JOE SATRIANI On His Attempt To Perform 'Mean Street' On 'The Howard Stern Show': 'That Was A Pretty Funny Moment'

In a new interview with Robert Cavuoto of Myglobalmind, Joe Satriani reflected on his attempt to perform Eddie Van Halen's intro to "Mean Street", the opening track off VAN HALEN's 1981 album "Fair Warning", during a recent early-morning live appearance on "The Howard Stern Show". Satriani later said that he "royally screwed up" playing the track, the original version of which saw Eddie Van Halen applying his two-handed tapping to lead-rhythm guitar.

Joe told Myglobalmind that "it wasn't" Sammy Hagar who pressured him into playing "Mean Street" when host Howard Stern asked the two of them which of Eddie Van Halen's riffs is the one that is most difficult to play. Satriani said (as transcribed by BLABBERMOUTH.NET): "It was my own naïveté. I had no idea. When we were gonna do that show, I remember saying to Sam, 'Do we really wanna show people what we sound like at six in the morning?' Plus we've never rehearsed. And I've avoided learning any of these songs for, like, three decades 'cause I never wanted to sound like Eddie. But Sam, he has such a positive attitude towards life. He's, like, 'No, it'll be great. We'll just get together. We'll have fun.' He said to me, he goes, 'Howard's going to ask you about your artwork and about this and all this.' And I said, 'Okay, yeah, fine.' So, silly me. Obviously, it's not turning out like that. And Howard asked me that question. And I should have just laughed and not played anything, but I was just being totally honest — maybe 'cause I was so sleepy [laughs] 'cause it was so early, and I just thought, 'Oh, yeah, sure.' I just felt like I was among friends, and I said, 'Yeah, I'll show you what I've been trying to play.' But, yeah, technically, I've gotta work on that a little bit.' [Laughs] In the end, I thought, well, this is a really endearing moment because it really does show how amazing Eddie was, because… What I've noticed about it is that even when people rehearse it and they get it down, it just doesn't even come close to the magic that he put into every note. And it's a mental thing that you have to get used to. You have to tell yourself, 'I'm never gonna get there. So, relax and just learn the parts and then put your own thing into it.' Because that's the only thing you can do. But yeah, that was a pretty funny moment."

A few days after Satriani performed on "The Howard Stern Show" with his new "Best Of All Worlds" tour bandmates Hagar, Michael Anthony and Jason Bonham, he told Guitar World about his "Mean Street" rendition: "I royally screwed up, which hurt like a thorn in my side, but I'll get over it."

Satriani told Guitar World that Eddie himself must have found it challenging to perform his early catalog through what the magazine called "incredibly gain-y rig of his latter touring years."

"He probably struggled with it the most," Satriani said. "Because I'm sure when he sat down to do the beginning of 'Mean Street', he experienced what I did on Howard Stern, where it's, like, 'There's too much gain!' Because you want a peak in the midrange of the gain so you can get those harmonics to sing out as loud. But if you cross the line, you get too much surface noise. But to try and figure all of that out at six in the morning was like… 'Damn, this is rough.'"

During the "Howard Stern" appearance, Hagar explained why he wanted to get Satriani involved instead of just some guitar player who can imitate Eddie's sound.

"The thing about what Eddie did — I mean, the reason Joe is in this band for this tour is because, like I said, if you're gonna go deep into his stuff in the VAN HALEN catalog, you need a guy like Joe Satriani that's not just imitating Eddie.

"So many little kids in grocery stores nowadays just pick up a guitar off the shelf and go play all this stuff, but they don't necessarily know what they're playing," he explained. "They're just imitating Eddie because he's so distinct. Joe knows what he's playing and Joe can do something like that and know what it means.

"I'm going, 'I think that's just Eddie just fucking around beating the shit out of his guitars,'" Hagar said, compared to Joe who actually "knows this stuff".

"That's the difference between playing this stuff with Joe and just having some guitar player in the band that can imitate Eddie," Sammy concluded.

The "Best Of All Worlds" tour will focus on music from the VAN HALEN catalog.

Kicking off on July 13, 2024 in West Palm Beach, Florida, the 28-date trek will feature special guest LOVERBOY.