Steve Vai
Fire Garden

THE REVIEW

A few years ago, when I started taking guitar lessons, the first video my instructor showed me was "Tender surrender" by a certain Steve Vai.

I wasn’t an expert on the six strings or familiar with many other guitarists to even make comparisons, not that I gave a damn about making comparisons anyway, as an expert on "pilu" I immediately understood that the guy with the arms and hands was completely making love to the object with the neck and strings.

After the lesson, I headed to the nearest record store and desperately searched for the Steve Vai CD containing "Tender surrender." Good evening, do you have any albums by Steve Vai? ...try the second shelf at the bottom right of the hard/rock section.

I search, search, search, damn there it is... but only one album! "Fire garden" priced at 5 euros, "Tender surrender" isn’t in the tracklist, but the cover is so nice, never mind, I'll buy it anyway.

I get back in the car and realize after only 60 seconds that I really like this kind of music.

Steve is very fast in execution, but in this album, he does not play much on this skill. He focuses a lot on creating atmospheres and environments, choosing to tease the listener with real instrumental games as in the case of "Bangkok." His solo style is characterized by an impressive mastery of legato and the whammy bar, recognized as the world's best at the latter technique, which he uses to tweak the notes. The musical world of Frank Zappa has decisively influenced Vai's guitar characteristics and his conception of dissonances and altered scales.

What distinguishes a professional work from a genius's work of art lies in passion, the ability to get involved, and the enthusiasm with which it is realized, characteristics confirmed by masterpieces like: "Warm Regards", "Brother", and "Dyin' Day".

The album in question showcases Steve's great expressive will vocally as well. In fact, the work, which contains 18 tracks, is divided into a first exclusively instrumental part and in a second part that embraces the last 8 tracks except "Warm Regards" where for the first time is proposed the voice of a man who usually prefers to let the guitar sing instead of himself.