Few guitars are quite as monstrous as Steve Vai’s triple-neck Hydra, but its tamer is considering retiring it.
The Ibanez guitar was launched in 2022 to coincide with the release of Inviolate, the virtuoso's first album in six years. Vai’s got plenty of mileage out of the near-mythical head-turner since then, but the jig may soon be up.
“This is probably the last time the Hydra will come out on tour,” Vai’s guitar tech, Doug MacArthur, reveals to Premier Guitar.
He doesn’t explain why, but Guitar World can take a wild guess. The Hydra comprises a half-fretless 12-string, a seven-string guitar, a half-fretless bass, and there is also a harp, and a suite of in-built effects for good measure.
As McArthur says, “Really, it’s five instruments in one.”
The maintenance must be astonishing, and it probably weighs as much as a small city. Given that Steve Vai underwent shoulder surgery in 2022 after a pizza oven mishap and was still feeling the effects of those issues as he began tackling Robert Fripp’s King Crimson guitar parts for Beat, it might be too big a cross to bear these days.
“I had some physical challenges with my shoulder, fingers, and wrist,” he told GW in 2024. “I couldn’t play the Hydra, and I was in a lot of pain – I didn’t feel like I was delivering on all cylinders.”
But the guitar, inspired by the steampunk double-neck in Mad Max, may have also run its course as an entertainer. It starred in the deft and dextrous track, Teeth of the Hydra, and has had its place on stage with the SatchVai Band, but maybe the ridiculous 36-string has said all it needs to over the last four years.
“When you see how I performed this piece, it’s so entertaining, because I had to negotiate the left-hand pull-offs so that the melody sounds uninterrupted – like a real melody,” Vai said of Teeth… upon its release. “It was crazy. It took two months.”
Maybe it’s time for a new star to take its place. The obvious contender would be Vai’s custom-built Green Special – a Vai-ified tribute to Brian May’s Red Special.
But given how Vai’s imagination ran amok with the Hydra, who’s to say he doesn’t have another mystical beast up his sleeve? Maybe he’ll go microtonal like Angine de Poitrine...
