[Guitar Cover] “Starfleet” (Edward Van Halen and Brian May) feat. SATSUMA3042

40 years ago, 2 guitar legends, Edward Van Halen and Brian May, with the help of Alan Gratzer (drums), Phil Chen (bass) and Fred Mandel (keyboards), teamed up at Record Plant studios in Los Angeles to do a recording session, whose outcomes are documented and released as an album “Star Fleet Project” later that same year. To celebrate the 40th anniversary of the legendary recording session, I made a guitar cover of one of the songs from the session, “Star Fleet.” Carefully listening to the original version of the song, I learned and played what Brian had done with his Red Special and also added my “delusions” of what he might have wanted the track to sound like. lol This time, I’m extremely pleased and honoured to have SATSUMA3042 to fill in Eddie’s part for this video to recreate the original recording’s thrilling vibe that Brian created with Eddie. He is one of the most renowned and respected Japanese guitarists especially for his incredibly faithful and detailed covers of Eddie’s guitar playing. Personally I’ve been watching his YouTube channel, which has got 14k subscribers now, since the early days of him uploading a famous video of his “Eruption” cover, so I can’t believe this opportunity to work with him on this particular “Star Fleet” cover! As in his usual EVH covers, he nails it to extreme details and successfully recreates Eddie’s guitar playing just like “fireworks”, as Brian praised Eddie’s playing on the studio session. While the original recording features the roar of Eddie’s famous Marshall Plexi (along with the Variac, probably) and Brian’s full-driven and treble-boosted VOX AC30s, these are not in the neck of our woods, unfortunately. I’d like to mention that SATSUMA3042’s KEMPER PROFILER and the VOX MV50 Brian May that I played here have nicely replaced those legendary amps on this recording. Surprisingly, “Star Fleet” is the theme tune of the UK version of the Japanese-made kids science fiction series, “X-Bomber.” This is another reason to team up with SATSUMA3042 - making an “all Japan team” to thank Eddie, Brian, and all the contributors to the Star Fleet Project for making this wonderful tune inspired from a creation of our country. I hope you like it! Don’t forget to check out: - The re-issue of the album “Star Fleet Project” was just released this year, available at: - SATSUMA3042’s official YouTube Channel @SATSUMA3042 - KEMPER PROFILER - VOX Official Website - VOX MV50 Brian May * My demo of VOX MV50 Brian May, just for your interest