I was fortunate enough to get the opportunity to photograph this concert for a magazine I was employed with at that time. The photos are at Here they are!

Enjoy!

It was a nite to remember ... to cherish ...

The GOD himself had come down to the MMRDA grnds Bandra mumbai ... to enthrall His mortal audience with a music which the blind could see ... the deaf could hear ... music which could pump life into a corpse ... The 8000 strong crowd waited patiently for 2 hours b4 the schedule just not to miss a single "see", a single "hear" from the cool goggle clad, shaved head GOD.

The show started with "Up In the Sky". The ticket money that we paid ... got over on this very song ... and O' boy who knew that there were 19 more tracks to come .... Then came the cooolest song .... my favourite ... cool as a breeze, COOL # 9. By the time He played "Flying in a blue dream", we were already out of this world ... in the GOD's durbar ... "the heaven" :)

This is the divine creature who has professionally taught "Metallica", "GnR", Steve Vai ... and the like ... who themselves are considered to be the Gods of music !!!

The other songs that we had the extereme privilege to listen were - "Is there love in space", "Starry night", "The Mountain song".

And last but not the least ... the penultimate one - "morrocan sunset" followed by the laaast "Psycho monkey" !!! What a show it waaaas !!! killing performance ... No wonder they had scores of ambulances lined up outside the stage ... :D

But was that the End ???????????? NOOOOOOOO WAAAY !!!!!!!!!! the worshippers wouldnt just let the GOD leave like that !!! The worshippers kept chanting "more" "more" .... Their penance was answered ... and the GOD reappeard !!!

So, finally ... last but not the least .... the penultimate one ... again my fav - "Surfing with an alien". Phew !!!!!!!!!! what energy ... equivalent to a 1000 atom bombs exploding inside of u !!! And the last song ... "Friends" left us gasping for more !!! That brought to an end, a show which I would rate the best till now ... A show the memoirs of which would last for 7 of my lives ... A show for which I have already sinned by putting it into words ...

-makarand

Guys, am still not out of the MMRDA show, it wasa life time achievement, coz I’ve been listening Joe almost last 17 years. since from the day he launched his 1st album ( Not Of This Earth ) & in this show, what a decent start & huge end with - going down, summer Song & Friends. it was the happiest moment in my life, i never imagine that one day i could see Satch playing in front of me, i wish if i could see those 3 man army ( G3), anyway, guys .. Steve Vai & Billy Sheehan might be comming in the end of this year. Hope we all guys meet there.

Yo Satch...

Well...to put it in a jist........ FLABBERGASTING A DREAM COME TRUE ok...now heres the review....not too much in detail.... i reached MMRDA by 2:45........i dint know where it was, neither did the autowala....so we werer searching for it..but it dint take long to find it....once the rick made this turn the venue came into view.......i thot it was kinda small and couldnt belive that it was it...but then i neared and i heard it....and got the confirmation .......... hardly anyone was there then......and i was like ok........cool....saw a few guys gathered around a peephole kinds........and they were like....its him playin....and then i peeped thru.........and sure enuf.........he was doin his sound chek.... i started Moshng then and there we waited and waited and waited and waited..........watched the line grow.....BTW did i mention i had the 2000 pass luckily i was like 3-4 in the line the gates opend after much delebriation at around 6:05..........i ran to the front.......and i was rt in the centre of the stage.....and the only thing seprating me from stch ws the baricades he came at about 6:45 carrying his candy apple JS2000 and immediately went into a song......... the setlist was as follows

Up in the sky

house full of bullets

satch boogie

time

searching

always with me, always with you

Lords Of Karma

summer song

bamboo

up in flames

hands in the air

morrocan sunset

starry night

war

Hordes Of Locusts

Strange

Is there love in space

psycho monkey

i am goin down

friends

Cool #9

Surfing With The Alien

Flying in a blue dream

not in that order....tho more or less ....at lest these are the ones i can remember.............if anybody else went and can remember more......plese add emm...........BTW i love bamboo....he played quiet a lot from crystal planet anyways his guitaring was impeccable, and his imprcovisatin amazing......he improvised the end to always with me..and stretched the 3:22 song to a good 8-10 mins......sexy work though...... the crowd was goin mad...when always with me played the whole crowd was humming the song its a divine sitte watching joe play.......he just gets into it and just emjoys it so so much... at one point he played with his teeth ok, on most of the songs he played, it was improvisatins galore...he improvised a lot ..a LOT... its amazing the way he makes the guitar cry.............his wahs rock at about 9:40 he had almost wrapped up but then when the crowd asked for more, he kindly obliged, his exact words,"since uvr been such a great crowd and since i love mumbai so much. we can have one more song............ok, am just gonna play i wanna play now...am sure MrJeff Campetelli is worried now, he has no idea what am playing....heres i am going down..." he then started jamming on his Chromeboy............which btw is the sexiest guitar i ve seen.he then went on to play war and then for the final he played friends... this when all the plec thrwoing and the drumstick throwing was at the max........he also said that playing in india was a dream come true for him.....and that he loved playing it here..... after the concert was over i decided to jump the barricade and go backstage...the security dint stop me so i went...but Joe had already left along with jeff, matt.....so i was just walking around back stage....then i thought y not go on stage....and then i did...there i was standing on the very stage where satch was a few minutes back, and looking at the now dispersed crowds.....Mike 'mad monkey' manning....started talking to him......he was great.....i asked him if he had any of joes picks left...he gave me 2..yes those are the ones he played with.... quiet heavy..mebbe a 1.14 or 1.0 mm ones.....then i got to look at the sexiest amps ever..the peavey JSX...400W 1x4 with the s e x y chrome finish ...there were 3 of these and i was in heaven.......then i turned ..and to the rt on the stage where 6 of the sexiest....most amazing guitars i had ever seen..........6 Ibanez JS 2000s lined up on the rack one was a 7 string... which he played for searching i think..dont remember........i coudlnt belive that i dint notice that being in the first row.........i actually touched his guitar.......held it baby........ 6 guitars.....1 with a candy Apple finsh, 1 Chromeboy ..1 white, 1 had a wierd esoteric pattern..dotty kinda...the 7 string with the transparent red...there was a natural finish....with no veneer or anything which looked pretty amazing too....i asked him about his strings...mike said that he played .9s . someone had told me that he apparantly plays all unwond striings..and i asked about this..and he was like no...he plays regular 3 wound and 3 unwond strings....and then he goes like...wait ill show u....and he takes out the Chromeboy and shows it to me, and i couldnt belive i was actually looking at satchs guitar from that close a distance..yah i actually held that baby...... i was in heaven ...in a daze as i walked down the stage......after roaming for a while...i decided to head home.......still in a daze............ that was the most amazing experience in my life....FRIGGIN amazing man

BTW joe if ur reading this...AM THW GUY WHO ASKED YOU ABOUT PSYCHO MONKEY AT PLANET M....... AND MIKE THANKS....FOR LETTING ME TOUCH HIS GUITAR......U ROCK TOO ......HOPE U REMEMBER ME. AM THE ONE WHO ASKED YOU ABOUT JOES STRINGS :D

JOE COME BACK TO INDIA SOON...AND THIS TIME DO PLAY LOVE THING :) YOU ROCK THE CONCERT TO ROCKED LOVE YOU JOE

The Joe Sat concert at MMRDA was awesome. I have been to other concerts as well but this one was definately the best. To Watch Joe perform live for THREE Hours ..... Yes THREE HOURS was a dream come true!!!! I have been listening to SATCH sine I was 15 but listening to him live and seeing him perform on stage just a few feet from me was simply amazing. This was a once in a lifetime concert and definately a concert I COULD NOT MISS.

Hope to see you come back to Bombay with G3.

oh oh oohohhhhh

god does play guitar

and

the concert it was aaaaaamazing

wow

he is god

"always with me, goin down, flying in a blue dream" some of my favs

all that is left now is listen to steve vai playin FOR THE LOVE OF GOD and then I can die and safely go to heaven.

ON 13TH MAY 2005 I WAS THERE AT THE VENUE AT 12 IN THE NOON WHEN THE SHOW IS STARTING AT 19:00 HRS. I WAS RELUCTATNT TO GO IN CAUSE I WAS SCARED THAT THE ORGANISERS WOULDNT LET ME IN. I WAS WAITING THERE IN THE SCOURGING HEAT SO THAT I COULD BE THE FIRST TO ENTER THE SHOW. HOWEVER I MET ANOTHER FRIEND KUMAR WHO WAS APPARENTLY WAITIN FROM 10:00 IN THE MORNING. I COULD NOT BELIEVE IT MYSELF THAT JEFF CAPITELLI PASSED BY ME AND I COULDNT GET AN AUTOGRAPH FROM HIM. ATLEAST I WAS HAPPY THAT I GOT TO WATCH THE WHOLE SHOW SET UP. THIS IS THE INTRESTING PART. AT 14:10 SATCH ENTERED THE STAGE TO HAVE HIS JAM SESSION. MAN HE WAS LOOKIN GREAT WITH THAT CAP ON. I GOT THE OPPURTUNITY TO GET HIS AUTOGRAPH AND TO TAKE HIS SNAP ON MY CAM. I WAS HAPPY THAT I GOT TO SPEAK TO HIM. THE SHOW STARTED AT 19:00. 3 LONG HOURS OF PURE SATCH MUSIC. WHAT WAS HE DOIN WITH THE GUITAR. HE WAS LITERALLY PLAYING WITH HIS TEETH. 20 OR MORE?!!!! TRACK IN 3 HRS IS TOO MUCH AND I WAS ELECTRIFIED WITH THE KIND OF MUSIC THAT HE WAS PLAYING. ALL THE MORE THE FIVE GUITARS THAT HE TOOK OUT ESPEACIALLY THE SILVER CHROME WAS THE BEST. EVERY SONG THAT HE PLAYED, WAS PERFORMED WITH A FEELING WITHIN AND I COULD SENSE THAT CAUSE It WAS GOING THROUGH ME AND ALL OF US. I REALLY ENJOYED EVERY MOMENT THAT HE SPENT ON THE STAGE RIGHT FROM THE TIME HE CAME ON TO THE STAGE FOR HIS JAM SESSION TILL THE TIME HE LEFT THE STAGE. I AM HAPPY THAT THIS WORLD HAS THE BEST GUITARIST. SATCH WILL ALWAYS DO WELL IN HIS CAREER AS A GUITARIST RIGHT FROM THE AGE OF 14 WHEN HE FIRST STARTED.

SATCH IF YOU ARE READING THIS I BEG OF YOU ON BEHALF OF INDIA TO PLS COME BACK AGAIN WITH G3 LIVE. WE WILL ALWAYS LOVE YOU. YOU WERE, IS AND ALWAYS BE MY INSPIRATION, MY MENTOR, WHO TOOK ME ON THE ROAD IN TO THE WORLD OF THE GUITAR. EVERY MUSIC YOU PLAY, EVERY NOTE YOU STRIKE YOU GAVE ME A CHANCE TO LEARN MORE. I AM PROUD OF HAVING YOU AS MY MENTOR AND INSPIRATOR.

MY LAST NOTE TO YOU: SATCH NOT OF THIS EARTH WE ALL LIVE IN A CRYSTAL PLANET WE JUST SAW THE GOD OF GUITARS

can't speak much bout the gig....listenin to satch since 1998 ..i was 15 @ tht time....used to go on air and listen to RJ ATIN DAS GUPTA who once had this joe satriani special on a saturday or i suppose it was three continuous saturdays....and the era of soulful,melodic and orgasmic guitar melodies and solo's began for me...and everything unfolded yesterday when i saw the guy first enterin the stage fmr the left hand side and my gawdddd wht energy shook my body ......it was like some electric charge flowin inside and some sort of shiver ripped me apart and fer a second or two i felt i was bout to die coz of excess happiness.sounds gayish but was nearly in tears in the middle of "always with me always with u".....the thing which caused tht was revolving around the question that "why is satriani playing fer us"...."we don't deserve him"..."why was the guy thanking us"....i was expression less and neither i cud thank him...cudnt donate him my organs or something just to make him happy.

i wish there wud have been some blood donation camp set up inside the grnd....wud hae surely given him my blood as a token...or tears collected in a lil bowl.

me and two other frens of mine were under an attack or something close to fits during surfin,flying,summer,starry.....and we were literally roamin arnd dancin doin some crazy moves as if we were flowin arnd the space and jumpin frm one planet to nother.

cant explain more....can't think of anything...after comin back ....cudn't get sleep....fer half n hr i was lookin at a wall and thinkin bout the gig.... and i think it was not meant to happen.it shudnt have happened.i didnt deserve it.who am i?

am ratin it 10.....end of issue.

\m/love u satch\m/

Now, I've been listening to Satch since i was 10... so this has been a long long wait for me... & it was worth more than every second & every penny. When Satch, Jeff & Matt walked on stage & just started jamming for a minute i was... i dunno... overjoyed mebbe... mebbe i couldn't beleive that my childhood dream of seeing & hearing my super-hero in the flesh (that too front-most row!) was finally coming true. Then Satch played the 1st few harmonics of "Up In The Sky" & I thought I was going to burst with utopia.

But one thing for sure I never dreamt that he would ever come to Bombay... I always thought that one day I would have to travel to the US to see him play live! It was unbeleivable... the only thing that i missed was... that i didn't catch a guitar-pick / a drumstick / didn't get an autograph or a chance to meet Joe & the Band.... But Joe did point at me (twice) as i mouthed the wah-wah notes before he played them... seen & heard a lot of Satch recorded-live-performances... so i do know a lot... hahaha!

Some of the songs were extended especially "Always With Me, Always With You" which transcended into a jam which I thought had partial elements of other pieces like "Ceremony", "Raspberry Jam Delta-v", "The Power Cosmic 2000 - Part 2" & also elements of Vai's "Bangkok"... not really sure of this... but it was similar (to my ears)! And I can easily say that till date, it was the best 3 hrs of my life!... yup they played for 3 hrs.

The setlist was as follows (might be a little mistake in the order of playing somewhere in the middle) - Up In The Sky, House Full Of Bullets, Cool #9, Up In Flames, Satch Boogie, Time, Lords Of Karma, Always With Me Always With You, Summer Song, Starry Night, Moroccan Sunset, Bamboo, Strange, Hordes Of Locusts, Searching, Hands In The Air, Is There Love In Space?, Psycho Monkey, War, Flying In a Blue Dream, Going Down, Surfing With The Alien, Friends

the gig was gr8 i liked the way he opened , by the way i wud like to ask the event management guys what happend why din't bramha opend for him. anyways most of the people there were very much thankful to those guys for not performing. but keep the spirit alive joe ur gr8 can u mail me some of ur good works like the one u perofrmed in india mumbai on a cd or something like that.

thanx nitin