I've certainly enjoyed doing clinic tours for larger audiences, but the most valuable teaching experience has been the hundreds of lessons that I've given where I can hear the students play.

Recently, I had some powerful magnets glued into the lower horn of a few of my guitars. This holds a metal slide in place so I can easily get to it and put it back, even in the middle of a song.

Teaching the guitar is a constant source of inspiration. I sometimes think I get more out of the lessons than my students.

I remember walking into a department store and you would hear an instrumental version of a Beatles song and it was usually kinda cheesy and very un-rock. Kenny G, for example, is a musician that I certainly dont want to sound like, but technically he is flawless but somehow the rock and roll aspect has been sucked out of it.

I use the volume control on my guitar, both for dynamics and as a manual noise gate.

After playing for 40 years, I've been able to evolve the way I see the fretboard and how I hear the guitar in my head.

Teaching has made me realize that a lot of my fast playing is the musical equivalent of, 'Umm… umm… uhh...' - it's like when you're trying to think of the next thing to say that actually has meaning, you fill space. 'Umm' has about the same meaning as my fast playing.

In my daily life, I tend to be very literal and unsuperstitious. But music gives me an outlet to be very emotional.

Music and guitar are my favorite things, so it's fun to get together with other people who share the passion and talk about the details.

Seriously, though, I think the only musical term that's ever put a bee in my bonnet is 'shred.' I tried to peddle the term 'Terrifying Guitar' to the world, but it just didn't stick. Now we've got 'shred.'

Scotty Johnson is a guy who I've worked with on a lot of my tours and albums, and I'm always blown away by his musical knowledge and playing.

I think I had heard Al Di Meola on the radio when I was a kid, that acoustic record, 'Friday Night In San Francisco,' with Paco de Lucía and John McLaughlin. His picking was unbelievable. I thought it was incredible.

To me, the secret of Eddie Van Halen was Alex Van Halen, because the way Alex played was so loose and the way the two of them locked together… Those two are connected so thoroughly they might as well be one person.

Of course, I'm a guitar player, so I'm thinking as a guitarist. I have to work within my physical limitations as to what my hands will do, and also the patterns I'm familiar with, and the places that my fingers are used to going.

I was doing a lot of teaching on my online guitar school and I started to use vocal melodies as a way of teaching my students. To be able to do that, I had to learn them myself.

To me, you had to have a least a couple of ugly guys in the band. That's why Saxon was great.

I love my job as a musician, and I am filled with gratitude that good people support my endeavors.

While I was writing the songs for 'Fuzz Universe,' I was immersing myself in Bulgarian Female Choir music, Baroque lute and violin pieces, Johnny Cash songs about trains, cows, mules, and mining coal, the Bee Gees, and Ronnie James Dio.

I'm Not Afraid of the Police' is the first song I wrote and recorded since moving back to Los Angeles. It's a loud-pop, crazy-guitar, big-harmony song with all the police sirens created by guitars and ADA flangers.

One of the things I like to do is to try to jam with everybody.

As human beings we're visual creatures, and it's so easy to play the guitar by looking at it. It's a real challenge to go from that visual way of perceiving the guitar to getting back to that pure sound connecting to the instrument.

I learned to sing from my mum and dad's record collection.

I've never had anything as formal as vocal lessons.

I was lucky to move around different cultures at an early age and have experience of different lifestyles.