Van Halen!

Just that song, maybe one or two others. Most of it sounds like crap Journey imo.

is Nash bad? never heard much about him

he didn't come off bad in Shakey which is where I learned the most about CSN

I think I mainly don't like him for talking shit abt Crazy Horse, but also always sleeping w/ people's wives

He was a steadfast friend for many years to Crosby when nobody else could handle the guy anymore, so I retract. I just think his music is boring.

The only thing I know about Nash is the Innocent Eyes video starring John Ritter, which is a stone classic.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5KwQORT1T6k

That might be the most '80s song/video combo ever. It could literally be by anyone/everyone.

I think I mainly don't like him for talking shit abt Crazy Horse, but also always sleeping w/ people's wives

― error prone wolf syndicate (Hadrian VIII), Thursday, October 15, 2020 8:12 AM (two hours ago) bookmarkflaglink

crosby's so fucking foul this is like eagle scout material in comparison

Good piece in the LA Times about the early Pasadena days

https://www.latimes.com/entertainment-arts/music/story/2020-10-15/eddie-van-halen-david-lee-roth-pasadena-high-school

I live close to that liquor store at Allen and Villa, and walked over last weekend. About a dozen people there, and someone left a Fender Squire (the type that sold for < $100 at Guitar Center) on the sidewalk where Eddie's "Van Halen" was written. Then I walked to the house and there were people there too.

Great piece. RIP Eddie.

Finally saw Van Halen at Staples Center in 2007 and it...wasn't amazing, thinking back. Still happy to have seen them in some capacity.

Fast forward to 2017, Metallica at the Rose Bowl in Pasadena. They did a brief, "impromptu" cover of Running With The Devil which I found endearing.

my wife and I were visiting LA for a week in spring 15. Driving around listening to shitty LA rock radio, I kept hearing references to Van Halen playing the Sunset Strip… so we figured out that they were to play outside on the strip for the Fallon show the night before we were to go back to NYC. I had never seen any version of the band, so I really felt that we had to see this…my wife does not in fact like VH; she would have been psyched were it GnR or Poison or the Crue…but she was game. A fancy showrunner buddy we were visiting the night before called his pal at the Fallon show to get us some, ahem, elite access, which amounted to showing up to a tent a few blacks away three hours before VH was to hit; we were eventually herded with about 50 not important enough people some 200 yards from the stage, behind hundreds of people who had been waiting in line all day. Frankie Banali was waiting among us, so was Scott Ian, but he was spirited away, maybe to where someone like Dave Grohl would be, on a roof in an expensive chair getting a foot massage.

No beer, no refreshment, no nothing to take the edge off. VH didn't start playing when they were sposed to, so we had to be "entertained" by this bald warm-up guy who shouted like Kinison… it was very trying. 1 and half hour late, they hit the stage. And so this was the infamous incident in which DLR did a sword dance while the band was gearing up "panama," hit himself on the nose. started bleeding and abandoned ship during the solo, leaving the band to pedal around the "runnin' a little hot tonight" breakdown, Eddie skreeing and skrawing, for 10 minutes…

Then Roth returns and they start the song over…this destroyed any momentum for me, and they played like the state fair Roth era set. With "Ain't Talkin" launching, I said "fuck this," my wife said "and how," and we went to Chateau Marmont to meet up with Fact checkin' Cuz.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ib3nuHsiG_Y

A+ anecdote

And that's why you don't play with swords.

Man, I always forget that DLR is practically covered with tattoos.

the kimmel show, goddamnmit…

DLR looks like a younger Stephen Miller.

With the help of George Lopez, Sammy and Eddie were able to reconcile:

https://ultimateclassicrock.com/george-lopez-sammy-hagar-eddie-van-halen/

I don't think this gets said enough, but Eddie is a trip on headphones.

Also: The secret genius of "I'll Wait" is that it's VH doing their take on "The Model".

I'll Wait is so good. They had the sense to leave a lot of space, that eerie synth sound and the big booming drums, way different that how most big rock acts tried to embrace new wave

I'll Wait is so good. They had the sense to leave a lot of space, that eerie synth sound and the big booming drums, way different that how most big rock acts tried to embrace new wave

really excited about this. I do a music podcast and Greg Renoff (Van Halen Rising author) gave us 2 hours of his time. so many cool tidbits on the band and its history, great guy

Did you know: Eddie Van Halen’s Eruption, the searing solo heard ‘round the world, almost didn’t make the album. @gregrenoff joins @matthelgeson and @nintendufus for a new Van Halen episode of CrossFade!https://t.co/RrDA2l5naw pic.twitter.com/WNxb7AbmIM

— MinnMax (@MinnMaxShow) October 23, 2020

i only saw Eddie Van Halen once, at Neil Young’s Bridge Benefit show in like 92 or 93? It was the end of the night and Simon & Garfunkel were doing “sound of silence”... Eddie stumbles out from backstage and (drunkenly?) attempts to accompany them on guitar. it was ridiculous and I was just happy he was there.

anybody else at that show?

did he add a tapping solo over it?

Lol at the image of EVH interjecting a full Eruption style solo, divebombs and all, into the middle of SOS

Wow. It's almost a shreds video.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o0y3o3zXFBA

haha half of that solo isn't even in key

Ha, that's an infamous mess.

shades of https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SkV5XqEd2Do

“Special plans!”

Stephen Thomas Erlewine's reflections on EVH and the band through all its incarnations may be the best yet I've read:

https://sterlewine.substack.com/p/eddie-van-halen-happy-trails

I don't think this gets said enough, but Eddie is a trip on headphones.

I've heard "Hot for Teacher" a few times on the radio recently, turned it up and noticed a few things with the drums I'd never really thought about before. At first I was convinced there was more overdubbing throughout the whole thing, a la the intro, and maybe there was, but then I came across this isolated track:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gbanpC_K62M

And a commenter made this, er, comment:

The 1st part of the intro is played on a Simmons pad with sticks then you hear the kick drums come in underneath. Everybody thinks the 1st part is his feet but that's actually his hands on a Simmons pad. Then the bass drums come in which are also Simmons pads. 1984 was Simmons pads with a ludwig super phonic snare drum and Roto-toms along with Paiste symbols. No actual real wood drums were used in the 1984 recording. I actually have very rare pictures of 5150 studio when that album was recorded, the Simmons pads were red.

I knew about the Simmons pads, but I didn't realize it was sort of an all-artificial material set, which maybe explains why the whole thing sounds so uncanny valley sci-fi.

One thing I haven't figured out (it's also mentioned in passing in those comments) is the occasional stick-click. It happens two or three times, but I can't tell if Alex is doing it on purpose for effect, doing it on purpose to help everyone's timing (a la Bonham in "Black Dog") or messing up. The last seems the least likely answer, since they would have just done another take, but I'm not sure which of the first two I'm going with.

You can see the set in the background here:

https://i.pinimg.com/originals/e8/b1/58/e8b1587b73c8f1995332e25eba84a01a.jpg

that intro makes me think of Bow Wow Wow

Good thread on Simmons :

http://forums.stevehoffman.tv/threads/albums-where-drummers-use-simmons-drums-electronic-drums.478617/

it can't be his hands at the start on the pads, b/c there's also a tom pattern he does about :12 seconds in, and he obviously does that w/hands

interesting follow up to that comment tho

Ted Templeman said in his autobiography that the first few seconds are actually a recording of the exhaust from Eddie's Laborghini. Donn Landee (the engineer) played with it until it blended with the start of Alex's drums.

exhaust from Eddie's Laborghini.

No way this is accurate. This sounds like the conflation/confusion of several stories, but closest to the revving in "Panama."

Also:

it can't be his hands at the start on the pads, b/c there's also a tom pattern he does about :12 seconds in, and he obviously does that w/hands

It's overdubbed, that much everyone agrees on.

Like, the bulk of the song is fast/exhausting enough, but it's telling that afaict he never did the full intro live. There are, of course, all sorts of mutant drummers now that have figured out ways to do it.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5GXshVjEVU8

And there's a similar callback here (which is insane, but Meshuggah, you know)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qc98u-eGzlc

ah my bad i thought you were stating there were no overdubs

Reminds me of Copeland’s stories, another multi-tracker that people have figured how to replicate

Yeah, he supposedly got a hoot out of watching people play, say, "Message in a Bottle," which takes a few extra arms/overdubs.

Wolfgang Van Halen has released a solo track in tribute to his father. The song is barely there, but the video is worth watching.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HI3aPJkZmNU

Emotional! Thanks

Hot shoe, boinin’ down the avenue

he went for John Fogerty on that one for some reason

Huh. Apparently Eddie and Alex recorded demos of "Christine Sixteen" and "Got Love For Sale" with Simmons. Had no idea.

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

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