Satch style improv

[Slasha]

hey, i've been messing around with different modes and stuff on different chords trying to find out how satch and vai kind of get that airy mysterious type sound in their scales and solos. Do they play just a normal lydian in the I chord? Or is it more complex? Someone please if you hve any pointers it would be greatly appreciated!

:cool: Slasha

[FretSlug]

I just learned from my guitar teacher (who is a god, but that's irrelevant) that Vai uses his Eventide harmonizer almost always when he plays his fast tapping stuff. Listen to Passion and Warfare, if you find a tapping part from it which has not been harmonized, please, point it out to me.

That's one thing.. Perhaps..

[Christoph]

It's hard to put any kind of method to Vai's playing, but as for Satch . . . he plays a lot of lydian, usually over add9 chords and the like. His progressions tend to "roam" around a lot through different keys (called pitch axis). One second he'll be playing in lydian, and the next second he'll modulate to dominant phrygian.

[Zeppelin]

dominant phrygian? whats that?
anyway about vai i aslo think that he uses some kind of delay on few of the fast runs in passion and warfare..
you can hear quite good the double notes and not matter how fast is he, he cant be that fast..

[Christoph]

A Phrygian scale with a raised third . . . basically just an inversion of harmonic minor.