<\/p>\n The electric guitar<\/a> was built by U.K. firm Guyton Guitars and has been described by Vai as \u201cdevotion made tangible.\u201d It features a longer scale length than the guitar May built out of an old fireplace with his dad while he was still a teenager \u2014 it has a 25.5\u201d scale, usurping May\u2019s 24\u201d creation.<\/p>\n You may like<\/p>\n It also has a stunning quilted maple top, a much thinner neck, and Yonderbosk Vai-Sonic pickups. This trio of single coils was custom-wound for Vai specifically for the instrument. For Vai, it\u2019s the realization of a near-lifelong dream.<\/p>\n \u201cIn the 1970s, when I was a kid in Carle Place trying to figure out how to play anything in tune, Brian May was one of my absolute heroes. His tone and touch oozed rock and roll class,\u201d Vai writes on Instagram. \u201cThe songs he wrote and the notes he chose dug deep into my psyche and helped shape a future fantasy image of myself in my mind.<\/p>\n \u201cHis Red Special was not just a guitar to me, it was a mythical object, an alchemical wand built by a young genius and his dad,\u201d he adds. \u201cI studied every photo and rumor I could find. That guitar planted the seed that maybe someday I could build my own, which thankfully never happened, due to a total lack of expertise.\u201d<\/p>\n But the guitarist didn\u2019t stay locked away in Vai\u2019s imagination or on his record player forever. At 20, he relocated to Los Angeles. There, he started work as Frank Zappa\u2019s transcriber, before being promoted to guitarist and learning an invaluable lesson from the eccentric musician<\/a>.<\/p>\n \u201cI landed a tiny apartment at Fairfax and Sunset, and one night I walked into the Rainbow Bar and Grill and saw Brian just standing there. Alone. Like a normal human,\u201d Vai remembers. \u201cI thought I was hallucinating.<\/p>\n \u201cBrian was incredibly kind to this unknown kid and then did the unthinkable: he invited me to a Queen rehearsal at Zoetrope.\u201d<\/p>\n It was a \u201dpinch me\u201d moment for Vai, who was still coming to terms with the fact that he was on the payroll of another one of his heroes.<\/p>\n You may like<\/p>\n \u201cSitting in a room with the entire band was already unreal enough, but then I saw the Red Special,\u201d he says. \u201cI pointed and said, \u2018Is that it?\u2019 Brian said, \u2018Yup. Want to try it?\u2019 Time definitely slowed down.\u201d<\/p>\n Guitars, though, can be highly personal things. He soon realized that he and the Red Special were not the perfect match.<\/p>\n \n (Image credit: May: Pete Still\/Redferns | Vai: Robert Knight Archive\/Redferns)<\/p>\n \u201cAfter idolizing that guitar my whole youth, holding it was seismic,\u201d Vai purrs, before dropping the all-important \u2018but.\u2019 \u201cI thought, \u2018This is it, I\u2019m finally going to sound like Brian May.\u2019 But much to my chagrin, I didn\u2019t. I sounded like me. And between the gauge .08 strings, ultra-low action, and a neck the size of a small tree, I played it like a baby giraffe on roller skates. Still, it was heaven.\u201d<\/p>\n Though the guitar wasn\u2019t quite what it was in his dreams, it remained a memory he held dearly. It seems May didn\u2019t forget that meeting, either.<\/p>\n Vai continues: \u201cAfter [Vai\u2018s second studio album] Passion and Warfare came out [in 1990], I was invited to perform at a Guitar Legends concert in Seville, Spain, and Brian was the musical director.<\/p>\n \u201cBrian told me the story about a young guitarist he once let play his guitar at rehearsal, a kid who was in town working with Zappa and who played amazingly well. I let him tell me the whole story and then said, \u2018Brian, that was me.\u2019 This stands as one of the most satisfying full-circle twists the universe has offered me.<\/p>\n \n (Image credit: Steve Vai Instagram \/ Guyton Guitars)<\/p>\n \u201cThrough the years since, I\u2019ve been blessed to have had the opportunity to get to know Brian, jam with him on multiple occasions, and even work with him. It\u2019s always an immense pleasure and honor, and he always delivered like a boss.<\/p>\n \u201cAnd now comes the part that still makes me blink, laugh, and shake my head in disbelief: The true unspeakable honor of this extraordinary guitar he had custom-made for me and gifted to me.<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s a \u2018Green\u2019 Red Special! It\u2019s hard to find the words. I\u2019m truly humbled.\u201d<\/p>\n Elsewhere, May has gifted his best friend, Tony Iommi, with a special left-handed version of the Red Special<\/a>, which could yet get a Gibson-made reissue<\/a>. The Queen guitarist signed with the historic gear makers in 2024, with his first-ever signature guitar, a 12-string SJ-200 acoustic<\/a>, hitting the shelves last year.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Journeyman guitarist Steve Vai has recalled two of his most poignant meetings with his early hero Brian May,…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":235533,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[28],"tags":[146,85,46,409],"class_list":{"0":"post-235532","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-music","8":"tag-entertainment","9":"tag-il","10":"tag-israel","11":"tag-music"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/235532","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=235532"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/235532\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/235533"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=235532"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=235532"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=235532"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"LEFT:](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/01\/CWvMRMtusNnwE9vQCpfFiK.jpg\")
\n<\/p>\n![\"Steve](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/01\/uBSbMhWNqj2uMxUBuTMu8M.jpg\")
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