Van Halen

[Pandemonium]

Giving the full tune a few listens, I'm warming up to it. Surprisingly, Roth's wordplay is the most appealing thing for me regarding the song. He still makes me wince whenever he falls back to that shrill yelping he does these days since he can't do those trademark screams he was capable of back in the early 80's.

[Tyler Durden]

[esqfool]

I went in 2008 when they toured and I'd seen Van Hagar. Absolutely no comparison. Van Halen was a pretty good show. I will for sure be going to a show on this tour. I remember last time, I went to a Black Rebel Motorcycle Club/Duke Spirit show one night and a Van Halen show the next. Not prisoner to musical pigeon holes.

[Pandemonium]

I went in 2008 when they toured and I'd seen Van Hagar. Absolutely no comparison. Van Halen was a pretty good show. I will for sure be going to a show on this tour. I remember last time, I went to a Black Rebel Motorcycle Club/Duke Spirit show one night and a Van Halen show the next. Not prisoner to musical pigeon holes.

I saw 2 shows during the '04 reunion tour with Hagar. The 1st one, I actually bought one of those expensive "All Access" packages which included a mid-day soundcheck and what turned out to be a 2nd row isle seat along with free booze and food. This was at the Anaheim Pond arena (or whatever it's called this week) and I was really surprised how cool and tight the band (minus Sammy) was for the the soundcheck. With bass player Michael Anthony handling all the vocals, they ripped through about 8 songs, mostly older deep cut Roth era tunes. I had already heard some pretty bad horror stories about Eddie this tour being drunk off his ass, playing for shit and being really nasty to the band and fans but he was pretty solid and sober during the soundcheck. The show that night was another matter.

They started off alright but as the show progressed, it was clear there was little connection between Hagar and Eddie. Sammy Hagar always bugged the fuck outta me even though I admit he has a much stronger voice than Roth. The dude just works too hard to be a people pleaser, signing autographs up front while the band is playing, shilling his Cabo Wabo booze.... By the time Eddie did his solo spot, he was pretty out of it. Some songs, it was hard to figure out what song Eddie was playing, he was that bad. It actually became kind of compelling theater, probably like what it must have been like seeing The Doors near the end of their run wondering what shit burned out Jim Morrison was gonna pull at any given time.

The whole drama of whether Eddie was going to have a full on meltdown onstage was enough to prod me into going with a group of friends to see them again the next week at one of their shows at Staples Arena in LA. That turned out to be a really solid show (probably because it was a hometown gig) and it was one of the only shows the band broke out an unplanned "Hot For Teacher" without telling Sammy who was literally standing on stage comically wondering what was going on.

When they did the Roth reunion tour, I caught the first LA area show at Staples Arena in late '07 lucking out on a 6th row floor seat right against the ego ramp on TM the day before the show. A few months into the tour, Eddie was still in very good form physically and playing ability after recently doing rehab and hadn't yet fallen off the wagon big time a month later. Set was basically a perfect Roth era best-of showcase and Dave's notoriously weak vox were really solid, probably the best I heard him sing since about 1982. The big thing missing (and still the case) is bassist Michael Anthony who's backing vox, solid playing and beaming stage presence was a huge component of classic VH. Eddie's son on bass made Chris Chaney look like Flea - the kid was a total stick-in-the-mud.

Looking forward to the new album and tour some 35 years after the first time I saw 'em.

[jptm]

after watching a few of the videos of last weeks NY show on youtube, it seems wolfie has gotten much better on bass.... I'm not sayin' he's MA, but he has put some practice in.

[Pandemonium]

after watching a few of the videos of last weeks NY show on youtube, it seems wolfie has gotten much better on bass.... I'm not sayin' he's MA, but he has put some practice in.

Yeah, his playing on "She's The Woman" is pretty sharp.

[JOEinPHX]

far from their best but I was expecting worse than this

Really?

I expected better.

Even a generic song about a woman would have been better than that.

[trevor ayer]

i like the tatoo song .. they always were a pop band and its really a pretty good song .. yup wierd mix but its a relief just to hear something nowhere near as bad as TGEA .. and wolfie is coming along on bass .. he is eddies kid after all .. its just a matter of time before he starts blowing us away .. the video itself is pretty bad .. who is directing these things .. horrible

[Pandemonium]

i like the tatoo song .. they always were a pop band and its really a pretty good song .. yup wierd mix but its a relief just to hear something nowhere near as bad as TGEA .. and wolfie is coming along on bass .. he is eddies kid after all .. its just a matter of time before he starts blowing us away .. the video itself is pretty bad .. who is directing these things .. horrible

Some fan put together this video that's not only better synced between music and video but just a better overall clip:

http://vimeo.com/35173319

[Tyler Durden]

i like the tatoo song .. they always were a pop band and its really a pretty good song .. yup wierd mix but its a relief just to hear something nowhere near as bad as TGEA .. and wolfie is coming along on bass .. he is eddies kid after all .. its just a matter of time before he starts blowing us away .. the video itself is pretty bad .. who is directing these things .. horrible

Some fan put together this video that's not only better synced between music and video but just a better overall clip:

http://vimeo.com/35173319

Nice find. I'm not a VH fan...but this really sells the song.

[Matz]

the song seem to grow on people. When I first heard it I didn't think much of it, now I'm pretty impressed. Apparantly it's doing well on the charts as well. Pretty cool comeback

[SR]

Nice shout to Anthony in that fan vid.

[Tyler Durden]

Nice shout to Anthony in that fan vid.

Yeah, I thought that was cool.

Okay, now someone here make a new video for "End To The Lies" and use some footage from Sonny's interview with Eric.

[trevor ayer]

Nice shout to Anthony in that fan vid.

Yeah, I thought that was cool.

Okay, now someone here make a new video for "End To The Lies" and use some footage from Sonny's interview with Eric.

ok ..

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rp2BI1y1 ... e=youtu.be

[SR]

Nice shout to Anthony in that fan vid.

Yeah, I thought that was cool.

Okay, now someone here make a new video for "End To The Lies" and use some footage from Sonny's interview with Eric.

ok ..

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rp2BI1y1 ... e=youtu.be

Unlistenable

[Tyler Durden]

Nice shout to Anthony in that fan vid.

Yeah, I thought that was cool.

Okay, now someone here make a new video for "End To The Lies" and use some footage from Sonny's interview with Eric.

ok ..

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rp2BI1y1 ... e=youtu.be

Unlistenable

[Pandemonium]

Preview of another new song called "Blood and Fire."



It's actually an update of an old 1984 instrumental song Eddie wrote for the sound track of "the Wild Life."



They should have called the new album "Cleaning Out The Closet."

[Matz]

not feeling 'Blood and Fire'

[Tyler Durden]

not feeling 'Blood and Fire'

I LOVE "Blood and Fire"!

[Pandemonium]

More tracks are out. I looks like Amazon UK fucked up and has several tracks available for download 2 weeks early. This one sounds like an updated "Ice Cream Man:"

[Deconstruction]

New 90 second clips are out of every song, and full versions of Blood & Fire/The Trouble With Never. The album is amazing.

http://dl.dropbox.com/u/2607563/Van%20H ... amples.zip

[Matz]

it's ok I guess, but we've heard it all before in a higher quality

[SR]

More tracks are out. I looks like Amazon UK fucked up and has several tracks available for download 2 weeks early. This one sounds like an updated "Ice Cream Man:"

[Pandemonium]

The album is excellent, way beyond anything anyone who's been aware of the band's history, especially Eddie's fuckups and decline the past 15 years had any right to expect. Listening to it, it's remarkable to think how it sounds like the logical follow-up to the "1984" album as if all the Hagar and Cherone albums never existed. Most impressive, is I can't think of another band that went almost 30 years before reuniting with their singer and releasing a new studio album that sits comfortably with the best of their original work.

It helps that about 2/3rds of the songs are reworked demos from '76 - '77 but Eddie has been mining his first few year's work through the 80's and 90's anyway, so that's nothing new. What this albums shows, is that even with a David Lee Roth who's vox are more limited than ever, Van Halen still sounds totally unique, even compared to the Hagar era. It's nice to have a Van Halen record with no Hagaresque songs with simple bone headed lyrics that equate sex with food (Poundcake, Good Enough, Up For Breakfast, ad nauseum) or sappy, keyboard driven love songs. What better, is the band actually exhibit energy and enthusiasm and Ed's son actually shows some great chops on bass.

My only complaint is that Roth's vox sometimes sound wincingly weak and obviously recorded apart from the rest of the band. Plus having him mixed dry and up front on most of the songs does him no favors. But the music is just flawless. Welcome back, Eddie.

[trevor ayer]

glad to hear u diggin the new record .. is it out or did u get some leaked version .. i kinda dig tatoo and get frosty so far .. i've never been to gaga over vh like i was for some other bands but i like them enough to be curious every once in a while and the snippets i have heard really do sound like the ole vh i always dug .. never was into hagar altho 5150 still isn't so bad .. its pretty normal to mine old riffs and licks .. i kinda wish janes had done that and put out the proper follow up to ritual with kettle divers suffer city maceo blood rag so what and a couple new tunes .. i am glad vh is out there proving it possible to comeback with a solid effort