by Joe Satriani
Songs like "Asik Veysel," "Andalusia," "Revelation," "I Just Wanna Rock," and "Musterion" all felt fresh to me in terms of how they came together, but there’s one song that brought out the composer nerd in me. The chorus in "Ghosts," which wound up being a digital-exclusive bonus track, was a series of minor keys strung out in a particular order I'd never heard used before. I came up with a melody that used two whole-tone scales over these two minor keys. When I was writing it, I was so excited about how they worked together. It was one of those moments when I was so intrigued by the compositional architecture of it, and later on I couldn't believe no one had picked up on it. It was definitely one of those times when you're reminded that the rest of the world does not hear music like you do. Ultimately, the kind of feeling I get when I'm working on a new record is one I love: I just want everybody to hear it because it’s a new version of my creativity.
CHAPTER 20 * *
Chickenfoot I—2009
"Satriani, rock’s leading instrumentalist and hero of a thousand guitar magazine covers, has joined forces with rock’s most irrepressible front man and his monumental rhythm section."
—San Francisco Chronicle
I was just getting ready to master Professor Satchafunkilus when I got a call from Sammy Hagar inviting me to Las Vegas for a celebrity jam with Chad Smith and Michael Anthony. I didn't know Sammy that well, but it seemed like a fun thing to do. As it turned out, the twenty minutes we played together was so much fun, we decided to become a band!
Sammy Hagar: I’m okay with the “supergroup” label, because we are: We're super players. We're superstars in our own right who got together, but we didn't do it for the supergroup reason. We did it for all the RIGHT reasons. We're doing it because we want to play this kind of music together and with no fame-and-fortune business attached. We just wanted to do it and it’s so unique because this is like Van Halen without the business end for me.
Chad Smith, drummer, Red Hot Chili Peppers: I’m the founder of Chickenfoot. I’m sure Sam will probably dispute that [laughs]. It started with us both living in Cabo San Lucas. I moved down there in 2002, and Sam of course is like the mayor down there. I first met Sam when I went down to his club one night for a birthday bash concert he was throwing. When I pulled up, there was a line out the door, and on the street there was a big screen with Sammy playing with Jerry Cantrell, Tommy Lee—all these guys are down there, right in the middle of this little weird Mexican town! We hit it off immediately. He loved the Chili Peppers and I was a big Montrose fan growing up. We had a shot of tequila together, and fifteen minutes later he said, "Come on, let’s jam!" We became fast friends and whenever he would go down there, which was a lot, he would call me up. We'd hang out in his club and just play whatever—James Brown, Zeppelin, the Doors—whatever we wanted. It was really fun.
Producer/engineer Andy Johns at Sammy’s studio for Chickenfoot I sessions in '08
PHOTO BY JOHN CUNIBERTI
Michael Anthony, former bassist, Van Halen: Sammy came up with the name Chickenfoot. It’s like the three talons on a chicken’s foot.
Sammy Hagar: When we were Chickenfoot without Joe, we were jamming and playing other people’s songs: Led Zeppelin, Cream, the Who, whatever. Chad was the one who said, "Let’s get together and make a record." I said I wouldn't do it unless we had a great guitar player because I just wanted to sing. I cannot be a great guitar player and a great singer. Chad’s too good of a drummer, Mikey’s too good of a bass player, and we needed a guitar player as good as those guys. Chad asked, "Who are you thinking?" and my immediate reply was, "Joe Satriani’s my favorite guitar player."
Chad Smith: In 2007, the Chili Peppers were taking our first real break for at least a year, and we hadn't done that in ten years. I told Sam, "Hey, I got some time off if you want to do something. Let’s do it now." Sammy said, "I'm going to get a real guitar player. I'll call Joe!" I asked, "Joe?" Sammy said, "Yeah, Joe Satriani!" I was a little reluctant to believe Joe would really be into it. A month or so later, Sammy called me up about a Super Bowl party he was playing in Vegas and said, "I called Satriani up and he said he wants to come and jam. Let’s get up for the encore!"
Michael Anthony: You never really know what to expect when you are live onstage. It could have been, like, five minutes of jamming the blues, then "See you later." There’s a magic and chemistry that can happen, though, and for me, it’s happened three times. Once when I joined Van Halen, the second time when Sammy joined Van Halen, and the third time when Chickenfoot jammed for the first time. We were having such a good time onstage, and it was great because after all the crap you go through— and that I went through in my career in Van Halen—to get together with some guys and not even have to think about anything but purely jamming with some buddies and having fun is the best feeling that there is. That’s basically why we all decided to get together and keep this thing going. There was no talk of, "Hey, let’s get together and form a supergroup." It was more like, "Wow, that was so much fun!" I remember when we were up there at that very first jam, we'd played through two or three songs, and Chad yelled to the crowd, "You want to hear more?" They just went wild, and he started Zeppelin’s "Rock and Roll." Chad wasn't ready to leave the stage that night and neither were the rest of us.
At Skywalker for Chickenfoot I sessions
PHOTO BY BRYAN ADAMS
I think the central idea for Chickenfoot’s stylistic direction was like an early-seventies rock band. Underneath that, it’s obviously the blues. We were celebrating the very early stage of classic rock. That was a surprise to us, but it just seemed to be where we naturally went. Chad didn't just bring his Chili Peppers stuff to the band, I didn't bring all my solo guitar stuff, and Mike and Sam weren't trying to be Van Halen. I think that’s what surprised us and what’s kept us together as a group. We created a fifth element that we all loved and were surprised by, and that really is the sound of the band. So as a group, as a four-piece, we performed really well, but it was amazing how much bigger we were than just four guys when we got together. There was something extra that came out of us, and that’s what we decided to call "Chickenfoot"—that extra thing.
Sammy Hagar: It was very bold because the music we were playing was very unfashionable, and it still is. We're playing brand-new classic rock. We're bringing fresh songs to that format. The only thing we discussed before we started was, "Let’s play the music we like to play." We didn't know what we were doing because we were on the front line, just digging the hole and stepping in it at the same time. We weren't looking to be something else that we're not.
The only learning curve was being confident around one another and feeling comfortable to show your ass. When you play music—especially when you're writing and nobody knows exactly what they're doing just yet—it can be uncomfortable around people you don't know or trust to really go for it. A lot of guys—mainly singers—will kick everybody out of the room when they're doing vocals or won't sing in front of people. We don't do it that way—we fucking just go for it. I just make HUGE bad notes before I know what I'm singing sometimes. That’s the only learning curve, getting to that point where I could say, "Joe’s not gonna make fun of me, though Chad’s gonna make fun of me," but that’s okay because that’s what he does. If Mikey makes a mistake, he knows we're gonna go, "What the fuck were you playing?" We joke with each other but we're not there to intimidate anyone or make anyone feel like they need to tighten their shit up. We really get loose around one another.
Joe in his pre-Chickenfoot incarnation wasn't really a jam kind of guy. Joe is a perfectionist. I know he can jam but his songs and his shows were usually ones where every lick was worked out precisely to end at a certain time. That’s kind of how he did things when we started because he wanted it to be perfect every time, and when you jam, things aren't perfect. So me and Chad really turned Joe out because Chad and I had been jamming together for at least five or six years before he came in the picture—Mikey too, but mainly me and Chad. We're brav
e souls and we're not afraid to show our asses. We're not afraid to make a mistake and go for it and try anything. Joe loved that, and he got so into it that he fell right into the same attitude. So as Chickenfoot started playing more together as a band, I could feel him getting off the hook and loosening up. I'm always telling him that "We turned you out," which is like we took a virgin and made him a whore [laughs]. And he fell in love with it, too, knowing he didn't have to be perfect.
Our chemistry was surprising to us. It didn't feel like something that was manufactured. This was not a record company-brainstormed band, this was just four guys who got together, surprised one another, and just went with it in a natural way. We would write and record, sit back and listen, and if we liked it, we'd release it. Both Chickenfoot albums have been do-it-yourself projects, with no label involved until we were absolutely finished, so artistically it’s our own thing.
Chad Smith: Once we knew we wanted to make a full album together, someone said, "Let’s get Andy Johns to produce us!" Joe had worked with Andy on The Extremist and with Sammy and Mike on For Unlawful Carnal Knowledge. I'd never worked with Andy but knew he'd been an engineer on Led Zeppelin IV. Here was a chance to work with a guy who worked on "When the Levee Breaks"! YEAH, I'll work with that guy!
Sammy Hagar: Andy’s brilliant, and musically, he'll sit and fucking work five hours straight on something with you, trying to get one note right. When you put your drums in a room and Andy starts listening, he starts moving mics around, putting mics here and mics there. He comes up with some great live rockin' sounds!
Andy Johns: In the studio, we understand each other very well. They know what I'm thinking and I know what they're thinking. When I got the call for Chickenfoot, we worked at Sammy’s first and did some demos, and I had quite a bit to do with how that went. Sammy was all on fire and eager. We continued recording at George Lucas’s Skywalker Ranch and it went really well.
Chad Smith: The studio was really big—obviously orchestras record in there—and it was very comfortable. We actually didn't really utilize the live room; we used about a quarter of it with baffles during tracking.
Sammy Hagar: When Joe and I first got together, in one session we wrote "Sexy Little Thing." Within a day or two, we had three or four songs written. "Learning to Fall" and "Turnin' Left" both came out of that and I knew it was working!
With "Sexy Little Thing," I was playing a friend’s '63 Stratocaster in my upstairs music room, looking out into the backyard. When I started writing it, I recorded it on a laptop and called it "Trekking Song." It sounded like an esoteric little instrumental. It had a Celtic feel to it, but I didn't really know what was going to happen with it until I brought it downstairs into the studio and listened to it a few times. I thought it could be a very accessible song. It didn't necessarily have to be some unusual Mixolydian-based instrumental. I think I'd written it before the Chickenfoot thing came together, but once Chickenfoot happened, I realized I had to write a bunch of songs before I went on tour. I started thinking for the first time, "What would I want Sammy Hagar to sound like if I had a chance to point him in a new direction?" My feeling was that he could dip into blues, sing in a lower register, and add elements of the Faces and Humble Pie and the Rolling Stones, and all that early-seventies rock stuff. I just had a sense that he would click with that. Going into our first writing session, all I had was the music and the title "She’s a Sexy Little Thing." It was enough to inspire him to create a story and melody line and a whole arrangement.
Sammy Hagar: With all the other songs outside of those we wrote in that first session together, Joe would bring me the music, and I would hear a melody first. Ninety-nine point nine percent of the time, I hear a melody to every piece of music and I just start singing. And 99.9 percent of the time, I end up keeping my first melody idea. I may have to tweak it, change a line, or make a phrase a little better, but that’s it. Then I write lyrics to my melody. My melody is usually what dictates the individual lyrics, but it’s Joe’s music that usually dictates the title. So, for instance, with "Oh Yeah," I just immediately started singing that for the chorus, and knew it was going to be the title. With that song, I didn't know what I was going to talk about in the verses. I could have written that one about a thousand different subjects. So for most of them, I came up with a title based off Joe’s initial idea—like with "Sexy Little Thing"—and then I just started writing the most tongue-in-cheek, dirty, sexy lyrics I could think of.
Sam has a great amount of experience being a successful writer of hits, and because he’s a singer and a really great communicator, he has an innate sense about how to communicate an idea vocally. That’s not my strong point, so when I bring ideas in, I'm always looking for something that’s a little bit left of center and strange, because that’s the kind of stuff I like to listen to over and over again. When Sam gets some of my ideas, I think he tries to figure out "What is Joe getting at?" and he tries to bring it to the people. He tries to make it something you can actually grasp. "Sexy Little Thing" is a good example of where he took something that, if I had written it, I would have made it a little bit odd and not as accessible. Since he’s the guy standing in front of the band holding the mic, looking at everybody in the audience, his thing is to reach the biggest number of people and get them to understand this idea. His gift is to cut through my weird guitar stuff and then figure out what to sing about and how to sing it so that everybody can relate to it.
Chad Smith: Joe would come up with the riffs and the basic song ideas and he'd email them to us. We'd say, "Yeah, I like that one. That’s a cool riff," and Sam would say, "I got something for that." It was real relaxed. Then Mike and I flew up one weekend, and we all got in Sam’s studio and demoed six or seven songs. Probably five of them wound up on the album. You know what’s really cool and rare is when you get together and play with someone, and think it sounds cool, and then go in the control room of the studio, listen to a playback, and go, "Fuck, that sounds better than I thought it was when we were playing it!" Microphones don't lie. They're naked and you can't get away with shit.
You can't worry about appearances when you're working on music. You have to go with what ultimately makes the song better. When I'm in Chickenfoot, where I'm playing with other players who are very creative and extremely capable and always ready to deliver, I always remind myself that I haven't hired these guys and they haven't hired me. We're all giving ourselves latitude. No one tells anyone what to play or not play. I love collaborating and I recognize that although it can be difficult when you're in the middle of it, the end result is worth it, and usually far better than you would have done on your own.
Chad Smith: It was great in the studio because nobody was telling anybody what to play. Everyone was just doing their thing, just eye contact and "play." It was really free. Of course, everybody’s a songwriting pro with building bridges and choruses and solos and shit, but we didn't want to overthink everything, and I love that, personally. I think that’s lacking in music today because Pro Tools makes it so easy to be so perfect. We just got in a room and played with no clicks, no editing. It was just an old-school band playing like the guys we'd all grown up loving.
Michael Anthony: I remember Chad and I talking to Andy quite a lot about our desire to really keep this thing fresh and loose and not try to get too precise on takes. In Van Halen, even if there was a little slipup, we'd leave it in. It’s just the energy of it, you know. I've been in so many situations with Van Halen where you beat a song to death, and even though it sounds great, you listen to it and go, "Man, it just wasn't like when we first picked up the instruments." We wanted to keep that excitement there with Chickenfoot because that’s what it was all about!
The band in Skywalker’s control room for Chickenfoot I sessions
PHOTO BY BRYAN ADAMS
During recording we'd play a song several times and let everybody kind of experiment a bit. Then slowly we'd say, "I liked when you did this more than that." It’s a process of being all
owed to experiment, all of us throwing out options, new ideas, and suggestions for how how to improve something. We'd do that from about noon until three o'clock, when we'd decide we were finished with a song and wanted to lock it down. The important thing is that musicians can deliver a performance after taking in criticism. It’s easy to agree with criticism and to acknowledge new ideas, but to actually implement those ideas takes a whole higher level of musician. Sometimes you're in a situation where you say, "Make it funkier," and then the band says, "Yeah, we understand. Let’s do it," and it turns out that they can't. They just don't possess the talent. With Chickenfoot, we always seem to be able to move in the direction that we agree on as a group because we're fortunate that we've got a lot of ability in the band to change direction on a dime and take advantage of any inspiration that pops up out of our unique synergy.