G3 - John Petrucci, Steve Vai,Joe Satriani @ BrisbaneConvention Centre, 29/11/2006

Wed 6th Dec, 2006 in Gig Reviews

Very few concerts live up to their hype, but G3 is an exception with four hours of shredding guitar, this show could have been called the Gods of Guitar. Joe Satriani teams up with Steve Vai and John Petrucci of Dream Theatre. Each member performs his own set and then all 3 jam on stage together. This was the first G3 show in Australia and the energy of the venue was almost as electric as the guitar playing!

John Petrucci opens the show with his unique style, combining progressive fusion with hard core, heavy guitar. Petrucci played an excellent set, with the highlight being Damage Control, this song sounds very much like his solos in Dream Theatre, heavy and powerful, but with melodic undertones and a deep sense of feeling. It certainly moved the audience to their feet. The rhythm section is also very solid with Dave Larue (Steve Morse/ Dregs) on bass and Dream Theatre ally Mike Portnoy on drums. Portney is a highly entertaining performer throwing his sticks in the air and catching them without missing a beat, he even has his own following with the audience yelling out for a drum solo.

Steve Vai is very animated, he looks like the joker and dresses like one too wearing an Aztec poker shirt, and later coming out with Aztec pants and a diamante choker. He is the showman of the troupe, he loves being on stage and has fun when he plays. With twenty guitars off stage in what appears to be an instrumental bike rack, Steve Vai is a guitar virtuoso, changing instruments on every song. He takes the mud from the Mississippi Delta to Venus on some cosmic guitar shredding space rock journey. Making sounds like you’ve never heard before and playing it in ways you did not know were humanly possible, he appears to be making love to his guitar, including the foreplay.

Building a Church becomes a conscious living structure with Vai commanding the elements into a heavy weight gravity storm, all the while working the wah wah stick and playing the frets like a keyboard. Oddly enough Vai doesn’t know musical notation, yet he is so in tune with his artform that he was able to revolutionize the guitar world by designing a 7 string guitar back in the late 80’s (around 89/90). He learnt the basics from Satriani then evolved it with his own flamboyance to create a mind blowing experience.

He jokes with the audience about being an American and steps back to allow bass player Billy Sheehan a brilliant solo, Sheehan plays bass like a lead guitarist (he was voted the “Best Rock Bass Player” 5 times in Guitar Player Magazine). Billy is THE god of bass playing, and has been for a couple of decades. Again, like Vai, he learnt purely from within, playing from the soul, he can’t really tell you what ‘that’ note is called, or how to read music notes, but he knows instinctively how to rock! Vai finished the set by playing the guitar with his tongue on Freak Show Excess.

Only Satriani could follow an act this good, he has always had an alien presence with great songs, great guitar work and jaw dropping ability. “Be warned” he says “I’m very loud”. He is an inspiration to watch, nobody gets that good by accident.

Both Satriani and Vai have their own line of guitars (Vai’s range has been THE best selling for the Ibanez brand for many years), and Satriani’s guitars are very colourful, red, blue, self portrait and that silvery black one made from aluminum. He is the king of cool, the audience are transfixed by his skill as he launches into well known tracks Cool #9 and Super Colossal, he also plays the harmonica and occasionally does vocals, though who needs words when you play guitar this good?

Satriani has a great energy on stage getting the audience clapping and involving them in a call and response routine called Crowd Chant, in which he plays and the audience mimics. He ends his set with Surfing with the Alien at which stage Vai and Petrucci join him, in what is clearly the highlight of the show, as they launch into a bit of inspired competition with the Jimmi Hendrix classic Voodoo Child. This was an incredible display of unparalleled guitar mastery by three of the worlds greatest!