Steve Vai recently sat down for an interview on The Cassius Morris Show, where he reflects on his three-year stint with Frank Zappa’s band.
As per Ultimate Guitar, Steve’s stint with Frank Zappa took him from 1980-1983 as the band’s lead guitarist.
During the interview, Steve delves deep into life when he was young and what his breakdown while on tour has taught him.
Steve recalled, “Things came to a head for me when I was touring with Frank Zappa – I was in Montreal in 1980, and I just had a complete breakdown, anxiety attack, that lasted a year and a half. It was panic, it was all fear, there’s a fear that was in the background that just overcame it. And I didn’t know what it was. I wasn’t doing anything – I wasn’t doing drugs, nothing. I harboured a fear of going insane when I was younger.”
“When you’re in your own head and you have thoughts that you don’t know why they’re there, you start thinking, ‘There’s something wrong with me.’ And then what happens is – it just gets compounded. It’s a form of ignorance, it’s just a form of fear that compounds itself. And I think one of the things was – I love music, I love the idea of playing music and all, but I was under the impression that if you become famous you would go insane.”
And Steve explains what had him under that impression for most of his life at the time.
“It was something my aunt had said when I was a little boy. And when you’re young and you hear stuff like that, you go, ‘Oh, okay, now I get it, I don’t ever wanna be famous.’ She even said like, ‘Oh, you go to New York City, and it’s it’s nothing but a rat race.'”
Love Classic Rock?
Get the latest Classic Rock news, features, updates and giveaways straight to your inbox Learn more
Steve added, “For my childhood, I thought if I went to New York City, I would see rats racing. So what happened was – I became really fragile. And it was the best thing that happened to me because depression – it’s like trial by fire.”
“And when you’re going through it, it’s inexplicable. I’m talking about a deep kind of depression, not like, ‘My dog died so I’m depressed. Nobody loves me so I’m depressed.’ No, I’m not talking about that. That’s more like being bummed out.”
Steve continues, “Depression is something very different and I experienced it when I was that young man for a while, and it’s devastating. But it was valuable because your greatest spiritual teacher is your own suffering – there’s no doubt about that.”
Watch the full interview with Steve Vai on The Cassius Morris Show below.
