Steve Vai detailed just how close David Lee Roth’s original solo band had come to reuniting at a club show in 2015, revealing he’d been within an instant of playing the opening chord of their first song – and he’d had to fight the urge to hit the notes.
The musicians who made the former Van Halen singer’s debut solo album Eat ‘Em and Smile had gathered at the Lucky Strike bowling club in L.A., having announced their intention of having Steel Panther’s Michael Starr front the group for a handful of jammed songs.
But Vai – who was set to perform with bassist Billy Sheehan and drummer Gregg Bissonette – had decided to ask Roth if he’d be interested in taking part; and to his surprise, Roth had agreed.
As word spread, however, the venue filled up beyond its capacity and many more people had gathered outside, and safety measures meant the event had to be canceled.
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In a recent social media post, Vai said he’d always enjoyed jamming at the Lucky Strike and so he’d welcomed Sheehan’s invitation. “I suggested I would call Dave Roth to see if he would be interested,” he the guitarist explained, “though I thought it was a long shot. But surprisingly, Dave was very into it.”
He continued: “Nobody knew Dave was going to be there. They thought it was myself, Billy, Gregg and our most wonderful keyboard player in the DLR band, Brett Tuggle (God rest his beautiful soul); and Ralph [Saenz, aka Starr] belting out Roth, which he does very well.”
Vai said the “line was four people wide and stretched all the way around the building” when he and Roth arrived, adding that around 2,000 people were already inside the 350-capacity room. “We were all ready to go,” he recalled, “and the only thing I needed to do was play the first chord of ‘Yankee Rose’ and the curtain would open, Dave would come out, and we would be off.
“Right when I was about to hit the chord, the club manager came to me and said the fire marshal… was shutting down the gig, and they were evacuating the building. The urge to just hit the chord was overwhelming in me, but I asked, ‘What happens if I play?’
Steve Vai’s Desire to Break the Law by Playing One Chord
“He said, ‘You’ll be fined.’ I said, ‘Fine, I’ll pay the fine – how much is it?’ He ran away… came back and said, ‘The fine would be $5k.’ I said, ‘Great, I’ll pay it.’ And then he said, ‘No Steve, they also said if you play, the venue would be shut down, lose their license, and you, the band and the club owners can be arrested.’”
Vai admitted it “only fueled my fire to hit the chord because I thought, ‘Ah, getting arrested over something like this would be pretty cool.’” But he added: “I had to think of the club owner, and also the fire marshal who was walking towards me, so I mustered up all the strength I had in me and put my pick down. I felt gutted.”
Photos accompanying his post show him telling his colleagues that they can’t perform the show. After he’d explained, he went to find Roth, who was waiting nearby. “In true Roth fashion, he said, ‘Perfect! Now we’ll get more press out of it than if we actually played.’ And you know what? He was right. The situation was all over the news.”
He concluded: “I wonder what would have happened if I hit the chord. Do you think I should have?”
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Gallery Credit: Matthew Wilkening
