If only every Eddie Van Halen video came with a warning – “Guitarists Everywhere: DO NOT TRY THIS AT HOME!”
In a recent clip of Dweezil Zappa’s podcast Runnin’ With The Dweezil, Steel Panther guitarist Satchel admitted to throwing a few guitars in the trash at an early age after failed attempts to recreate them the same way Eddie did. Satchel found out the hard way – just because Eddie made it look easy didn’t mean it was easy.
“I think I ruined a couple of guitars early on,” said Satchel.
Zappa: “How? What did you do to them?”
“Like soldering things to the wrong thing,” responded Satchel. “Routing them out, like taking pickups out and trying to do…ya know, things that Eddie Van Halen made look so easy; and he did it, and it worked, and it changed the whole guitar world and I would go, ‘Oh, cool. I guess putting a new pickup in hear would be real easy to do. I’d ruin my pickguard and the pickup wouldn’t work and [chuckles], I was just like, ‘Hey mom? Can you buy me a new guitar?'”
Listen to the entire segment with Satchel below:
The 30-episode “Runnin’ With The Dweezil” podcast is available exclusively through dweezilzappa.com. Packages include listening parties, Q&A sessions, “Brown Sound” bonus episodes, custom Axe-FX, Helix, and Kemper presets, a 1-year subscription to Premier Guitar, and much more.
A portion of the proceeds will go to benefit Mr. Holland’s Opus Foundation and Feeding America.