How Did You Come To Know Of Michael?

[Pain]

MAB does have a rather solid fan following among guitar buffs, but unfortunately, the common people have not heard of him. So, my question is, how did you people come across his work?

For me, I was watching an Mtv program I think, gods of guitar or something like that. I saw that this dude was playing a guitar with four necks and with inhuman accuracy and of course, speed. Then I looked him up, and quickly became a fan. How about you?

[karo123]

I was looking for a song by Slayer on youtube and a guy with funny haircut came up in related videos, I've started the vid and heard something about keys to lamborghini so I was like "aha, okay, that might be interesting".
After the first over/under pattern, I went to some guitar-related forums to find out if its real, after getting confirmation I went out and came back home with my first guitar.

[Dustin Silvers]

I was so obsessed with Randy Rhoads that I'd only would listen to recordings of Rhoads, but I heard someone say MAB was better than Rhoads (I cussed him out). That night, I was listening to Crazy Train, and I seen MAB's Tribute to Randy in the related videos. I gave my computer screen an evil look, clicked it, I fell in love with MAB's music. Shortly after, I heard "No Boundaries", and I heard my favorite to this day..... "Time Traveler". P.S: Spelling and Grammar isn't metal! \m/

[Carlos Lobo]

This is a great topic.

Once I was searching the web and stumbled upon a video of a guy playing a guitar with two necks in the most incredible ways. I liked the song, but I still wasn't what you can call a fan. A few months later I listened to the song Full Force while I was searching for songs online and I couldn't believe my ears. I had never listened to such insane speed before. I started to want to learn more and more about this guitar God and saw a video of a young MAB playing No Boundaries. The perfect combination of melody, tecnique, speed, extraterrestrial abilities, inovative visual components, and composition. To me, even Petrucci started to look like an apprentice in comparison to MAB.

[BKW]

I know I have told this story before on here, but I don't mind telling it again!

I moved to Illinois from Michigan on August 15th of 1985. I went to a local music (guitar) store and asked them about the local music scene. They gave me a lot of info, but mentioned that they had tickets for sale for a show the next town up in a week or so. The price was only $6 so I went not knowing anything about the band other than the guy working the store said that he would recommend them.

Talk about having your mind blown!

I had seen a lot of shows at that point, but I had never had a guitarist blow me away before.

Here is some actual footage taken from that show, I was in the fifth row:


And here is the ticket from that night:

[themaidenmaniac]

Saw Michael at "Music Live" in England. Jaw dropped. I then fantasised about sweep picking for months and drooled at videos such as prog revisited (which were hard to find at the time as the mighty "youtube" was not in existence). ;D

[jani92jani]

When i had played guitar for few months, i wanted really to find a good dvd/book wich would help me to develop a great technique. So after a while youtube video surfing, i found this video

Which obviously jaw dropped me and after that video i found the speed kills add, after i got my speed lives Dvd i started to practice the exercises on it like crazy and it really boosted my technical ability, today three years later i am very comfrotable with my technique because of speed kills, i still use some of the exercises that i learned on it, for example, i play the first exercise everyday.

[jacoby3mnk]

My story has a bit of a different approach to it.

In the summer of '88 I saw Vinnie Vincent Invasion in my hometown. I was lucky enough to meet all of them after the show. A few months later the band broke up. The band consisted of: Vinnie Vincent, Mark Slaughter, Dana Strum, and Bobby Rock.
:

Then in my junior year of high school('90) a classmate brought a tape of a band called Nitro. I first heard Freight Train and was shocked by the speed, clarity of guitar playing,and singer's range. I looked through the booklet and saw Bobby Rock played on this recording and that drove me to go out and buy the tape instead of getting a copy.

About a month or so later a different friend loaned me a copy of the MAB Star Licks vhs tape to study. I don't remember studying the tape that much just being amazed at the way Michael played.

After that I got the Nitro H.W.D.W.S. cd and have been hooked on his music since.

Unfortunately it took me over 20 years to get serious about playing guitar so I am not where I wish I was, but Michael's dvds continue to inspire me and challenge me to become a better player.

[Blue]

I saw his name on Yngwie Malmsteen's website in 2005. I did a search on the net and found his website. The solo from "Planet Gemeni" was automatically played when you entered the website at that time. I was immediately blown away of course.

[SendHelp]

In high school (graduated in '06), I was really into 80's hair metal and guitar solos, even though I didn't really play guitar. I used to play a lot of air guitar, and my friends knew I loved hair metal. At that point I just really liked guitar solos but didn't think I'd ever really play one, at least not very well. So my friends were telling me about this video they saw that they said I would like. A guy playing a double guitar. This was before youtube really existed. There were a few random sites that had videos on them but they weren't really the flash streaming format that they are today, they were windows media files... anyways it was the double guitar demonstration from Speed Kills 1 ( ) and I was so awestruck it basically inspired me to learn how to play the guitar. If I was going to learn how to play guitar, I wanted to learn how to play it very well... who better to learn from than MAB? So I studied Michael's DVD's and started listening to all of his music. I've basically been a fan since the moment I found out about him!

Not too long after I discovered Michael, they uploaded the double guitar solo music video to the angelo website, my mind was blown, it exceeded the awesomeness of the Speed Kills double demonstration. The first time I saw him live was at a clinic in 2006, I've gone to most of his Florida clinics and performances every year since then - it didn't take long for him to remember me, of course I had joined the forum by the second time I saw him. So basically the internet exposed me to MAB, I'm glad for that. I probably wouldn't be playing guitar or wouldn't have as much dedication to it without MAB.

[Michael Angelo Batio]

Thanks everyone! I sincerely appreciate the comments and support!

[Carlos Lobo]

Mar 26, 2013 20:58:34 GMT -6 SendHelp said:

In high school (graduated in '06), I was really into 80's hair metal and guitar solos, even though I didn't really play guitar. I used to play a lot of air guitar, and my friends knew I loved hair metal.

Hair metal? Is that the long hair headbanging kind of metal?

Just Kidding ;D

[Carlos Lobo]

Mar 27, 2013 0:06:36 GMT -6 Michael Angelo Batio said:

Thanks everyone! I sincerely appreciate the comments and support!

And you Michael? How did you come to know of yourself? ;D

[Cybersquatch]

For me it was somewhere between '87 and '89 (can't remember the exact year) I had a good friend who worked for a local surf shop here on Florida's west coast and the owner just happened to be a guitar player a little older than us he of course found out we had some similar interests in music especially guitar oriented stuff (probably the reason my friend got the job) at that time the owner was going very heavy on the instructional video path and was getting everyone and anyone that made them so one day he came to both me and my friend and asked "Who do you think is a fast guitarist?" or "Name some fast guitarists" of course we already had all of the Shrapnel catalogue and then some, so we named names like Vinnie Moore, Tony MacAlpine, Paul Gilbert. Yngwie Malmsteen and after everyone we named, he responded jokingly yet sincere in a way, that they were slow. He then replied that he had a guy here on video his name is Michael Angelo (Batio came later on as we all know) that blew them all away in comparison. He loaned us the video and yeah we were gape jawed at what we just witnessed that was at a time when I thought the speed of those others had reached the maximum possibilities of a human being or any other being for that matter then this guy from Planet Gemini comes into our world and shatters all of our logic and reason and pounds us into submission to his mighty prowess! Our minds were know match, and still to this very day I am dumfounded as to how some of these feats are performed with such a high level of accuracy, and speed while yet maintaining emotion, melody, tone, and compositional fortitude! I look forward to many more gratuitous shred moments in the future all Hail MAB!!!

[zenshredder]

I found out about Michael through an internet radio service before they started getting really big called Slacker radio. This is how I found out about Yngwie Malmsteen, Rusty Cooley, Tony MacAlpine, etc. but I really didn't like him at first, I thought he was just some fake "Youtuber" at the time until he came to do a clinic here in my hometown Bakersfield, CA. There is literally NO demographic for him whatsoever here, it's all country music or rap/hip hop here because it's a massive clash between people living in the ghetto and freaky oilfield workers. We have what some of you might know as "The Dale" or, just Oildale(and I hope Michael didn't have to drive through Oildale, it's embarrassing lol -.-) ANYWAYS I decided to check him out, was mesmerized by his performance and haven't looked back since. I regret not being able to talk to Michael but I'm sure I will get the chance to once again someday ;D

[Pain]

You people have very interesting stories to tell. I must admit, I'm having real fun reading your posts.

[Carlos Lobo]

Well, you're the man Pain. What a great thread you came up with. Keep 'em coming!

[Pain]

What I realized here, is that the forummers are sufficiently active, but they dont get interesting enough topics to indulge themselves in. I'm glad I could come up with an interestong enough topic

And, Carlos, long time no see!

[jdwon1172]

I didn't get into Michael's material until I met him in 1995 through a friend of ours. It was at a birthday party for former WLUP radio personality, Liz Wilde. It was around the time his first solo CD (No Boundaries) hit the market. However, the first CD I bought of his was Nitro's second CD (HWDWS). It wasn't long after that I bought OFR, Planet Gemini and No Boundaries (yes, in that order) and "the rest is history"...

[Cybersquatch]

Apr 14, 2013 14:03:46 GMT -6 jdwon1172 said:

I didn't get into Michael's material until I met him in 1995 through a friend of ours. It was at a birthday party for former WLUP radio personality, Liz Wilde. It was around the time his first solo CD (No Boundaries) hit the market. However, the first CD I bought of his was Nitro's second CD (HWDWS). It wasn't long after that I bought OFR, Planet Gemini and No Boundaries (yes, in that order) and "the rest is history"...

JD it's been a while welcome back brother!

[Brian]

Summer of 2005 I was chatting with my friend's cousin who also plays. He sent me a link to the No Boundaries video from Speed Lives that was on the Angelo.com site. I couldn't believe what I was seeing. At that point I hadn't heard any of the shredders or solo players that I have been introduced to after joining this forum. I played the video probably at least 30 times that day lol. Since then his lesson DVDs have really helped me become better at playing, and his music has definitely inspired me to practice more.

[Erikrt123]

For me it was the movie Shock'em Dead. I was already a guitar player originally wanted to be a drummer... but to noisy for the place/neighborhood I lived in. I liked to draw and found Yngwie's album Trilogy on the new release wall thought it would be great to draw something similar... bought it, popped in the album when I got home... decided guitar was the way to go. Anyway, fast forward a few years. As a guitar player I hated fake guitar playing in movies. But, I saw this movie in the new release section. I thought to myself, well, it is Horror so that is a plus, I love horror. Tracy Lords.. well didn't get what I was hoping for from her.. but simliar from others, lol! Hey, I was was teen boy, lol! It has guitar... I guessed it was worth a viewing. I could put up with fake guitar for horror and well you know, lol. During the Devil Scene I was all like that should be me, lol! I watched the rest movie and was shocked, I was all like, hey, that up close playing is spot on. Dang that dude is fast and amazing! So, for once I watched the credits to find out who played the guitar... To find out it was a sprite young Lad named Michael Angelo (Batio) wasn't a factor yet. I was hooked! The rest is history as they say.

[Pain]

"Tracy Lords.. well didn't get what I was hoping for from her.. but simliar from others, lol!"

[sanghei]

I remmember it well, it was somewhere in set 2007. talking to a friend on the interwebs and suddenly he finds something on youtube that amazed him, someone playing 2 guitars at the same time. he sent me video wich was the Double Guitar performance from MACE youtube account.

I spent endless hours watching that, No Boundaries (speed kills version) and Rain Forest videos, and eventually became a fan.

aprox a year after Michael toured europe, so I went to the workshop, and saw the most awesome performance I would ever see, just a guitar, a amp and a master with unlimited amounts of skill. also meet one of the coolest persons ever

[karelking]

I was searching some videos on youtube about speed guitar, then I came across the song No Boundaries in Speed Kills and I know MAB since then. Now I listen to MAB songs everyday.