Eddie Van Halen or Jimi Hendrix?

Pat: Can I tell you my Eddie Van Halen story? I actually met him. He was backstage at the final Nirvana concert at the Forum, which for me, was like,"Oh my God, I'm playing on the SAME stage as [Queen's] Brian May!" I was dying. Anyway, Eddie Van Halen comes backstage drunk out of his fucking mind, and he started begging Kurt to let him play with us. It was so disgusting. He was like, "I'm all washed up; you are what's happening now." It was horrible! He was a horrible racist pig!

Jeff: I heard he was running Mennen Speed Stick deodorant all over his face. Is that true?

Pat: Yeah [laughs]. Kurt had this deodorant, and he sniffed it or something like that, and it got on his face. It looked like he had cocaine under his nose.

Jennifer: I heard he was asking Kurt to let him come on stage and play "Eruption," but Kurt said, "no," and Eddie said, "C'mon, let me play the Mexican's guitar," referring to you.

Pat: I told Krist [Novoselic], I thought we should let him play with us. But he said no because we'd never get him off the stage. When I walked up to Eddie, he was talking to Krist. I just saw the back of his head so I didn't know who he was. And Krist goes, "Oh Eddie, you haven't met Pat. He's our new guitar player." Eddie turns around and sees me, but he doesn't say hello or anything. He just say's, "Oh no, not a dark one." At first I thought he was kidding. But he kept asking me, "What are you? Are you like a Raji or something? Are you Mexican?" Then he kept saying to Kurt," C'mon let me play the Mexican's guitar." I was horrified!

Jeff: Is he the El Duce of Metal?

Pat: [Laughs] Eddie Van Halen is the perfect example for me of not wanting to meet your heroes 'cause you'll be disappointed. I hear he's sober now. I blame that incident totally on the alcohol. I've done a lot of bad things when I was drunk, too.

Jeff: I don't think you're coming from a judgmental place at all.

Pat: I was just shocked. I was thinking, "God, Eddie Van Halen hates me.

Indeed, and the span of which containing many other guitarists.

Guitar-wise, I've always defended Eddie as more than just a one-trick pony (he's a four-or-five trick pony), but he's no Hendrix.

I never thought about VH that way but I can see it!

What do you think of "Dreams"?

I really don't like the Sammy Hagar stuff.

-- Myonga Von Bontee (scottyfield...), October 3rd, 2005.
did they meet ?

I think Smear's right - it probably was more alcohol-fuelled idiocy (à la Elvis Costello) than genuine racism on Van Halen's part. But, all the same, jeez...

He probably thought he was being sneaky by saying shit like that to convince Kurt and then he planned to take over a new generation when he got on stage by showing 'em up.

I feel comfortable saying this now that I own bought up almost every album of his in the past week or so. I did not realize he actually put so much feeling into his playing. Warning: do not do as I did and buy Sex & Religion or Flex-Able Leftovers first. These were the 2 I had previously sold back. Everything else is pretty unreal, especially Flexable, Passion & Warfare, Alien Love Secrets, Fire Garden, Real Illusions: Reflections and Alive In An Ultra World. Then: The Ultra Zone, Flexable Leftovers and Mystery Tracks Vol. 3. For the cheapskate, the double cd Anthology has a lot of good tracks on it, but you'd be better off grabbing these one at a time from the cutout bin like I did.

Is that somehow a bad thing, or an ignoble shortcut?

As for guitar, there's no Hendrix in Rock School. The kids playing guitar don't show any. The best you get is Frank Zappa, mostly because the dean is a Zappa superfan.

From the Seattle Post Intelligencer, a time ago:

Seattle found itself in a media frenzy last summer when billionaire Paul Allen presented his exuberant Experience Music Project (EMP) to the world. Allen's interactive museum--an ode to guitar great Jimi Hendrix--awed, inspired and had many people shaking their heads in bewilderment over its twisted metal exterior. Some compared the architecture to a squashed tin can, but crowds still came by the thousands to discover the music inside.

Daunted by press reports of waiting lines snaking around the block and back, at first I let EMP do its thing without me. Because I'm hearing impaired, the music world has gone by pretty much without my notice for the past several decades, although I admittedly rocked to Hendrix in person at the 1969 Newport Pop Festival.

...We found ourselves among those shaking their heads at the exterior design of EMP. World-renowned architect Frank Gehry, famous for his use of bold colors and atypical shapes, stayed in character when he molded EMP. Having more of a Bach personality than a Hendrix fetish, Gehry bought several electric guitars when he first came to Seattle and cut them into pieces to study their shapes, colors and textures. These elements were the beginnings of the structure that symbolizes the energy and fluidity of music--and possibly the electric guitars that Hendrix invariably smashed during each performance.

The first impression of the interior of EMP is one of high tech design and almost industrial space. With few visitors at this mid-morning hour, it felt almost cavernous and strangely quiet for a venue dedicated to high decibel rock and roll. After navigating the ticketing area and having our hands stamped concert-like, we entered the celestial, 85-foot high Sky Church that broadcasts to the heavens on the largest indoor video screen in the world. This dramatic reception/performance area is named for Hendrix's vision of a Sky Church where all kinds of people--regardless of age, background or interests--could come together to appreciate music.

====

Hendrix has a museum/tourist trap. Nothing like that in Pasadena for Eddie. He might have to die first.

And as for the fuckhead who said Hendrix is somehow less for using "destortion," get one clue moron. Both Hendrix and Eddie used plenty of destortion [sic]. The difference is Hendrix is distorting the power section of a tube amp by just turning the fucker all the way up, and Eddie is distorting the preamp section by carefully tweaking the amp with a bunch of kind of interesting techniques. Neither one is inherently better and neither is inherently bad. They are just completely different.

Eddie's a fantastic player of rock and pop. Hendrix is really a jazz player in the rock idiom.

Chuck Berry kicks both of their asses in many ways.

The real question is if Hendrix had lived to face his demons, would he be a total prick? Alternately, if Eddie had died at the peak of his career, would anybody be talking smack about him now?

So anyway, I am one of the biggest Van Halen fans you'll ever talk to, but I'm still gonna have to go with Hendrix.

EVH is the master! Cobain.. worm food.

obviously Cobain was depressed too? YA THINK?

I've heard this meme before and it's nonsense. Hendrix was a blues and R&B player. His playing comes directly out of that music -- and I don't mean this to be in any way denigrating. But there's hardly a lick of jazz in anything he plays.

As for EVH, well, unlike the kid in Rock School and the minions making after-school trips to guitar center, he actually COULD groove as well. And he could play a really memorable, catchy guitar solo, which is one of my ultimate measures of a guitarist. I'll take Hendrix over him, but I wouldn't want to live in a world without Hot for Teacher.

But otherwise.....yawn.

Wrong. Eddie learned tapping by watching Ace Frehley from Kiss do it first. And it's about the only thing he ever learned.

Van Halen was "discovered" by Gene Simmons. Eddie and Alex recorded some demos with Gene and Paul when Gene was considering replacing Ace and Peter.

Eruption is not that amazing. Get one grip on reality.

Not if you've been in a Guitar Center on kiddie weekends or watched the movie Rock School. Now it's more along the lines of a reason to walk out the door, grit your teeth and suffer it, or reach for the bottle of aspirin.

like the bootles

"You're right, every recording artist has been underrated. That includes people like the Dave Clark Five"

TOTALLY! i've gone on and on about how underrated they are. so sad. one of the greatest bands ever.

i mean people know who they are and they were big in their day but nobody listens to them. and they really should. so great.

re: david lee roth as leader of jimi's band, we have the technology to make that happen now...

http://i274.photobucket.com/albums/jj242/donaldparsley/Dave_Clark_Five_1966.jpg

all this machinery making modern web posts can still be open-hearted

Pretty good video of the Osmonds. I've never seen him so rocking and a rolling. Roll over John Smith.

correction: Joseph Smith

often mistaken for his grandad, john smith is rolling over in his grave!

Mike Smith too!

Joseph E Smith and Your Seven Grannies on Bongos

Sounds like something the underrated Vivian Stanshall announced on that underrated track "The Intro And The Outro"

Listening to some of Eddie's best stuff, I didn't hear anything at all new from where Hendrix left off. Eddie had his own guitar licks of course just like different guitarists have their own solos also, but Eddie certainly didn't take the guitar any further than Hendrix. Compared to wild, but smooth Jimi, Eddie looks like he was trying too hard.

WILD BUT SMOOTH ALTON WONG!

I'm only recounting to you what I saw in the youtube which is just my opinion.

i kid, alton. we're all family here.

I can tell, and that's good.

"eddie might have been the most influential american guitarist after hendrix. on hard rock and metal. for better or worse."

Yup. Rapidly played sequences of single notes which, were they slowed down, would be revealed as basically uninteresting--thanks, Eddie!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CSZei5O2DbI

still interesting

Not a big EVH fan myself, but don't think Alton is making his case very well.

Actually, I like this slowed down version of Eruption better. In contrast to the regular version, this one is at least something different.

It's super cliché to say that Hendrix is overrated, so I won't say that

it's not "super cliché" so much as it is "completely fucking stupid."

i like slowed down eddie. sounds awesome. i do think he's very entertaining on his own. or was. plus, he was kind enough to include a bathroom break for half the crowd!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zJ6jy3L0B70&feature=related

they wore it well.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ppLk2bPNTkc&feature=relmfu

Eddie Van Halen had some good guitar solos in the late 70's and 80's like all great lead guitarists have, but it wasn't anything new, just different like there are many different songs. Jimi Hendrix, when he was around in the late 60's came out with something totally original and powerful. This was out of this world and it changed the face of the earth as far as popular music was concern. As I said before it hard to imagine how music would sound today without Jimi. Eddie's in denial about the fact that if there was no Jimi, there would be no
Eddie. Well, there still would be a Eddie Van Halen, but he might have been just tuning guitars or something for a living. Jimi Hendrix played everything that was possible, so no one could ever take it any further.

Hendrix might be the better player or better at crafting unique sounds, but Eddie was miles better as a song writer there's easily seven Van Halen albums I would listen to over Jimi's stuff.

Who's a better songwriter is a matter of personal taste. They were both excellent at it. Paul McCartney is something else.

I've never seen Jimi live, only on film and audio sound. A couple of my friends who have seen Jimi live said that when they saw Jimi playing, no one ever went to the restroom, even during break if there was one.

Only 3,000 people went to the bathroom during a Jimi Hendrix show, but every one of them avoided a UTI.

The Beatles are grossly underrated and they have changed music more then anybody. Actually, they seem to have changed everything.

Worst post itt imo.

Hahaha the Beatles, one of those great 60s psych pop bands that never really got their due

Thank God for those Nuggets comps or I'd have never heard 'Hey Jude'.

That's a troll post if I ever saw one.

Eight years ago tho. I have no idea how The Beatles fit into ILM Discourse at the time.

great revive

ffs

That pair of posts b4 the revive is pretty gr8

the Van Halen Rising book was great