When Joe Satriani sat a teenage Steve Vai down and started teaching him guitar, neither of them could have predicted that four decades later they’d be sharing top billing on a 40-city North American tour. The SatchVai Band’s Surfing With The Hydra Tour arrives at Albany’s Palace Theatre on Thursday, May 21, 2026 — and the tour name carries some conscious weight. “Surfing with the Alien,” Satriani’s 1987 breakthrough, peaked at No. 29 on the Billboard 200 and introduced the world to a guitarist who had no real precedent at the time. Hydra implies something more layered: multiple heads, multiple voices. That’s a reasonable metaphor for a collaboration that keeps finding new reasons to justify itself.
About the SatchVai Band
This is not Satriani and Vai’s first run together. The 2025 European tour they completed before this North American leg appears to have produced something genuine. “Joe and I struck pure jammin’ gold night after night,” Vai said of those dates, describing the experience as “even more rewarding…than I ever thought possible.” When a musician of Vai’s stature deploys that kind of language without irony, it tends to mean something.
The full band is worth noting: Kenny Aronoff on drums, Marco Mendoza on bass, and Pete Thorn on guitar — a proper rock ensemble, not a two-guitar showcase with a rhythm section in the background. The set draws from both artists’ solo catalogs, the new single “Dancing” (released March 2, 2026), and forthcoming material from a SatchVai studio album. Satriani’s student roster — Vai and Metallica’s Kirk Hammett among them — is a legacy of its own; his own catalog stands on separate terms. Vai, who went on to Frank Zappa and three Grammy Awards, has built a stage presence that is technically extreme and theatrically singular. Support on all 40 tour dates comes from Animals As Leaders, the Washington D.C. progressive metal outfit founded by guitarist Tosin Abasi in 2007.
About the Palace Theatre
The Palace Theatre on Clinton Avenue has been Albany’s most reliable room for this kind of touring act for as long as I’ve been covering shows in this city. The sightlines and acoustics here reward a performance built on tone and technical precision — there is not a bad position in the house for a guitar-forward show. Note that the balcony is not elevator-accessible; plan accordingly if mobility is a consideration. The Palace is located at 19 Clinton Avenue, Albany, NY 12207.
Tickets & Pricing
Tickets range from approximately $69 to $73. A VIP Upgrade Experience is available as a separate purchase through Ticketmaster. Doors open at 7:30 PM. Get tickets for SatchVai Band at Palace Theatre →