All of Steve Vai’s guitars

not_the_dj

New section on his website with details of all the guitars he’s owned!

https://www.vai.com/guitars/

TheMarlin

The Gretsch with P90’s is stunning!

mbe

Crikey, I thought I had too many but that is an incredible amount. Over 200 currently owned plus basses acoustics and exotic ones.

dindude

Over 100 of which are JEMs, blimey!

ICBM

“Because he can”, obviously... a bit like his playing - why use one note when a hundred will do?



I am a fan by the way!

There’s some interesting stuff there as well as the JEMs and Universes - things from his very early days like the Gibson SG200 and the Univox Les Paul copy. I was trying to spot what his first guitar (before the Univox) was, but I must have missed it...

Aha! It was a red Tiesco, like the blue one. No picture of it.

Interesting that a couple of times he describes the SG as having "one pickup", when it clearly has two. But if I remember correctly, these pickups are resin-potted, so if they die you're screwed - and they're a unique size so virtually impossible to replace, without doing major work. Maybe his had a dead pickup.

not_the_dj

I love the crazy stuff like the DNA ones, where his blood was mixed in with the paint.

Vibetronic

Some amazing stuff there. I've got a Joe Despagni Jem - didn't realised he'd died until recently. I recently sold another guitar, and by complete coincidence, the guy who bought it used to be the owner of my Despagni Jem. Turns out that it was the guitar that Joe used to keep in his shop and loan out to people whilst he worked on their guitars. 

bluechargeboy

Ooo, an AZ in SSS configuration with strat controls...

DrBob

Of all of them it’s the blue Destroy All Guitars Telstar that I’m craving. Bloody love those guitars 

boogieman

I can’t see any mention of Neville, unless I’ve missed it? Dave Malam (is he still on here?) owned it at one time I believe, may still do for all I know. 

bluechargeboy

I'm gonna be on this site all day!

I'd love one of these blue JEMs. One day....

boogieman

bluechargeboy said:

Ooo, an AZ in SSS configuration with strat controls...

So basically........... a Strat then? 

DrBob

boogieman said:

bluechargeboy said:

Ooo, an AZ in SSS configuration with strat controls...

So basically........... a Strat then? 

I do like the slightly sharper edged aesthetic of these. It’s a bit like they stopped the morph between a Strat and a Jem half way through 

bluechargeboy

boogieman said:

bluechargeboy said:

Ooo, an AZ in SSS configuration with strat controls...

So basically........... a Strat then? 

Well, a Strat with a thinner neck, stainless frets, Luminlay side dots, massively superior upper fret access, etc etc.....

Wonky

And I thought I had GAS bad!!!  How many guitars does one guy need!
Fun looking through them though, I must admit.

ICBM

Wonky said:

And I thought I had GAS bad!!!  How many guitars does one guy need!

I suspect either he or Ibanez just come up with an idea every few months/weeks, and they say "we'll make it for you" and he says "thanks". It's interesting that he seems to still play 'Evo' more than any of the others.

Wonky

ICBM said:

Wonky said:

And I thought I had GAS bad!!!  How many guitars does one guy need!

I suspect either he or Ibanez just come up with an idea every few months/weeks, and they say "we'll make it for you" and he says "thanks". It's interesting that he seems to still play 'Evo' more than any of the others.

It is nice to see he's got a favourite, like most of us.  Pretty much all the choice in the world but a special connection to one.

Moominpapa

I  like the initial screen message:  "Please wait while we load almost 400 guitars".

No problem - I'll go put the kettle on.

Stevepage

bluechargeboy said:

I'm gonna be on this site all day!

I'd love one of these blue JEMs. One day....

Not a guitar that would usually grab me but when I played that model a few years back I fell in love with it. Now I can't stop looking at them.

bingefeller

ICBM said:

Wonky said:

And I thought I had GAS bad!!!  How many guitars does one guy need!

I suspect either he or Ibanez just come up with an idea every few months/weeks, and they say "we'll make it for you" and he says "thanks". It's interesting that he seems to still play 'Evo' more than any of the others.

A lot of the other guitars are used on his albums.  He will often layer different guitars for different harmony parts, different guitars for rhythms etc. 

EricTheWeary

Just flicking through and some of the JEMs seem to  have very little wood above the monkey grip, I wonder how common it is to have a break there.