Steve Lukather: "After playing eleven years in Toto, it became time for everyone to take a break and experiment with some other people, play some other music, and come back to it fresh in a year or so when we deem it feeling good to everybody. Well, for me, I didn't want to take a break. I had a bunch of songs with a plan and a direction. So as a result, here is my album. Through my years in Toto, and as a session guitar player, I've acquired numerous musical friends who have helped me out on this album. What I wanted to do is a combination of all of my favorite records.
The guys I worked with on this album, like Eddie Van Halen, Steve Stevens, Richard Marx, Danny Kortchmar, Jan Hammer, Randy Goodrum and, of course, Jeff and David from Toto, all took what we listened to, took our own version of what we heard, and made it into our own. These guys understood how I'm frustrated because I'm proud of what I've done in the past, but that's that. There is whole other part of me people haven't really heard. This album is made to surprise people in a good way. I'm even surprised myself in the sense of trying to keep this record simpler production-wise. I wanted to maintain the personality of each individual player so that you could, for the most part, feel who's playing. You can hear noises, people breathing, or counting off in the middle of a room.
You can hear my influences like Cream, Hendrix, Zeppelin on this album. Pink Floyd is also a heavy influence on me. David Gilmour is one of my heroes, along with guitar players like Jeff Beck, Eric Clapton, Jimi Hendrix...
So it's all here, on this record; I hope you like it. I'd like to change people's minds with this record, and I hope that you're pleasantly surprised. I will be over in Japan by the time this album comes out, to play live, and show that this is a real thing, not just a studio endeavor. I love to play live!"
