Steve Vai
Fire Garden

Reviewing a work by Steve Vai inevitably requires great attention in following all his artistic evolutions and the ability to give a judgment as objective as possible, beyond one's own legitimate musical preferences.

Just like his greatest masters, Frank Zappa and Jimi Hendrix, Vai dedicated his immense talent to experimentation and the continuous search for new horizons to cross, almost as if to challenge himself, constantly questioning himself, never resting on canonical patterns, easily impactful virtuosity, predictable melodies, and immediate consumption.

And so, after a baptism of fire with Zappa, where in addition to being his most brilliant student, he also got to earn the title of "transcriber of impossible pieces", he began a career devoted to change and marked by a guitar without limits or boundaries, moving from "Flexable" to the encounter-clash with the great neoclassicism of Yngwie Malmsteen in Alcatrazz, from the glorious years with Diamond Dave Lee Roth to the collaboration with Whitesnake of Coverdale, and then returning to his beloved solo career, with the quintessential fusion masterpiece "Passion and Warfare" and many other works, including the fundamental contribution to Joe Satriani's G3 project.

In 1996, the album titled "Fire Garden" was released, which in reality can rightly be considered a double CD enclosed in one, with over 74 minutes of music, with a further double division into "phase 1" consisting of nine entirely instrumental tracks and "phase 2" with all vocal parts except for the eighteenth episode, "Warm Regards", which is entirely instrumental and one of the most intense and brilliant moments of the entire work.
It starts with a rather aggressive beginning, given by "There's a Fire In The House", which reaffirms in the title the presence of fire as the dominant natural element, and then moves to more meditative and introspective sounds; "The Crying Machine", "Dyin' Day" and "Hand On Heart" offer the listener, in a holistic perspective, the evolution that Steve Vai has matured over a long career and represent the most shining examples of how now the word "feeling" is in total symbiosis with the innate technical and virtuosic abilities, pervading and setting the soul and heart on fire with infinite velvety emotions.

But Steve's creative flair is great, as we know, and it often takes him very far, almost like a modern-day Ulysses on a journey to cross the "Pillars of Hercules," and the horizon of the "Fire Garden" magically moves to the deep East of "Bangkok", a fine sound carpet that introduces, to conclude the first phase, the powerful "Fire Garden Suite", a piece of absolute genius and nonconformity, without a shadow of a doubt, one of the most ambitious of his entire musical journey. The second part of this work sees a Steve Vai also as a vocalist and, unlike many other guitarists, he shows a certain inclination to express his own songs even through his vocal cords; guitar and voice merge, giving life to songs of strong impact and pathos, like "Little Alligator" or even more "Brother" where Hendrixian reminiscences find their highest representation in an absolutely personal and modern interpretation, or the sweet and enticing, almost American-like "All About Eve", but "Warm Regards" is the real icing on the cake; we return to 4 minutes of masterfully interpreted guitar, a lesson of style and class in a crescendo of true and intense emotions, to listen, love, and perhaps dream a little: ladies and gentlemen, this is Steve Vai!