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A Lesson from the 90s in Finalizing Projects

CJ Chilvers
CJ Chilvers
— 1 min read

I spotted this uploaded to YouTube and had to share it. It’s from a 1995 documentary called Reel Satriani on the making of Joe Satriani’s seventh, self-titled album. There’s several cool things about this:

  1. It’s from the end of the analog age. Everything in it is legal pads, 2-inch tape, and physical instruments.
  2. It’s Joe’s first attempt at recording a totally live-in-the-studio rock album, like albums used to be made decades before. Everything is final. You can’t go back and fix anything, and when it’s done, it’s done.
  3. It was never released on DVD or Blu-Ray, only VHS. It’s probably one of those soon-to-be-lost music documentaries.
  4. This part linked to here (at 32:22ish), shows the writing and recording of a song from the moment of concept. It’s pretty much everything I wanted my life to be in the 90s. I was very young. But I did eventually save enough to buy the guitar he writes the song with (an Ibanez JS700).