rock really hard and sound good and look really cool. That’s been our secret strength, which is why I think it’s grown since I became a live performer. That doesn’t happen unless people like what they see.
C– For me as a music fan, I have to say with Lady Gaga, she’s got a great thing going and definitely tours the world and is very successful but when it comes down to it, it just has to be all about the music and group of musicians up on that stage with their guitars and bass. It’s often not JUST about the big light show, but some artists feel they have to do that to get people to come. But I think for a lot of fans, especially in Atlantic Canada you will find they love the music.
J– That’s great to hear! That’s what we want. We want the audience to get transported by what we bring to the show – A show from the heart. I’ve got many stories I can tell you of what my music means to our fans. I get to experience meet and greets every day. I get to hear about people and how they’ve used my music in their lives. It’s gratifying, its uplifting and its sometimes heartbreaking. We’re in a different part of the entertainment industry. I’m grateful to be a part of it. It’s such a privilege to be able to play live. I’ve been doing this since I was 14 years old and I love it!
C– You started out mentoring some other guitarists and helping them to go on, What was that like for you and how has that influenced you and your music career?
J– I’ve always been a guitar player that played gigs. That’s what I did. As a way of making money, I taught guitar lessons. When I was a high school student, I actually went to school with a young kid named Steve Vai. He became my first student, and I taught him for almost three years. It was a fantastic experience to be a teacher to a kid who I knew was destined to be a virtuoso. You could see it even with the first couple of lessons. But I moved out to the San Francisco Bay area and started teaching there while playing clubs at night with different rock bands. I wound up teaching Kirk Hammett of Metallica, Larry LaLonde of Primus, jazz guitarist Charlie Hunter, Alex Skolnick of Testament, and Kevin Cadogan of Third Eye Blind. There were a lot of different players I had that went on to become household names in many different styles of music. It was so great to hang around with students who were really motivated. During that whole time though, I was just a musician who had a dream to take one stop further.
C– For this tour, I know you have the light show and all of the great band members, but in comparison to a Chickenfoot show where everyone might be up and dancing, are you looking for people to be sitting down and listening to the music, or do you want them to stand up? What is the idea that you have?
J– We want to see people do whatever they want. I think that’s the way we’ve always done it. The last week of the European tour, we were playing in a venue with 5000 capacity where most people were standing up and just having a good time and screaming right up against the stage. In some concerts in the UK, we played a lot of symphony and opera houses with beautiful balconies and red velvet where once people sat down, they really didn’t want to get back up.
C– The venue in Halifax you’ll be playing on October 5th, the Rebecca Cohn Auditorium, security will be telling people to sit down. You are not allowed to stand up in that venue.
J– It really doesn’t matter to me. We have a good time no matter what. We want to let people do what they like.
C– What drives you to want to play Atlantic Canada? I know a lot of the artists that come here say after the show, “Oh my gosh, I love it so much here! Why didn’t we come here sooner?!”
J– We’ve had a long history of playing in Canada. It’s a big country and it’s difficult to say yes to everybody who sends us an invitation. It’s really an agent’s job to figure out a way to get a place and then sitting down with the manager and figuring out what’s really going to work. This time around we just put our foot down. We’ve been trying to treat Canada like the US with multiple destinations, so I’m hoping this time to get not only a reintroduction to places we’ve been before but to be introduced where we’ve never been before.
C– The last time you played Halifax in 2009 with Chickenfoot it was a big show. What is the future with you and Chickenfoot? Are you planning to get together again?
J– I really believe in the band. I think that we’ve got some real magic between us. I’m always the one pushing to get the band back in the studio and see if we can’t get a real world tour going. I’m not sure if the second part will ever happen but I’m pretty sure that I’ve got everyone excited to do a set of sessions in January that will wind up being our next record. Stay tuned for that one!
C– Thank you so much for the interview! Is there anything else you would like to say to your fans in Atlantic Canada?
J– Thanks so much for the invite! We’re extremely happy to be coming!
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“Unstoppable Momentum” is now available in record stores and can also be downloaded here on iTunes(link).
Tickets:
Tickets for the Moncton show(Oct 4) are available online at www.casinonb.ca, by phone at 1.866.943.8849, or in person at Casino New Brunswick Gift Shop.
Tickets for the Halifax show(Oct 5) are available online at www.kil-dacweb-3.cohn.dal.ca/online, by phone at 902.494.3820 or 1.800.874.1669, or in person at the Dalhousie Arts Centre Box Office (6101 University Avenue).
