11/20/2023 0 Comments Eddie van halen hair![]() ![]() ![]() The difference between Van Halen and the hair metallers who followed was what always separates game-changers from imitators: their wide listening habits. Van Halen had transformed rock by unwittingly creating music's most profitable rubbish dump. But the bands Van Halen spawned, sadly, were pallid imitators without Van Halen's invention and skill. It sounded like nothing before it, yet also like it could have been made at any time until Nevermind was released 13 years later: that's an awfully long time to sound undated. That debut was nothing short of a paradigm shift in the sound of heavy music, as important as Jimi Hendrix's first record had been a decade before, and Nirvana's second would be in closing the era Van Halen began. They closed their debut album with a version of John Brim's old blues Ice Cream Man, and even then you can't imagine, say, Humble Pie coming up with such a confection. Where heavy rock's use of the blues had previously been trudging and unwieldy, Van Halen added a sense of flight, taking away the swing, speeding even a simple 12-bar into something entirely unrelated to its source. Their signature sound was clean, precise and full of attack: there's absolutely no fat on the songs that made their name. Roth was already a blowhard, Eddie's guitar technique was clearly light years ahead of the competition, Alex Van Halen and Michael Anthony were a thunderous rhythm section. All the elements that instantly identify Van Halen were present on the Simmons demos: it's no wonder that when they came to record their official debut, it took just days, with minimal overdubbing. Simmons was so impressed he flew the band to New York to produce a session for them at his own expense. Van Halen, legend holds, were spotted by Gene Simmons of Kiss, playing at the Starwood club in Los Angeles in 1976. The tension between Roth's goofiness and stellar guitarist Eddie van Halen's desire to be taken seriously was at the heart of their music, and eventually tore the pair apart. ![]() So did the Ramones, of course, but Van Halen's idiocy was of a different order to punk's: it wasn't built around comic-book humour, but on David Lee Roth's apparent range of interests, which ran the gamut of pursuits from casual sex to casual intoxication, with nothing in between. They were too popular, too vulgar, too much, too soon. Of course, you wouldn't believe Van Halen were the most important American band of the late 70s if you only read rock critics. They took their name from a brotherly relationship they had a goofy, Jewish singer with family connections to New York bohemia they added pop hooks and smarts to fast, aggressive guitar music their debut album included a song with the word "punk" in its title and they weren't the Ramones. Van Halen formed the band of the same name in California in 1972, with Lee Roth on vocals, his brother Alex Van Halen on drums, and Michael Anthony on bass.Thirty-five years ago, a four-piece American guitar band set about changing rock music for ever. The guitarist’s death comes just months after Wolfgang offered hope that his dad may one day tour again with the band. He blamed his illness on metal guitar picks that he used to hold in the same spot in his mouth. Van Halen had been battling the disease after being first being diagnosed with tongue cancer in 2000. He added: “I will always do the half-Jesus towards you, Eddie Van Halen.” Midway through the concert, Roth addressed Eddie, saying: “The best years of my life the high points of all my life – onstage with you, homeboy.” Ending the tour at the Hollywood Bowl in Los Angeles on October 4, 2015, you can watch the band play the final encore of ‘Jump’ below. Van Halen last toured in the summer of 2015. It was the band’s third time hitting the road since David Lee Roth rejoined the group in 2007. In addition to the thousands of messages, memories and photographs of the guitarist that have been shared, people have also been sharing videos of Eddie performing live, including his final performance with the band. My heart is broken and I don’t think I’ll ever fully recover from this loss. Every moment I’ve shared with him on and off stage was a gift. “He was the best father I could ever ask for. “I can’t believe I’m having to write this, but my father, Edward Lodewijk Van Halen, has lost his long and arduous battle with cancer this morning,” he said in a statement on Twitter. His passing was confirmed yesterday (October 6) by his son, Wolfgang, who revealed that the 65-year-old had lost his long battle with throat cancer. ![]() READ MORE: Eddie Van Halen, 1955 – 2020: a fire-fingered colossus who turned guitar solos into a firework display.Fans have been sharing footage of Eddie Van Halen‘s final live performance with Van Halen, following the death of the legendary guitarist. ![]()
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