More Van Halen BS

Lightyear · July 09, 2015, 07:36:52 PM

Could EVH be a bigger douche?

http://rock103.iheart.com/articles/rock-news-104703/sammy-hagar-battles-it-out-with-13694610?cmp=oboffsite

westen44 · July 09, 2015, 09:42:15 PM

I have never been able to stand the little twerp Eddie Van Halen.

Psycho Bass Guy · July 09, 2015, 09:54:11 PM

Eddie never recovered from having his Marshall's variac set to "douche."

Basvarken · July 10, 2015, 04:08:45 AM

Rather painful to see Edward making such a fool of himself. He's an incredible guitarist and he influenced thousands of guitarist all over the world. But the everlasting VH soap has been beyond the point of amusing for quite a while...

PS:
My youngest son Bas celebrated his 9th birthday two days ago with his friends. We took them to the cinema to see The Minions.
EVH came by too:

uwe · July 10, 2015, 09:10:42 AM

It baffles me. They don't even perform the Hagar years songs anymore.

I saw Van Halen at the Nassau Coliseum, Long Island, in 1988. Though no Van Halen fan at the time (or ever before or after), it was a kick ass gig, they were in their prime and Hagar can of course sing circles around Roth (who has strengths of his own, I can appreciate both Van Halens).

The new Tokyo Dome double CD is not a catastrophy, kudos to DLR for leaving so many of his bum notes untampered with. Eddie plays well, so does his son (he's considerably more busy than MLA) and Roth doesn't have so much issues with the high notes (he could never really sing well high, just emit little high yelps) as - surprisingly - with the low ones. He can't really project his macho baritone you heard on so many studio tracks anymore. So he sings in the middle most of the time which changes the songs quite a bit.

66Atlas · July 10, 2015, 07:08:55 PM

VH with Hagar pulled off stuff that they never could have done with Roth. DLRs campy style gets tired after a while but makes for a better nostalgia act. For todays sake Id rather see Chickenfoot in a small club than VH in an arena. Sorry Ed $:-\$

66Atlas · July 10, 2015, 07:13:22 PM

is the minion playing a Burns Bison with a Kalamazoo bass neck? I want one...

uwe · August 06, 2015, 10:34:51 AM

Interesting interview/feature even if EvH means zilch to you, it's certainly well-written. My, he is a strange man with an autistic streak.

http://www.billboard.com/articles/columns/rock/6605231/eddie-van-halen-addiction-david-lee-roth-touring

uwe · August 06, 2015, 11:34:24 AM

Got the 2015 remasters of the Roth era stuff today: Finally you can hear Michael Anthony (his bass, not just his backing vocals). And how he plays with a pick! And isn't such an unbusy player after all.

Roth's voice is still overloud in the mix, but that was of course the trick to make his range-wise non-hard rock voice tower above the music, same thing with Billy Idol productions. Not everyone is a Robert Plant, Ozyy Osbourne or Ian Gillan whose voices cut through without too much volume enhancement. When I listened to a lot of Black Sabbath recently, it struck me how idiosyncratic a singer Ozzy was and how he always found an interesting, even "nice" melody to even the most dominant and discordant Iommi riffs.

westen44 · August 06, 2015, 12:10:42 PM

I've always been impressed with Ozzy's voice. It's one of the most unique voices in rock, period.

uwe · August 06, 2015, 12:27:23 PM

Whew, they got all experimental on Fair Warning (an album I have never heard before save for Unchained):

Basvarken · August 06, 2015, 01:23:01 PM

Really love that album.
But as much as I like their music, Eddie is completely out of it in that interview. What a bunch if bullshit is he venting there. And for what reason?

Sammy Hagar was furious about Eddie's story on Michael Anthony

uwe · August 06, 2015, 02:10:44 PM

I don't know what's with the Van Halen brothers, they seem to resent that Anthony has befriended Hagar more than anybody else before in that band.

Interestingly, this is what Roth has to say about Anthony:

"Clearly, vocals are every bit as much a component of success as a rhythm section or a guitar solo, and there's an old expression saying, "They don't go home singing the lighting show, they don't go home singing the production." You're right, they sing my words and my melodies. And what we have at our fingertips is arguably one of the greatest high tenor voices ever – that was in Michael Anthony. In our tiny little corner of the universe, that voice is as identifiable as the high voice in Earth, Wind & Fire, as identifiable as the high voice in the Beach Boys. Van Halen is an indelicate house blend of both – that's intentionally. So I would always look forward to that reunion."

Which probably hasn't raised his popularity stakes with the other two!

I think the comparison to EW&F and the Beach Boys is very apt - you might add Barry Gibb's backing vocals in the Bee Gees, Brian May's backing vocals in Queen, Timothy B. Schmidt's backing vocals in The Eagles and Phil Collins' backing vocals in early Genesis (imagine Carpet Crawlers without them, you can't!) -,

Anthony's voice was that much a trademark too.

When I heard the VH debut in 1978 at a friend's house, I noticed two things as "sounding different": (i) the guitar, (ii) the high-pitched backing vocals. Roth's verse vocals struck me as someone talking mostly over the music because he couldn't really sing (that's not a knock, he has qualities of his own, and the "talking" is very often effective - at least in the studio!), with the catchy chorusses making up for that (a recipe VH work to this day) and he looked, well, like Jim Dandy of Black Oak Arkansas! Van Halen really didn't have proper singing in their verses until the advent of Herr Hagar IMHO.

As for Eddie's vocals being part of that chorus sound - yes, of course, it was obviously always a very processed mix of voices (as it was with Queen or Abba too) and now that Anthony's tenor voice is gone the backing vocals still sound Van Halen'ish on the recent live album and that is very likely Eddie's voice, but there is an important ingredient missing, it is only an approximation.

As for the "teaching him to play bass"-comment: I don't doubt for a minute that Eddie has shown/taught MLA bass patterns or made proposals in VH's lengthy recording history - guitarists do that. And that is perfectly ok, I sometimes show them riffs and chords too, they are not always very good at those.

But on the same token I believe that MLA could come up with enough things himself. There are enough mannerisms in his playing on the VH and Chickenfoot albums to tell me that he a style of his own and didn't need videos from Eddie for that. The younger Van Halen brother obviously has a very selective memory. And a mean/bitter streak.

uwe · August 07, 2015, 06:02:49 AM

Yesterday was Van Halen day for me, I heard all six Roth-era albums back to back. I have to rewrite my VH history a little: There were much fewer duff songs on those six CDs than I had expected/feared. Next on my list is the Hagar era and of course the much derided Van Halen III!!!

gearHed289 · August 07, 2015, 08:05:11 AM

First 4 VH albums are killer. Things got a little sketchy after that, but I like all the Roth stuff overall. I could never stand Sammy (aside from his work with Montrose), but he can certainly sing. I just always thought he was embarrassingly commercial/cheesy.

Quote from: uwe on August 06, 2015, 02:10:44 PMI think the comparison to EW&F and the Beach Boys is very apt - you might add Barry Gibb's backing vocals in the Bee Gees, Brian May's backing vocals in Queen, Timothy B. Schmidt's backing vocals in The Eagles and Phil Collins' backing vocals in early Genesis (imagine Carpet Crawlers without them, you can't!) -,

Yes, but I think you're thinking of Roger Taylor's Queen vox. =) And Phil sang GREAT with Peter! I was just watching old clips from Belgian TV last weekend.