Steve Vai Opens Up About The Anxiety Attacks He Suffered While Touring With Frank Zappa

Guitar virtuoso Steve Vai opened up about the time when he was touring with another guitarist Frank Zappa, during a recent appearance on The Cassius Morris Show.

In the conversation, Steve stated that he had a complete breakdown and anxiety attack in Montreal in 1980, and the problem didn’t disappear for over a year according to Steve as he felt fear and panic all the time.

Furthermore, Steve pointed out that he wasn’t drinking alcohol or using drugs, but he was pretty afraid of going insane due to this problem and wondered what’s going on with him during this period.

While Steve was revealing one of the hardest times of his career, he also revealed that even the biggest names of celebrities could deal with the anxiety and depression, even though they don’t use drugs and alcohol.

Here is what Steve Vai said:

“Things came to a head for me when I was touring with Frank Zappa – I was in Montreal in 1980, and I just had a complete breakdown, anxiety attack, that lasted a year and a half.

It was panic, it was all fear, there’s a fear that was in the background that just overcame it. And I didn’t know what it was. I wasn’t doing anything – I wasn’t doing drugs, nothing. I harbored a fear of going insane when I was younger.

There’s a term for that, actually. It’s escaping me at the moment but that’s actually a diagnosable symptom of anxiety, being afraid of going insane.”

He added:

“When you’re in your own head and you have thoughts that you don’t know why they’re there, you start thinking, ‘There’s something wrong with me.’ And then what happens is – it just gets compounded.

It’s a form of ignorance, it’s just a form of fear that compounds itself. And I think one of the things was – I love music, I love the idea of playing music and all, but I was under the impression that if you become famous you would go insane.

It was something my aunt had said when I was a little boy. And when you’re young and you hear stuff like that, you go, ‘Oh, okay, now I get it, I don’t ever wanna be famous.’”

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