Joe Satriani has revealed why he became “disillusioned” by vintage guitars, with the Surfing with the Alien shredder underscoring his preference for modern builds in a new interview.
For some players, vintage guitars are the Holy Grail. From pre-CBS era Stratocasters to pre-war Martin acoustic guitars, there are certain models from certain periods that hold a mythical appeal. Satriani, though, doesn’t see what the fuss is about.
“Working in a vintage guitar shop, you kind of get disillusioned about the price of these things and what they actually sound like,” he tells D’Addario in a new video charting his celebrated career.
“After hours, we would sit there, my friends and I, and we would play all these guitars that were supposedly the most expensive, the most valuable, rare guitars. And they'd be like, ‘There's nothing special about it.’
“The musician has to connect with the guitar for it to become special,” he adds.
He certainly makes an interesting point, though playability is only one side of the coin. Vintage gear expert Joe Bonamassa, for example, places much importance in the actual story of a guitar and the sentimental tales the instrument can tell.
His quest for the Gibson Les Paul used by the late Deep Purple marksman Tommy Bolin, for instance, is one of the wildest guitar acquisition stories out there. History and providence are powerful things but as Satch observes, another player could easily pick it up and feel no connection to it.
Bolin’s Les Paul has a rich history, but from a purely performative perspective, that doesn’t necessarily mean it play better. Nevertheless, it does carry one hell of a story.
On the contrary, Pink Floyd and prog rock legend David Gilmour has claimed that time can make vintage guitars play far better than their contemporary counterparts. Yet his iconic Black Strat, which shattered records as it sold for $4 million in 2019, is no better or worse than his signature reissue model, he reckons. Vintage doesn’t always equate to better.
Instead of romanticizing the past, Satriani, through his partnership with Ibanez, has crafted a series of futuristic signature guitars, including an ultra-ambitious Ibanez Y2K Crystal Planet prototype. It sold for $10,000 last year.
He's also been happy to adopt modern tech into his live rig, with a signature TONEX One pedal, loaded with presets made by Satriani, indicative of that.
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