SATCHVAI Band, Animals As Leaders, Joe Satriani, and Steve Vai

After the disbandment of his previous technical metalcore band Reflux, Tosin Abasi was asked by his then record label Prosthetic Records, to create a solo album to which Abasi refused on the grounds that it sounded ‘egotistical’. A year later after expanding his technical guitar skills he took the label up on the offer and Animals as Leaders was born, the name drawn from Daniel Quinn’s 1992 anthropocentric novel “Ishmael”.

The band’s first album the self-titled “Animals as Leaders” was recorded in 2008 with Abasi laying down all the guitar and bass tracks and engineer Misha Mansoor adding the drums and synths. The album was released on April 23, 2009 on Prosthetics Records and saw guitarist Javier Reyes join the band.

On the success of the album Animals as Leaders enjoyed an extensive tour schedule including the illustrious 2010 Summer Slaughter Tour alongside acts such as Decapitated, The Red Chord, The Faceless and since then supporting more mainstream acts including Dredg, Underoath and Thrice.

The band was able to headline their own tour for the first time in mid 2011, enlisting Dead Letter Circus, Last Chance to Reason and Intronaut as support acts and announced on July 27, 2011 at a show at the Masquerade in Atlanta, Georgia, U.S., that the gig was being recorded for a live DVD. November 8 of that year marked the band’s sophomore released entitled “Weightless”.

2012 brought in drummer Matt Garstka to replace Navene Koperweis, and an impressive European headlining tour. In the same year Animals as Leaders signed to Sumerian Record who subsequently released the band’s third album “The Joy of Motion” on March 25, 2014.

Satriani was born in Westbury, New York, US and raised in a neighboring town called Carle Place. He first expressed an interest in playing the drums, but settled on guitar at the age of 14, largely in response to the death of one of his idols and perhaps greatest source of inspiration, Jimi Hendrix. Satriani was a fast learner and 4 years following his decision to pursue guitar he was training under legendary jazz artists such as guitarist Billy Bauer and pianist Lennie Tristano.

Within a few years time Satriani had his own students, one of them being the technically proficient and likeminded artist Steve Vai. Satriani sought out a music career in Berkley, California and made his transition to the city in 1978. In addition to acting as a solo artist he still kept his stint as a teacher alive. A few of his students went on to be highly respected and commercially prominent artists in their own rights, such as Kirk Hammett of Metallica, Kevin Cadogan of Third Eye Blind, and David Bryson of Counting Crows.

One of Satriani’s first immersion in the California music scene was his joining of the San Francisco rock band the Squares. Through this experience he networked with many other musicians one of them being Greg Kihn who eventually invited Satriani to join his band. By this time Satriani already released a self-titled EP as well as his first studio album “Not of This Earth”, which came out through Relativity records and was later reissued on Epic.

Though Satriani was respected within a tight niche community, he was still in commercial obscurity. However all eyes and ears started to fixate on him after Steve Vai (who during this time was ridding off the success of his work with David Lee Roth) spoke glowingly of him in Guitar World Magazine.

Satriani released his breakthrough record “Surfing With the Alien” in 1987, which peaked at No. 29 on the Billboard 200, making it one of the most successful instrumental albums of it’s time. His follow up album “Flying in a Blue Dream” came out in 1989. This release was a critical and commercial hit as well, appearing at No. 23 on the Billboard 200 and earning a Grammy nomination for Best Rock Instrumental Performance. This release has since achieved gold certification and it’s single “One Big Rush” was featured in the Cameron Crowe masterpiece “Say Anything”. In between these albums Satriani released the EP #11 and also accompanied Mick Jagger on a tour of Australia and Japan.

During this period Satriani was topping countless guitar magazines as one of the world’s greatest guitar players; however, he took a brief break from recording and focused his attention on developing signature guitars for the company Ibanez. Sariani returned with his highly anticipated 1992 release “The Extremist”, which became his most popular release to date making its way to No. 22 on the US Billboard Charts. Satriani issued his compilation album “Time Machine” in 1993 and subsequently replaced Richie Blackmore as the guitarist for Deep Purple.

Satriani returned to his solo career a year later and released his 1995 self-titled studio album. Also around this time he initiated the renowned G3 concert tour with Steve Vai. G3 is an annual reoccurring event and has featured incredible talent such as Yngwie Malmsteen, Robert Fripp, John Petrucci, and Steve Morse.

In 1998 Satriani put out “Crystal Planet”, which featured the hit single “Ceremony”. Following this release was “Engines of Creation”, arguably Satriani’s boldest experimentation (featuring elements of electronica and techno).

Satirani churned out a string of high quality releases through out the remainder of the 2000s including “Strange Beautiful Music”, “Is There Love in Space?”, “Super Colossal”, and “Professor Satchfunkilus and the Musterion of Rock”. Satriani rounded off the decade releasing a collaborative recording with Michael Anthony, Sammy Hagar, and Chad Smith under the name Chickenfoot.

Incredibly enough, Steve Vai only started playing guitar at the age of 13 years old. This is practically ancient compared to most virtuoso instrumentalists, as most of them are childhood prodigies who received lessons before they could walk. Not for Vai, he just picked up the guitar in 1973 and after some lessons from Joe Satriani himself, he was leading his own band, fittingly named The Steve Vais. After only five years of playing the instrument, he was accepted into the Berklee College of Music, but dropped out early as he had secured a job performing with Frank Zappa.

Vai had sent a transcription of a Zappa guitar solo to the man himself and Zappa was so impressed with the results that he employed the to transcribe a number of his guitar parts. This eventually lead to Vai joining Zappa’s band The Mothers of Invention, where Vai’s sheer skill was so overpowering that Zappa credited him in his album linear notes as playing “stunt guitar”. Vai first went on tour with Zappa in 1980, and stayed for two years before leaving for Los Angeles, California to focus on his solo career.

His debut solo album was released in 1984, and while it wasn’t a huge success it did secure him a spot in the heavy metal band Alcatrazz, filling in the lead guitarist spot that some no-hoper called Yngwie Malmsteen vacated. It was his time in the band that secured him the spot that would hurl him into the public spotlight, playing lead guitar in Diamond David Lee Roth’s new band. His first album with The David Lee Roth Band was released in 1986, sold over 2 million copies and set Vai up as the next Eddie Van Halen in the eyes of many, many people.

Ever since leaving the David Lee Roth band in 1989, Vai has worked as a journeyman guitarist and a solo artist in his own right. He’s enjoyed successful stints in bands like Whitesnake and Public Image LTD while also having hit solo records like 1993’s “Sex And Religion” and 1999’s “The Ultra Zone”. He remains an inspiration to multiple generations of guitarists the world over, and still comes highly recommended.