1285. Van Halen / Women and Children First. 1980. 3.5/5

Van Halen’s rise to prominence from the release of their debut album in 1978 was built on two amazing albums filled with songs that appealed to audiences of differing ages, and a non stop touring regime that saw them build that audience with their live sound and the excitement and charisma of their lead singer as well as the genius of their guitarist. They toured as a support act for bands such as Journey and Ronnie Montrose and famously opened for Black Sabbath towards the end of their first formation and were reported to be blowing them off the stage. One of the reasons Van Halen managed to make an impression was that what you heard on stage was what you heard on the album. There was few if any overdubbing or multi-tracking on their albums, they created a live feel about them so that when the fans came to see them, they knew what they were getting. And their hard work on the road allowed them to build that live reputation into a living machine, one that continued to grow through each show.
On the band’s first two albums the recording time had been around two weeks, slotted in between the live gigs the band continued to play. For this third album, a similar occurrence took place, with the festive period of December and into the new year of January 1980 chosen to record their follow up to “Van Halen II”. Though the band continued to utilise a ‘live’ environment in their recording session for this album, there was more studio overdubs on this album, as well as less emphasis on utilising backing vocals and more of David Lee Roth being the sole focus of the vocals. There was also no cover songs played on this album, most likely the result of the band having been able to compose enough songs of their own as they were out on the road, as well as bringing in some songs they had recorded as demos in the years before the band got their recording contract.
All of this came together quickly, with the album being released within a month of the recording and mixing being completely and led to the release of the band’s third album, one that was described by one critic as "[the] record where the group started to get heavier, both sonically and, to a lesser extent, thematically” titled “Women and Children First”.

Van Halen was always a band that wanted to have an opening track that grabbed by the... shirt... and took a hold of you from the opening beat, and the opening here of “And the Cradle Will Rock...” does that again. The opening begins with what sounds like a guitar, but according to Eddie is actually a phase shifter-effected Wurlitzer electric piano played through his amplifier. Yeah, I don’t understand it either, but it sounds great, and once Roth hits in with his vocals and scream of “Wow”, and Eddie’s riffing and soloing over Michael Anthony’s solid bass guitar riff, everything fits together like it should. Put the album on and crank that start and you’ll be immediately drawn in to the album. Following this comes another great song intro, this being the jungle drums from Alex Van Halen, along with Roth doing his best Tarzan impression and the opener slowly building before breaking into the opening riff proper at the 75 second mark, and we’re away! There is another breakdown in the middle of the track with a similar slow build back into the harder tones of the song. There’s lots of Roth squeals throughout and Eddie breaks in and out a couple of times during the track. The song is “Everybody Wants Some!!” and it has also become one of the band’s most loved tracks, with appearances in several movies over time which are all enhanced by having it a part of them.
“Fools” had been written some years earlier and had been played live as early as 1975. It bases itself hard on a blues riff from Eddie and conversational vocals from Dave that he used to love to engage in, along with the requisite squeals that punctuate this album in particular. This is the one track on the album where there is a noticeable heavy influence of blues in the song, albeit in a very Van Halen way. “Romeo Delight” kicks things into a higher gear, powered along initially by Roth’s great vocal delivery, fast and biting and breezing along, followed by Eddie’s guitar chiming in to push into a higher gear. The breakdown in the middle slows it all down before the build to the finish to off the first side of the album in style.
“Tora! Tora!”, the instrumental that opens up side two of the album, endlessly reminds me of the beginning of the Spinal Tap song “Rock and Roll Creation”. Have a listen to them both together one time, and I’d be surprised if you didn’t agree. Spinal Tap ripping off another artist? Insane! This segues straight into “Loss of Control”, a song that had been played live on different occasions all the way back to 1977, which opens with a ripping guitar solo piece from Eddie and then Dave pulling off typical Dave vocals including falsetto backing. This is one of Van Halen’s fastest ever songs, with barely a break between all members of the band before its conclusion. Oh, if only the rest of the album had stayed at this tempo, it would have made for a more fascinating spectacle. Great song.
“Take Your Whiskey Home” is a song that originally came from a demo the band had recorded at Cherokee Studios in 1974, before Michael Anthony had joined the band. The version for this album did have some revisions made to it both lyrically and musically. This settles back into a solid rhythm, with Roth’s vocals mostly set in a normal register tone apart from the squeals that he intermittently lets loose. "Could This Be Magic?" contains the only female backing vocal ever recorded for a Van Halen song, with Nicolette Larson, who is best known for her work with Neil Young, singing during some of the choruses. The rain sound in the background also is not an effect, it came from the rain that was falling during the recording of this song outside. This is followed by “In a Simple Rhyme”, which also originally came from the same demo as “Take Your Whiskey Home”. It has that same sound of that era of the band without the real breakout guitar riffing you may have expected. Michael Anthony’s bass guitar is prominent throughout, and Eddie’s solo DOES mirror the excitement that he provided with such pieces in those years before the band had been discovered. The end of the track has a hidden song titled “Growth” which lasts for about 20 seconds. Apparently at the time the band was recording this album, they were also considering starting what would become their next album, Fair Warning, with a continuation of "Growth," but did not eventually go through with that idea.

It’s always an interesting conversation when you come across a Van Halen fan when you talk about favourite eras of the band and more importantly the progression of the albums in the catalogue. There is a definite skewing of which are the fans favourite depending on what age and what time they found the band, and also just what they are looking for from their music.
“Women and Children First” does seem to be a change in course from the first two albums, and one that continued onto the following release “Fair Warning”. There is a more concerted heavy riff through most of the songs, often at a faster pace than the first two albums, and a reliance more on Eddie Van Halen’s song riffs than the individual spurts of brilliance in his chosen solo slot. There is STILL that of course, he doesn’t skimp on that here, but the songs riffs seem more important here to complete the tracks to a better finish. He and Michael Anthony’s bass lines combine well here to build a harder edge and better filled tracks, a depth in sound that carries through the room out of the stereo or into your ears through headphones. David Lee Roth moves further out front and more in your face on this album as well, taking control of the front of house, something that also continued into the next album.
As I have mentioned before, I came into Van Halen through ‘1984’ like a lot of my generation. It was the album of that time in music, that saw Eddie’s growing love of the synth dominate. From that point in time, mostly over the next decade, I found all of the five albums that preceded that hit, and found a sound that actually moves around and climbs far more than I thought it would when I first listened to those albums. And one of the biggest movements I found was between “Van Halen II” and this album. I was well enmeshed in the heavy metal genre by the time I heard this album, and when I first heard it I more or less guessed that it would mostly of the style that the band had on the debut and sophomore album. So I was truly surprised by songs such as “Romeo Delight”, “Loss of Control” and “In a Simple Rhyme”, which have large moments at least, if not entire tracts, that verge on metal music, in heaviness and speed. And the opening two songs, probably the best known from the album, in “And the Cradle Will Rock” and “Everybody Wants Some”, are only a tiny adjustment and decision away from being full blown metal anthems. That of course would have been an interesting thought for the fan base at the time this album was released. Were they looking for that ramping up in a more aggressive style, or were they just looking for more of the same? I’m not sure, but by the time I’d discovered the album it suited my tastes at that period.
It’s probably easy to see that I really like this album. It had been some time since I had last pulled this album for a listen before the past week, and I wasn’t sure exactly how I was going to react to it. And the result has been interesting, because I had listened to it ten times prior to this day on which I am doing this review, and another eight times just today. And I feel like each time I’ve had it on has been more enjoyable. Perhaps its just that I’ve had a pretty ordinary day at work, and this really helped get me through it. But an album that has the capacity to do that is a good album to have.
Out of the 12 Van Halen studio albums, I rank this a very good #5. In some ways it is underrated, but also because of its style perhaps fans of an earlier or later era of the band would feel less positive about it than I do. Individual taste is always the key. For me, this album into the next album is a bloody good era of Van Halen.

1204. Van Halen / OU812. 1988. 3/5

Overall, Van Halen had come away from the split with former lead vocalist David Lee Roth in a strong position. After the commercial success of the album “1984” with Roth on vocals, there was doubt over whether they could reproduce that success with Sammy Hagar coming in. That was laid to rest by the release of “5150”, which was full of chart busting singles and the same kind of hard rock guitar infused with the increasing keyboard and synth that “1984” had introduced, while Hagar’s vocals were a great match for what the band was producing.
Following the tour to support that album, the writing for the next album began soon after, with both Eddie and Sammy already inundated with ideas to progress with. Prior to the album being released, there was a lot of speculation as to how the band would progress musically on their second album with this line-up. DLR’s second solo album “Skyscraper” was released at the start of 1988, the episode of which you can find in this season of Music from a Lifetime, and it had shown a slight change in style from his first. And many wondered just where Van Halen would go with their new album, and whether Sammy Hagar would be an influence in its direction musically, or whether the musical direction that Eddie had taken over the previous two albums would continue to evolve in the same way. Long time fans of the band were looking for a return to a more guitar oriented theme much like their early work, where Eddie’s guitar dominated, rather than where the synths of the 1980’s did so. Prior to its release, this album was surrounded by theories and speculation, much of which perhaps ended up being problematic for the fans when the album finally saw the light of day.

“Mine All Mine” opens the album perfectly, a rocking Van Halen song at the right tempo, slotted with keyboards that dominate in a way they had for the band’s past two albums, and vocals that, at times, I often mistake for David Lee Roth at the beginning of the song, before it becomes obvious that it is still Sammy Hagar at the helm. Eddie’s solo here also revives the better attributes of the band as well.
In many ways, personally at least, I think “When It’s Love” is a poor choice as the follow up song. It’s the epitome of the Van Hagar rock ballad, and of course it did great business on the charts when released, but for me it stops the album in its tracks at the first hurdle. And, in many ways, it never really recovers. Of course, all of those millions of fans out there who love the song would disagree.
The middle trilogy of “AFU (Naturally Wired)”, “Cabo Wabo” and “Source of Infection” have a much sound about them, Eddie’s guitar and Sammy’s wailing with that great hard rock rhythm of Alex Van Halen and Michael Anthony. “Cabo Wabo” has a slower groove than the other two but fits in nicely. “Source of Infection” again could have been DLR singing such is the way the track is sung and creates the backing vocals the way the band used to.
Three songs released as singles follow this into the back half of the album, and as a result the real energy of the album gets misplaced. “Feels So Good” has almost church-organ keyboards throughout, only building with Eddie’s solo by the end of the song. “Finish What Ya Started” is a semi-acoustic tome that for many fans is a bonafide great song, but for me pretty much just stalls the album again, while “Black and Blue” is the more energetic of the three tracks.
“Sucker in a 3 Piece” is the concluding track on the album, unless you have the CD (which I guess would be the majority of album owners out there) which has a cover of the blues track “A Apolitical Blues” which, really, does nothing for me. It’s a strange one to have included to be honest, but along with some of the decision making on this album, perhaps it actually fits alongside that.

I never jumped out and bought this album. There was a lot of other albums at the time that were dominating my listening (and the severe lack of cash meant I couldn’t just buy every album I wanted in those uni days), and so for some time I only had the singles released from the album as my guide, which can sometimes be good and other times be average. It would be fair to say that in this case the singles coloured my feelings of the album. Once I started to listen to the album it was those songs that I heard the most, and for me it probably harmed the way I felt about the album.
Over the years, I wouldn’t say that my opinion of the album has changed much. And like I mentioned in the intro, for me this was a real line in the sand album. There is stuff I like enough here, and on the albums that followed, but none of them for me ever compared to those that came pre-1987. And that was never a nostalgia thing either, it was just that the band turned the dial away from the style of music they had always done to this point, and found the next station on the dial. None of it felt like a reaction to what was happening in music at the time, it honestly just felt that it was the direction this group of four was looking to diverge into. For me, I wasn’t completely invested in that direction.


I’ve spent the past two to three weeks listening to the album again in preparation for this episode, and my feelings on the album remain the same as they have for 35 years. I’ve put it on, and it almost immediately went into the background for me as I did whatever else I was doing at the time. At no time did it dominate, or demand that I sing along or stop what I was doing because it was awesome. An average album, without the hooks necessary to truly become a big hitter in my music collection.

1190. Van Halen / Van Halen III. 1998. 2/5

For over 20 years Van Halen had been one of the leading hard rock bands in the US, and with a popularity that had also spread around the world. Even with a change of lead singer halfway through their career, their popularity had never waned, and indeed could be said to have increased as a result.
Following the release of the band’s tenth studio album “Balance”, the growing tensions within members of the band were beginning to overflow. The relationship between lead singer Sammy Hagar and the Van Halen brothers Alex and Eddie was unwinding. Over a period of months, where the band was first writing and recording songs for the film “Twister”, and then over the negotiations over the release of a greatest hits package, where Hagar’s desires for its compilation seemed contrary to what the Van Halen’s were thinking, the working and personal relationship between the two parties deteriorated to the point that Hagar was no longer a member of the band. Depending on which story you choose to believe, Hagar was either fired, or Hagar quit of his own accord. Those stories have never really found a common ground in the years since.
This resulted in a short-term reunion with David Lee Roth, where two songs were written and recorded for the aforementioned greatest hits album, before he too was spurned by the band, and again the story as to what happened in that period of time has two versions.
The band had continued to try out new lead singers, and they eventually decided to hire former Extreme lead vocalist Gary Cherone as Hagar and Roth’s replacement, an interesting choice at the time, but at least someone who was a proven performer and a well-known singer in the rock and pop world, someone who had proven in his former band to be able to sing hard rock sings and rock ballads as well. Now all that needed to be achieved was to have an album to showcase his potential to add to the already known quality of Van Halen, Anthony and Van Halen.

It would be fair to say that when “Van Halen III” came out, it was not especially what everyone was expecting. The music was less intense, less... rock. There was a more acoustic vibe to most of the songs, the energy seemed to have been cast aside. Sure, there are still some good riffs here, and some of the songs have energetic pieces in them, and occasionally you here a bit of the old Eddie Van Halen on guitar. But the album is a world away from what most people got into Van Halen for.
Over the period of time from when the album was released, and the tour to promote it had come and gone, it was Gary Cherone who was the one who copped most of the flak for the performance of the album. Many people dubbed it the Van Halen and Extreme crossover, suggesting that the success of Extreme’s “More Than Words” single a few years earlier had infiltrated the way this album was written. But the things that those critics would never have taken into account is that Cherone would have had almost zero input into the direction of the album. He was the hired gun, the one asked to follow in the footsteps of David Lee Roth and Sammy Hagar, and that was always going to be a thankless task no matter how talented he was.
Cherone himself made the point that he felt that it would have been beneficial for both himself and the band if they had toured together before they went in and recorded the album. This would not only have given him a chance to be seen by the fans as a part of the band, the four band members would have found their way to bond as well and be able to take that into the studio with them.
Still, even if that had been the case, the majority of the writing and performing on the album was by Eddie himself. For whatever reason, he played the bass on almost every track, with Michael Anthony only contributing to three of the tracks, and later on Michael admitted that he had been told exactly what and how to play on those three songs, which was not something that had been a part of his playing in the past. The result of this was that Michael himself, along with others, have seen this album more of an Eddie solo album than a true Van Halen album. Though all the tracks were credited to all four members of the band, in fact the writing and arranging pretty much came down to Eddie, and he played most of it as well.
Importantly, and this is something that probably wasn’t really utilised on the album’s release when it came to album reviews and fans thoughts, it is difficult to separate what you WANT the album to sound like, and the way it is actually written. And in separating that, is it possible to listen to this with an open mind, and try to discern whether it is an average album, or just an album that is so different from what you wanted or expected that you simply categorise it as that as a result.

20 years on from their eponymous debut album crashing the charts and making a scene, as reviewed here on this podcast just a few episodes ago, this album was up against the changing face of hard rock and metal music in the late 1990’s, and Van Halen’s style was one that you suspect could still have fit into that mould of the music scene. But there is little doubt that the change in the music here went beyond even what had occurred on the last couple of Van Halen albums with Hagar on the mic, and that change was something that felt as though it was pulling away from the long-time fans the band had. The back up vocals don’t feel as lively, nor sound as convincing as in the past. Just about everything about this album makes you feel like there is something missing, but also perhaps missing a trick.
I bought this album on its release, mainly because Van Halen were finally going to tour Australia, and I was finally going to see them live. So I did my due diligence, and I listened to it on rotation for the two months leading up to that concert. They played five songs off this album live, and they were fine, but what I got from that gig was how good Gary Cherone was, and how well he sang all eras of Van Halen songs. And I thought at the time, that with a bit more of the traditional Van Halen sound, the NEXT album could be really killer! Of course, that was not to be. Eddie had his hip replacement, and they parted amicably. But it did seem like a missed opportunity. Again.
So I’ve had this album on again over the last couple of weeks, and honestly it hasn’t gotten better with age. It is too long (at over an hour the longest Van Halen album), it is too slow, it is too reflective. It is the most un-Van Halen Van Halen album. I think Cherone was unfairly saddled with the blame for that, but I’m sure Michael Anthony was closer to the truth in that this was more an Eddie solo thing, one that was to be different from what the band usually provided.
Even though there was one more album to come down the track, Van Halen effectively finished at this point. Michael Anthony was replaced by Wolfgang Van Halen at that time, and it became a nostalgia based act from then on until Eddie’s passing.

1189. Van Halen / Live: Right Here, Right Now. 1993. 4/5

Few people were aware of it at the time, but this album became one of the final releases on Van Halen, though the band was still active beyond this for 25 years. With several albums having now been released with Sammy Hagar at the helm, there were already nervous kicking at the ground and whispered thoughts behind closed doors as to how much further the band could go in its current form.
One thing that the band had not done by the time it had finished its “For Unlawful Carnal Knowledge” album was released an official live album, showcasing the greatness of the band and the four individuals who were a part of it. And whatever the decision making behind this album eventually being recorded, it still seems as though it didn’t go as smoothly as it probably should have, given it had been almost 20 years that Van Halen had toured the US in particular.
The album was recorded over two nights in Fresno, California, with a combining of performances over the double album release. However, what seemed to damn this release was the fact that the original show had been broadcast at the time of it being played, and when fans heard what was on offer with this album, it was apparent that some post-production work had been done. The originally broadcast concert had a rawer sound that was much closer to what people thought of as the Van Halen live sound, whereas this album had differences in both the instruments and the vocals. It was later revealed by Hagar in his 2011 autobiography that the Van Halen’s had tinkered with the speed of the recording and other factors in order to fix up perceived problems in the live set. Hagar said this then made his vocals sound out of key and sync. As a result, he was asked to come into the studio, and sing along with the video of the gig, and completely re-record his vocals. Now, other live albums over the years have used a similar technique and have survived the scrutiny that was on offer at the time, and to be honest this album has as well. Unfortunately, because it is the only true live album the band released, it perhaps doesn’t give the clearest indication of the powerhouse that van Halen was when on stage because of this.

The band certainly made up for not having had a live album prior to this one. The two CD release covers almost two and a half hours of live songs and performances. And while ignoring a little the news I have already related over the post-production issues, it sounds terrific, but especially on those songs where the energy is at its highest, and the band gets to really showcase what they do.
But... and there almost always is a BUT when it comes to live albums... there are a couple of things that I find grate on my conscience a little. The first is the insertion of both a bass solo and a drum solo. Now I know the band was renown for these, and that it was a part of their live act through their whole career. But do we need to have them placed on a live album? How many of you out there, on ANY live album that contains bass, drum or guitar solos, actually listen them all when you are listening to the album? Truly! Because I know that when its on CD I press skip immediately, and when it is on vinyl I groan my way through until we reach the next song. They are unnecessary. Great when you see a band live, but please don’t hold up the momentum of the album by putting them on here.
Secondly, where are all the songs from pre-1985? I know the band pretty much only played their big singles from the 1978-1984 era once Dave had been let go, and I’m sure that grated on fans who saw the band during this era, but how can you release a double live album, with 24 songs on it, and only have four Roth era songs on it? And one of those was “You Really Got Me” which of course is a Kinks cover! So three Roth era tracks, but we also have TWO Sammy Hagar solo tracks on here, and a cover of The Who’s “Won’t Get Fooled Again”! Now, come on. Were we just trying to wipe away half of the back catalogue because another guy was singing on it? Imagine Black Sabbath not playing any Ozzy era tracks when Dio was singing? How about Iron Maiden ignoring their first two albums once Bruce Dickinson arrived? It just doesn’t make sense.
And finally, while I am all in favour of bands promoting their latest album in order to show how good their new material is, surely playing 10 out of the 11 songs from their then current album “For Unlawful Carnal Knowledge” is just way over the top. I mean, how bad could “The Dream is Over” have been to miss out on being included on this album? (though they did actually play it). They could probably have just played that whole album in one hit, and then bunched the hits together in the second half of the concert. I mean, that’s been done plenty of times since. They could have been the originals when it came to this trend if they had.

I bought this album on a whim sometime in the late 1990’s at a shopping centre in Erskineville in Sydney, probably sometime not long before I eventually got to see Van Halen live for the first and only time – though by this time it was Gary Cherone who was fronting the band. I hadn’t heard anything by Van Halen since the “OU812” album, so I do remember getting through this for the first time and wondering what the hell had I just listened to. Probably was always going to be the case given I hadn’t heard the “For Unlawful Carnal Knowledge” album at all, and that I had been expecting to hear great Roth era songs such as “Unchained”, “Hot for Teacher”, “Mean Streets” and “Dance the Night Away”, just to name a few. Instead, I got this album, which at the time was a slight disappointment. Then I went off, saw Van Halen with Cherone which was absolutely sensational, and then promptly put this back in the CD shelves to be mostly forgotten for the next 20-odd years.
Pretty much until two weeks ago, when I pulled it out again to prepare for this podcast episode. And, not surprisingly, I have enjoyed this immensely. Time can sometimes be a comfort, and hearing Hagar singing at his peak has been totally worth the time spent. And, to be honest, it’s the vocals here that really win the day. And perhaps with Eddie’s growing love of synths and keyboards in this phase of the band’s career, that isn’t completely surprising. Because while there are still some good guitar pieces in the current material of the album, most of it is based around the soft rock ballad than the hard rock guitar. For someone of my vintage now, I am much more able to accept that as part of the Van Halen package than I would have been back when I first got this album, though as I have related, I’d have loved to have heard more of that older material as well, when Eddie’s guitar was the star rather than the band as a whole as it did eventually become, for better or worse. So for me, this album has improved over time, and become something that is still worth listening to – even given the gripes that I have brought up through this episode. Sometimes, you just have to accept what you have, and get on with it.

1007. Van Halen / Van Halen II. 1979. 4/5

Van Halen’s eponymous debut album had been released in February 1978, and as always the episode covering it appears in Season 4 of this podcast for your listening pleasure. The band then went on an extensive tour to promote it and along the way continued to pick up new fans of the guitar based hard rock that they had filled that debut album with. At one point they opened for Black Sabbath, creating a rivalry of sorts as the brash young opening band showed more enthusiasm than the older and tour-wizened main attraction. Van Halen’s touring stretched all the way through to the first week of December, and most bands would be looking for a break after such a long engagement. However, a week later, Van Halen had returned to the studio in order to write and record their follow up album.
Once again, the recording time was short, in this case only seven days were spent in the studio. The band did have some leftover material from the writings sessions of the first album, and even songs written well before that. Some of those songs of course never surfaced until the band’s final album some 30-odd years after this. There had also been writing done on the road, all of which allowed the recording of this second album to happen quickly and with few speedhumps.
At this stage of the band’s career, the bumping of heads over the style of music the band should be playing had not come up in conversation, with the four members all on the same course. Because the songs are all still more or less out of the same writing sessions over those recent period of years, the sound on what became “Van Halen II” was similar to that which came from “Van Halen”. The second instalment is more or less an extension of the first album, with a similar structure and song body about it, which for those who loved that first album was all they could have asked for from the follow up.

While the debut album opened up with a cracking opening song that then set up the entirety of side one of that album, I’m not sold on how this album opens up. The band starts with the cover version of “You’re No Good” to open up the album, and even after all of this time I just can’t understand why they went in this direction. I’ve been spoiled by the original version of the song that is in the cult movie classic “House”, which is in a great scene that to me is timeless. As such, this doesn’t do enough to top that. To me it is an unfortunate weak opening. The first single from the album is the classic “Dance the Night Away” which harbours all of the great things about this band in one song. It may not be the most energetic of the songs here but given its exposure it is the most well-known, and it gets this album moving after the slight disappointment of the starting track.
For the majority of the album this is an upbeat jaunty exercise, mixing the jive drum beat of Alex Van Halen and the funky bass of Michael Anthony along with the ridiculous guitar skills of Eddie Van Halen and the athletic vocal chords of David Lee Roth, which are also stacked in support by the other members contributions. Each song is short and sweet, and action packed. When an album only stretches to 31 minutes, you’re going to get that. Songs like “Somebody Get Me a Doctor” and “Bottoms Up!” and “Outta Love Again” all have that upside joyous vocal quality backed up by Eddie’s wonderful guitar licks. Dave is almost freelance riffing on “Outta Love Again” which showcases just what a voclaist and performer he was, especially in these early days of the band.
“Light Up the Sky” opens up the second side of the album, and really does light up the sky, picking up the pace further, with the mood lifted high by Dave’s vocals, and then set on fire by Eddie’s flying solo and even a solo drum piece for Alex to get his chops around. Great song.
Whereas the first album had Eddie’s “Eruption” to audience to with mouth agape at his skill and just listen to in amazement, "Van Halen II” has “Spanish Fly”, a one minute instrumental piece with Eddie again excelling on his instrument in a different form, this time on the acoustic guitar. It’s still great to listen to. It gives another side of his amazing skills rather than the belligerent guitar that he is best known for. This is followed by the straight up rock guitar stylings of “D.O.A” which still does most things right.
The final two songs on the album slow back down to a much different tempo. “Women in Love…” and “Beautiful Girls” both go for a more reflective, less urgent style, and while others may enjoy these songs as much as the others on this album, for me it comes as a slightly disappointing end to the album after what has come before this. And that’s only from someone who far more enjoys the faster and more energetic side of the band that the side that produces these songs as well. Again. It doesn’t make them bad songs, just not of the style that I prefer.

My introduction to Van Halen really came with the “1984” album, surprisingly released in 1984, and then the split which then resulted and came with the “5150” album. So, the albums prior to this were a mystery to me until those years after this, and only from listening to them at friends’ houses who had the albums. Eventually I came to own all of the band's albums and gave them the listening they deserved.
“Van Halen II” has always been a mid-range album for me. Much like I do with all of Van Halen’s albums, I find they are a bit 50-50, in that there are half of the songs on an album I love, and then half that I... tolerate. Here I find the upbeat songs are great, and the others are a slight letdown. It was certainly the way for much of my youth and into my twenties with the band.
Listening to the album again now, I find nothing much has changed. I enjoy all the songs I have put on this episode for you to sample - “Dance the Night Away”, “Somebody Get Me a Doctor”, “Outta Love Again”, “Light Up the Sky”... and the other songs are there, and I listen to them because they are there, but that’s all. The album sounds like the band is having a party in the recording studio. The whole vibe is fun and fantastic, with all four members at the top of their game and sounding like they are having a great time. And this moves away from the blues base of the first album and tends to take on the live sensation they must have been channelling at this stage of their career. For me though that doesn’t change the fact that there are peaks and troughs here as there tends to be on most Van Halen albums.
Put it on the stereo and turn the volume up, and it comes across a whole lot better because you get that studio party vibe coming through. Throw it on in the car or on a walk, and I don’t think it works as well.

757. Van Halen / Tokyo Dome Live in Concert. 2015. 4/5

To be honest, going in to write a review of this album, if I don't make the exact same points as every other reviewer in the world then something is wrong. Because really, a live album from Van Halen should be a celebrated event, with the highlights outweighing any negative reactions. And for the most part here, that is exactly correct. But a couple of things tend to grate a little when you listen to the album, things that can't be changed over the course of time that has passed in the band's existence.

The set list is a cracker. Given that they were only going to play songs from when David Lee Roth had fronted Van Halen, it meant that apart from three songs from their latest release, all of these songs are from their classic albums between 1978 and 1984. That means some pretty mean songs get a run here in the live setting, and there is barely a song that any fan could say they missed here over the course of the two discs and two hours. There are even a couple of songs that, for me at least, they could have left off. But that's just personal preference.
So the song list is a ripper. However, what does get found out pretty early on are the vocals. Yes, David Lee Roth has grown longer in the tooth, and there isn't a vocalist alive (or dead for that matter) that hasn't had to adjust the way they sing in their latter years to compensate for the deterioration of their vocal capacity. Some do it better than others. I'm sure we can all handle the fact that DLR can't be expected to hit all the same notes that he did 30-35 years ago. However, that shouldn't mean that you can't do justice to those old songs by making a few variations. Unfortunately here, rather than try and compromise, DLR tends to play around with the vocals, changing their timing and pitch, throwing them out of sequence with the music, and (no doubt) playing around with the crowd all the while. I'm not sure that is fair to either the ticket-buying customer or the album purchasing listener. You deserve to hear "Unchained" and "Panama" and "Ain't Talkin' 'bout Love" and "Jump" performed as they were written, because they are the timeless classics that should always be preserved and played correctly, not just piss farting around with. Especially, but not only, because they were being performed for a live album. Some songs here, obviously ones that DLR is more comfortably within in his range, sound fine with no adlibbing. The absence of Michael Anthony is felt hard here too. No disrespect to Wolfgang and Eddie, but they can't match what Michael brought to the band with his vocals, and it is noticeable in many of the songs here. It could be argued here that I am being far too picky, and it would not be an unfair argument. However, this is what I get from listening to the album, and it does bring home the disappointment that the first live album with DLR on vocals has come this late in the band's career.
Apart from this, the band's performance as a whole is sensational. Wolfy's bass is serviceable, Alex's drums are as hard hitting and dominant as always, and Eddie is... well... he is Eddie Van Halen, with all the trademark squeals and runs and tapping - and RIFFS - that mark his career and his band's music. Just sensational.

Those that will ignore my more domineering thoughts on Diamond Dave's vocal performance will find an album full of brilliant hits performed by musicians who show they are still capable of pulling it off in the live setting. Those that may agree with my thoughts will still find more than enough here to like, even if it is only hearing Eddie take on the world with just a guitar in his hands being manipulated by his amazing fingers.

Rating: Change, nothing stays the same.  4/5

708. Van Halen / Van Halen. 1978. 4/5

By November 2013, there is little that I could write here about Van Halen that hasn't written or said a thousand times over. It is a seminal album, one that broke new barriers, created some new ones, and launched not only this band but a hundred others that came in the years following its release. In the end, the only thing I can write is my own thoughts and opinions on it, and no doubt they too mirror many others from down the years.

Van Halen showcases the wonderful talents of the four members, and how they combine so well in the band. Alex Van Halen has a terrific drum kit and the sound he gets out of it on this album is terrific. He shows off all his skills and rolls. Michael Anthony plays his bass with what seems like simplicity but is much more effective than that, and his backing vocals are a real key to the music. And then you have David Lee Roth's soaring vocals, and Eddie Van Halen's guitar. A pretty awesome foursome.
Much of the album I think you can either take or leave depending on your mood. The album opener "Runnin' With the Devil" is a moody piece, dominated by David Lee Roth's vocals with a short stint from Eddie Van Halen's guitar in the middle. This is followed by the 103 seconds that changed a million guitarists lives, the Eddie Van Halen guitar solo entitled "Eruption". This is what made this album so significant, and still does to this day. It showcased Eddie's talent to the world, a position from which he has never turned back, and he has dragged the band with his name in the same direction. It was then a clever move to follow this with a cover of The Kinks" "You Really Got Me", because it has one of the most recognisable guitar riff intros in the history of music. Thus, even though he may not have written it, the listener goes from hearing Eddie's "Eruption" into this well known riff, and it all falls into place. His guitar re-working of the song also works very well, along with the vocals from both Dave and Michael.
In many ways the album has dated over the years. It isn't as fresh as it was when it was released. The one obvious exception to this is "Ain't Talkin' 'Bout Love", which still maintains the best of what Van Halen had to offer - a terrific riff from Eddie, a really nice underscore bass line from Michael, great drumming from Alex and Dave's pointed and scene-stealing vocals. 35 years later and this remains one of their greatest ever songs.
Songs like "I'm the One" and "Jamie's Cryin'" are very much dominated by David's vocals and lyrics than anything the rest of the band are doing. They're doing their bit of course, but the memorable parts of the songs are the vocals. Realistically, the remainder of the album doesn't stand out itself, but becomes more of a conglomerate of the whole. "Atomic Punk" allows Eddie to become creative on guitar, which dominates the song. These songs all have that atypical early Van Halen sound, guitar and drum oriented with Dave's story-telling vocals being complemented by the harmonies of Michael and Eddie, but are not ground-breaking material or standout tunes. Eddie's solo is the highlight of "Feel Your Love Tonight". "Little Dreamer" is more introspective with a slower pace and feel to it that the hard rock songs of the first half of the album. The cover of John Brim's "Ice Cream Man" seems all out of place, but was obviously a band favourite - and the blues is not really my thing either. The album comes to a close with "On Fire", which is back to the pace and rock that you expect from the band, and completes this debut opus with a bit of heart.

Van Halen has never been a band to be pigeon-holed, and the album Van Halen is of the same stuff. There is a mixture of everything here, though it all has what can now be categorised as a Van Halen sound to it. Some of it still holds up brilliantly, some of it can probably be best papered over. It is still a good listen if you go from start to finish, but picking out selected songs to play may have you questioning their worth in the greater scheme of things. There is certainly no doubt that it was a groundbreaker when it was released, and that it still has its place all these years later.

587. Van Halen / A Different Kind Of Truth. 2012. 3.5/5

It's a tough gig as a fan when you wait 14 years for a band to release a new album. Especially when the last album they DID release just didn't work, and the new album brings back a long-lost member of the family. And to be honest, Van Halen was really on a hiding to nothing. Bringing Diamond Dave back into the fold was probably their last resort, given the (somewhat unfair) backlash Gary Cherone received after Van Halen III crashed and burned. But could they make something together that not only was new and interesting that also wasn't so radical that it turned away their fan base?

It would appear that, in order to achieve this, much of the album contains material that was either written or originated in some form from their earliest incarnation from the late 1970's. Whether this was a deliberate ploy to ensure that they kept the feel of the original band intact in this new recording, or for some other reason, is not immediately obvious, but is not a bad ploy given the length of time between albums for the band (14 years) and with DLR (28 years).

I have found that the more I listened to the album initially, the more I enjoyed it. Even the lead song and single, "Tattoo", which I found boring and lacking in interest on its release, began to have me tapping along to it in subsequent spinning's of the CD. Not too much though, it is still a fairly average song. However, tracks such as "She's The Woman" and "China Town" and "Bullethead" and "As Is" compensate for the lacklustre tunes that surround them.

There's not a lot new about this album, but there are some refreshing moments. Roth is never really extended vocally here, but he still performs his job manfully, and his attitude still swanks through the album. What IS pleasing is that Eddie appears to have found his guitar again, and his characteristic licks at times explode out of the speakers like the days of yore. It's good to hear him back once again.

While none of the songs here will likely go on to become classics, it is probably enough that this album delivers no more or less than it promises. The fear was always that it could have been a massive disappointment after all the years of waiting. In the end, it's just nice to have the band back together, and producing an album that is more than listenable.

398. Van Halen / For Unlawful Carnal Knowledge. 1991. 3/5

By the time this was released, I was probably coming to the conclusion that Van Halen were finished. I mean, they had had a pretty fair run, and even following the departure of DLR they had produced a pretty good follow up with Sammy Hagar and 5150. But not much had come since, and to me the magic was sifting away.

Even when this came out, it didn't grab me like other albums had. Probably at the time I had other parts of the genre grabbing my attention. Still, it begins pretty solidly, "Poundcake" and "Judgement Day" are good solid songs that provided a good sart to the album. The problem for me from that point onward is that the rest of the album, while quite listenable and not awful, doesn't bring anything new to the mix. I think they had a chance to go out on a limb and return the band to its peak, if only Eddie was unleashed and allowed to really hammer on those strings again. For whatever reason it is, the thing that made Van Halen great is being restrained.

This is not a bad album, but it is one that is just above average. Putting it on and listening to it is not a chore. Expecting it to get repeat listens is probably expecting a bit too much.

Rating: More of the same from the Van Hagar era. 3/5

374. Van Halen / Fair Warning. 1981. 4/5

To be honest in some ways it is still a bit raw thinking about Van Halen now that the guitar god Eddie Van Halen left us permanently last year. I think it made casual listeners appreciate more fully how brilliant he was, and as a result just how good the band and their albums were as well. And having already had an album reach its 35 year anniversary this year, it was interesting to come into an album that reaches its 40th anniversary of release today, April 29, and not only hear the differences in the music between the two even though they are just five years apart, but of the general reaction of both albums.

I read a lot of reviews of Fair Warning coming in to do this, both fan reviews of people like me, and then journalists reviews from back in the day when the album was first released. And the reasoning behind that was that I just wasn’t sure if anyone else had the same reaction to the album as I did, and whether that was a good thing or a true indication of the general populous view of the album. Because, and my research tends to prove this, Fair Warning is an album that divides fan's opinion pretty much at 50/50 - and I’m talking huge fans of the band not just casual listeners who might only be interested in the popular songs or the big selling albums of the mid-1980's. In essence, it is an album where people think it is the greatest of the Van Halen discography... or one of the worst. Now, that seems like a difficult thing for an album to do, considering the vast array and number of releases that Van Halen managed in their career. And in some ways, perhaps it was the changing of the style of album that Van Halen have attempted here from their first three albums that has provided this range of opinions.

One phrase that is used heavily when it comes to reviews and descriptions of Fair Warning is “their darkest release”. Now, I understand that the first two albums came across as fun-loving, sunshine-filled anthems with bright guitar riffs and vocals and melodies that sounded like everyone was enjoying themselves, which no doubt was the case. And certainly some of the songs here seem more languid and dark-back-alley type of atmosphere than banging out bright hard rock. But “dark?!” “Sinister?!” I think some of this is a bit of a throwaway in order to describe away what some may think are lackluster songs than to actually call them out for that. I’m happy to do that for a couple of them. “Push Comes to Shove” is a change of scene for Van Halen, it’s almost a blues track being sung in a low key night club rather than a stage filled with noise and thousands of circling spotlights. I don’t hate the song, but it certainly doesn’t match up with what I see as a Van Halen classic track. And I’m happy to put my hand up for a similar observation with “Dirty Movies”. It also strides a similar path, one that has forked away from the usual path that Van Halen had trod. Dominated by the 16/4 rhythm of Alex Van Halen’s drumming and the thumping bass line of Michael Anthony, the sludgy pace and slightly monotonal vocals of David Lee Roth generally leaves me bored. Once again, I don’t hate the song, but it is different, it is a change, and you can see why lots of early fans of the band didn’t enjoy where these two songs in particular headed. But having opened with the excellent "Mean Street" the album then follows it up with another cracker, the harder faster rocker “Sinner’s Swing!”, which contains all of the best elements of Van Halen – hard hitting drums, great bass riffs, Dave’s duelling bright vocals and Eddie’s brilliant riffing guitar.

I wrote a review of this album about 14 years ago, and what I had written at the time didn’t marry up with what I think of the album now. Some of it was still true, but for the most part I had taken a rather negative view of most of the album, apart from probably three songs. It was interesting, because during that time I was heavily invested in listening to European power and speed metal, something a long long way from what Fair Warning is offering up, and I don’t have any doubt that this clouded my opinion as I wrote it then. What I have said here earlier was at the forefront of that, and also with “Sunday Afternoon in the Park” which has never really done much for me. And reading that review made me understand why there were some absolutely hammering reviews of this album that I read in my research. But I think a lot of that is misplaced, as was my own opinion all those years ago. I didn’t listen to this album until well after its release, a few years into the Sammy Hagar era I suspect, and at that time the only song I really cared for is "Unchained". Eventually I got the album and actually gave it a decent listen, and my memories of that is that I thought it was fantastic, which only made my review later on strange even to myself. And while the first single from the album, “So This Is Love?” might seem a bit predictable and completely the opposite of the reaction to some of the albums so called darkness, it was always part of the love I had for the album as a whole.

So what do I really think about the album? Honestly, I think I’m an idiot for whatever I was thinking back in 2006 or whenever it was that I penned that previous review. No doubt I was listening to a lot of stuff that wasn’t related to this at all.
Because, quite simply, this contains all of the great elements of Van Halen. I thoroughly enjoy Alex’s drumming on this album, he is synched into the groove and his drum sound is just perfect, and uses every form of timing at some stage during the album. I’m not sure his drumming ever sounded better than it does here. Michael’s bass thumps through the speakers, and his backing vocals are as ever such a massive part of the band’s sound. Dave's vocals are as sensational as ever, and Eddie is just Eddie.
Not every song on here is a winner, and that’s okay because that’s the case with about 95% of all albums ever recorded. And perhaps the greatness of the good tracks is what weighs so heavily on the couple of tracks that are not quite up to that standard. I don’t know. But 40 years on, this album still rocks the house, and holds its place – in MY opinion – as one of the best the band released. And the major reason for that? It’s because of the song that will, in my opinion, always be arguably Van Halen’s best song, with the opening guitar riff that still send shivers down my spine each and every time I hear it.

Rating: "Maybe enough ain't enough for you..." 4/5

(Updated April 2021)

239. Van Halen / Diver Down. 1982. 1.5/5.

Van Halen’s popularity had been booming for a number of years prior to 1981, when they released their album “Fair Warning”, one which you can find an episode of this podcast on in Series 1. The tour following that had been extensive, and following it, the band had been looking to gain some down time, before they began again and looked to record a new album. As I mentioned in the intro, in the days where albums still sold enough to be a main form of income, record companies were looking for more releases rather than an extended time between albums being recorded. So what the band did instead, in order to buy themselves more time was to record a cover song as a single to release as new music. Though David Lee Roth had suggested doing a cover of the song “Dancing in the Streets”, it was eventually decided to do a version of “(Oh) Pretty Woman”, the Roy Orbison song. The problem was, it began to move up the charts, and with that success, there were even more demands from their record company to get a new album out. Pushed into a corner, the band relented, and moved into the studio.
Was there a deliberate ploy to involve cover songs on the album? Was it a way of filling an album and getting it out as quickly as possible? Or did the band truly think this was where they were at in their career and that this was a ‘bold’ move? To be honest, I don’t know the answers to those questions, but given the album that “Diver Down” is, they are questions that are worth asking and mulling over.

I guess, for me, I need to split this album into the two halves that it comes in – the original tracks that appear on the album, and the cover songs that take up the remainder of the album. So let’s look at those cover songs first. And in all there are five of them. And all five are mostly well known tracks from their original forms, or from further more popular cover versions that were created form them. The opening track is “Where Have All the Good Times Gone” which was originally recorded by The Kinks. And it opens the album fine. Would I have expected a harder edge on the song? Perhaps. Was the band trying to do a fairly close cover of the song, and just adding a bit of Van Halen to it to create a point of difference? My guess is yes.
The second cover is of “(Oh) Pretty Woman”, which was also the single released before the album. The band wrote an instrumental intro piece that led into the song, on the album called “Intruder” which actually acts as a nice lead in. Once again though, perhaps I expected more guitar influence to come into the track, expecting Eddie to flail. Don’t get me wrong, his guitaring here is terrific, but I guess I expected, and expect, more from it. Side 2 opens with “Dancing in the Street” which really sticks to the same tempo of the original. It’s interesting that the Mick Jagger/David Bowie version that came out a couple of years later was far more upbeat and rocking that this version. I’ve never really understood that. If you are going to do cover songs, why just recreate them without a bit of artistic licence? Again, Dave sings it well, the band plays it well, but would my life be different if I hadn't heard it?
THEN we have a song called “Big Bad Bill (Is Sweet William Now), from all accounts a song Dave found on an obscure radio station, recorded it and played it to the band, who laughed and said ‘let’s do it!’ If nothing else, at least you get to hear Alex and Eddie’s father Jan play clarinet on the track – Jan was apparently a very accomplished player in his day. But apart from the novelty of that, it’s just not what I want to hear. And yes, Dave especially is always very eclectic in his music, his solo career has shown that, but isn’t this just a step too far? Fan-wise, this isn’t for me. And nor is the album closer, “Happy Trails”.

Beyond that, the original Van Halen material for the album fluctuates. “Hang ‘em High” had apparently been floating around for awhile, and was reworked to fit into the album, and it does fit in snugly after the opening track. “Cathedral” is an instrumental piece Eddie had apparently written more than a year before, and had played it on stage a bit, and he wanted it to have its place on vinyl. “Secrets” is a slower lounge club song of the style Dave seems to enjoy. “Little Guitars” has a great feel to it, mixing Eddie’s styles of guitar riff over Michael Anthony’s great bass sound. It’s almost like early Police in sections, it’s a good one. And “The Full Bug” sees the real Van Halen return, with DLR squeal and Eddie’s guitar on fire, the chorus back up of Michael and Eddie backing Dave’s vocals, and Alex’s solid hard core drum beat.
In summation of the original songs here, more than anything, these songs sound like Van Halen. They are played at a clip, the vocals don’t sound forced, and Eddie plays his guitar like he wants to, putting it his pieces like they fit rather than integrated within a framework.

My discovery of Van Halen came from the “1984” album and beyond, and it was several years before I really began to research and discover the albums that were released prior to it. And despite some reservations about certain parts of certain albums I enjoy all of them.
But I can assure you that when I first heard this album, I was... appalled? I guess? It completely took me by surprise. And you know, it’s not that Van Halen hadn’t performed cover songs before. “You Really Got Me” came right off that first album, so cover songs are not a surprise. But the ones they chose to do here, and in the style they did? That really harmed the way I saw this album for a very long time. And certainly once I started asking around about what other people thought of the album, it surprised me as well. I can’t believe this album spent something like 65 weeks in the US charts, I really can’t. And there have been polls and articles written ranking this as one of the great guitar albums, and I can’t wrap my head around that either.
So yes, my first impressions of this album was that it was dogshit. I didn’t like it, It pretty much either bored me or just plain didn’t interest me. And although that was a few years ago, I still feel that at the time it was accurate. Have things changed over the years? A little bit I guess. I have enjoyed the album (for the most part) over the last couple of weeks. I still enjoy the opening tracks, I love “Intruder” and the way it acts as the segue into “(Oh) Pretty Woman”. And I still love “The Full Bug”. Overall, I have enjoyed “Diver Down” a hell of a lot more over this period of recollection and reminiscing than I have ever done so previous to this. So I guess I don’t HATE this album anymore. I certainly seriously dislike some of the tracks, but I guess I can stand to live with that. Perhaps I’m just getting old.

120. Van Halen / The Best Of Van Halen, Volume 1. 1996. 4/5.

There is no argument from me that Van Halen are a great band, and that early on they were one of the front runners when it came to guitar bands. Hundreds of bands that have made it since can than k Van Halen for their influence upon the scene.
To me, however, I still think they were a little bit hit and miss. They had some great stuff, but they also had some stuff that still makes me sit there and think “What the hell were they thinking there?!”

This Best Of is a bit like that as well. There are some brilliant songs on here, from both the DLR era (Ain't Talking 'Bout Love, Unchained, Jump, Panama) and the Hagar era (Dreams, Why Can't This Be Love, Can't Stop Loving You), but others are just lukewarm offerings.
They were also very optomistic with the title. Only VHIII was released following this, and that has been 10 years now since this came out...

Rating : Great tunes from a great band, but not the best they could offer. 4/5.

96. Van Halen / Balance. 1995. 3/5.

The end of the 1980’s had seen Van Halen storm the charts with their albums “5150” and “OU812”, along with singles that populated the top ten in the US and around the world. The arrival of Sammy Hagar saw the band move away from their hard rock roots into combining this sound with a more commercial rock sound that included Hagar’s soaring vocals with a more influential part taking by the keyboard and synths that Eddie Van Halen was experimenting in, which suited the musical style of the late 1980’s. As the calendar turned over into the 1990’s they released their third album with Hagar titled “For Unlawful Carnal Knowledge”, one that won the 1992 Grammy Award for Best Hard Rock Performance and pushed their profile higher. On the tour to support that album the band recorded two shows in Fresno, California, which they then released as their first live album titled “Live: Right Here, Right Now”. Career wise, everything seemed to be tracking nicely.
On the inside however, moods were swinging wildly. For a start, the Van Halen brothers were in a world of hurt. Eddie was suffering with a hip injury as a result of avascular necrosis, the death of bone tissue due to an interrupted blood supply, while Alex was suffering from ruptured vertebrae around his neck. Neither of these injuries made for comfortable playing of instruments. Eddie had also newfound sobriety, something not always easy for the person involved or those around them to deal with. Amongst this, the internal struggles and conflicts between band manager Ray Danniels, Sammy Hagar and the other band members were reaching a boiling point. Mixing all of this in together created a combustible atmosphere that plagued the band through the recording of the album over the three months from June to September of 1994, mostly tucked away in Eddie’s home at 5150 Studios, finally coming together to be released in January of 1995.

There are fans out there who have said quite openly that they feel Van Halen as a band was unchanged in their musical output in the 1990’s despite the direction that music headed during the first half of the decade. The more you listen to this album today, compared to having listened to it back on its release, it’s hard to stick with that point of view. There is a definite merging of the sound that Van Hagar had adapted to over their first three albums together, and the sonics that was bounding around them when they were writing and recording this album. Not so much as a grunge morphing, but a settling of the tempo of the band back to a slower, more thoughtful tone. The wider scope of songs, their style and involvement, is also a changing factor. How often would you actually choose to go in to listening to a Van Halen album that didn’t actually contain many riffs and solos from the guitar of Eddie Van Halen? Not often, right? Well, my guess is this is why “Balance” doesn’t always come up on ‘must listen to‘ albums lists.
The opening of the albums offers up a bit of everything. The opening track “The Seventh Seal” combines a lot of different factors, including both early 1970’s guitar sounds and a melody through the middle such as progressive rock bands of the late 70’s and early 80’s were fond of. It offers up an interesting riff progression from Eddie that is unlike anything the band had tried before. Despite its unusual feel it is one that I enjoy. This is followed by the mid-80's styled and themed rock ballad of “Can’t Stop Lovin’ You”, one that could easily be imagined as having been written for the “5150” album. It stands out here because it is so different from what has been offered up as the opening track. And the next track! Because then comes “Don’t Tell Me (What Love Can Do)”, which focuses again on a very 1970’s rock them both in guitar style from Eddie and vocal style from Sammy, a lower, steadier, dreamlike fashion. Eddie’s slide solo through the end is mystic in origin, and Sammy's vocals hard and to the point. Like the opening track this is unlike what you would generally class a Van Halen song but is no less intriguing or enjoyable as a result.
“Amsterdam” has a riff that dates back to the mid-80's, an idea stored for later use, with lyrics that in a retrospective interview Eddie claimed to hate as they dealt with smoking pot, without being used as an innuendo. As with “Can't Stop Lovin’ You”, it is easy to hear the 1980’s influence in the track itself. “Big Fat Money” jumps out of the gates at an increased tempo, bounding along with hard core tempo from Alex Van Halen on drums and Michael Anthony on bass leading the way and some honky tonk rock and roll piano headlining the back end of the track. “Strung Out” is a minute and thirty seconds of something Eddie recorded years ago on a piano at Marvin Hamlisch’s beach house that he rented. For some reason he threw a whole heap of stuff into this piano to see what sounds it would make and then began playing the strings like a guitar. Honestly, it is a completely unnecessary track, reminding me of things that Black Sabbath used to put on as intervals on their albums in the 1970’s.
Following this unnecessary track is what I would deem to be yet another unnecessary track. The rock ballad “Not Enough” is a join-the-dots, colour-by-numbers rendition of this genre of song. Yes, piano. Yes, searching vocals over the top of the piano. Yes, the heartfelt vocal rendition of bridge and chorus. And yes, mournful ballad guitar solo played to inch by sickening inch perfection. It was of course the fourth and final single released from the album, and it is still as painfully awful as the day this album was released. This was a major error. Awful.
And yet, following comes “Aftershock” which competes for best song on the album. Though the guitar is still puzzlingly muted for the most part through the song, Sammy’s vocals are excellent. Eddie’s solo sections come through loud and clear, but his guitar is mixed way down for the rest. It’s a strange decision from acclaimed producer Bruce Fairbairn to have it play out this way. But then, surely the Van Halen’s would have had a say in it as well.
“Doin’ Time” is basically a one minute forty drum and percussion solo that acts as an intro to “Baluchitherium”, which is an instrumental that came about through design, though that design was actually for a normal song. The original plan was for it to have vocals, but in the studio there didn’t seem to be a lot of love for the track. After some tweaking, it was felt that it did have something to offer, but just as it was rather than trying to make it something it wasn’t. It’s okay!
“Take Me Back (Deja Vu)” features a guitar riff that had originally come from a song called “No More Waiting”, whih had on occasions been played by the band live prior to releasing their debut album. Recycled and resurrected here, incorporating acoustic slide and steel string guitar, it has a 70’s Nashville feel to the song. Again, it feels out of place for a Van Halen album, though perhaps not as out of place on this album as it should. The album concludes with “Feelin’”, a six-minute-long adventure that channels the spirit of what has come before, completing an album where little has remained as it once was, but for seemingly different reasons than what was occurring around the band at that time.

Van Halen is a band that I cottoned onto reasonably late in the piece, although it was probably the same as a lot of Australians did, on the “1984” album. I was then embroiled in the famous Roth/Hagar stand-off in the mid-80's when many suggested you had to be on one side or the other. I chose... both sides and followed both Diamond Dave’s solo career and Van Halen with Sammy at the helm, enjoying both similarly. Both had their positives and negatives, but I still listened to them.
By the time this album came to be released, I wasn’t sure what to expect. The 1990’s had killed off a lot of great bands form the 1980’s or had forced many of them to change their course, none of which really worked anyway. I had had mixed reactions to the band’s previous album, “For Unlawful Carnal Knowledge”, and given this was another three years down the track I was unsure of what to expect from “Balance”, and whether Van Halen could regain a bit of their original pomp and ceremony than what the direction had been that they were headed. And I was right to be unsure, because initial listens to this album failed to calm those reservations.
I mentioned earlier in this episode that it seems inconceivable that you would come to listen to a Van Halen album on which Eddie’s guitar was relegated to an inferior position within the songs and structure of that album, but that is exactly what I think of “Balance”. There is far less of his exuberance and mastery on his instrument on this album. And what there is, there is not enough of, or it has been toned down in the mix or the writing to become a secondary element. There are places where it comes to the fore, but before you know it, it has been sent back to the dungeon until the next time the sun rises.
Beyond this, the songs are reasonable. Having had this on for the past two days to prepare for this episode, and to truly recall what I think about it, I have still found some worthwhile attributes. When the album was released, I know I felt that this just wasn’t what I was looking for. Life in 1995 was about to explode in my face, and this was so dreary that I didn’t need it, given the dark veil hanging over me like a black cloud at the time. On reflection again over recent days, I find that songs such as “The Seventh Seal”, “Don’t Tell Me (What Love Can Do)”, “Aftershock” and the instrumental “Baluchitherium”, while not from the classic vaults of Van Halen, are still worth listening to. Others, such as the truly dreadful “Not Enough”, should be stricken from the record forever. Pun intended.
Of the 12 Van Halen studio albums that the band released during their career, for me I rank this as #10. Perhaps that is not a surprise. To be honest I believe most would have it that low on their lists if they really thought about it.
This was the final album of that second lineup of the band. With the differences in opinion between Hagar and the Van Halen brothers, they parted company after this tour. There was still life in the band, though the next album was to divide opinion of the fans even more than this album did. Which, at the time, appeared impossible.

13. Van Halen / 5150. 1986. 3.5/5

There is an exchange in the movie Airheads that has Chazz asking Harold Ramis’s character “Whose side did you take in the big David Lee Roth/Van Halen split?”, and when he eventually answers “Van Halen” Joe Mantegna’s character immediately replies “He’s a cop”. Even though this movie was released a decade after the events it references, it was still a touchy subject and hot topic. Who made the better music – Van Halen fronted by David Lee Roth or Van Halen fronted by Sammy Hagar? As a teenager at the time, I can tell you the fight was real, and whichever side you took you would find yourself in an argument with someone. After the commercial success of 1984 and DLR’s departure, was there any hope for the next album, which happened to be 5150?

When this album came out, there was a bit of the residual shying away from allowing this album to be good to my ears. It would be traitorous to let myself actually enjoy this album, as a protest to DLR moving on from the group. Still, it didn’t take much for me to be won over to the dark side for a time. In essence, about three or four listens to the first side of this album was enough to convince me that the ship could continue on its course. And, all hysteria aside over the vocalist, why wouldn’t it continue? The rest of the crew was exactly as it had been through those first six albums, and surely they would be the posse that led the charge. And Hagar could sing, which on the first side of this album he showed with gusto. The opening stanza of “Good Enough” is a solid opening track, incorporating enough of the good vibe Van Halen sound to keep the optimism high. This is followed by the big selling single “Why Can’t This Be Love?”. The energetic “Get Up” is then overwhelmed by the high quality second single “Dreams”. In all of these tracks, the further infusion of keyboards and synths into the music is an attribute that slightly confused at the time, though perhaps not so much all these years later. It was the age of synths, and Eddie has a passion for the instrument as well. It’s just that most fans wanted to hear him playing the guitar rather than the keyboards, and these songs – especially the two singles – had him contributing a lot of one and only a slice of the other. The opening side was finished off by “Summer Nights” which always sounds as though it should have been performed by DLR.
The second side of the album falls apart a little bit. “Best of Both Worlds” is a reasonable song, though a bit standard tracked and without a lot of energy which could have been added. This becomes irrelevant as the dud ballad “Love Walks In” comes on. Seriously, Van Halen playing a true soft rock ballad? I still don’t think I’ve forgiven them for this. Sure there may have been songs in the past that have skidded close, but nothing on this scale. “5150” is a better rock track, living up to the more noticeable ideals of the band, while “Inside” is fine for what it is.

In the long run, I think this album probably highlighted its ideals better when it was released than it does now. And it probably never provided an answer to that burning question over the better prospects of Hagar or Roth. When running a rule over both 1984 and 5150 they seem to be on a similar path, one that has forked away from the guitar heavy earlier albums. Whichever man was helming the vocals for 5150 you would expect a similar result from the album. The music was changing, and while my feelings over the album haven’t changed since its release, that change is still obvious.

Rating:   “It’s got what it takes…”  3.5/5

5. Van Halen / 1984. 1984. 3.5/5.

It is strange to recollect now that at a time that Van Halen reached the peak of their popularity in the commercial market, they also reached the end of their first chapter. Through all of the battles and visions of grandeur and so forth, 1984 was headed for a road works sign ahead. The album is dominated by the three singles lifted from it, the real fusion of synth that inflicts itself upon some of the tracks as a constant reminder that it was released in the mid-1980's, and the spandex on the music videos that propelled the album's success.
As was related in the episode in Season 2 of this podcast which reviewed the band’s previous album “Diver Down”, the band had wanted to take a break from recording and touring at that time, but the success of the single had the record company pushing for anew album. As such, that break finally came following the tour for that album. It was also following that album that Eddie Van Halen was unhappy by the concessions he had made to both lead vocalist David Lee Roth and producer Ted Templeman, who had both discouraged Eddie from making keyboards a prominent instrument in the band's music. At this time Eddie was building his own studio, and as parts were being installed Eddie began to experiment on his synthesiser. What resulted was Eddie writing and composing much of what eventually became “1984” without the inferred different direction of Roth and Templemann. It was just himself on synth with no one else around, which is why he finally got his way. And so this is how the album was created, the combination of tracks based around keyboards-heavy influence, and the typical guitar driven tracks that the band had been renown for up to this point in time. And while most of the band’s writing and recording for previous albums had been done in a matter of weeks, the fact that this album had several months spent on it shows just how serious the band (or at least some of them) were about bringing a new desire to the band than had been the case up until that fabled year of 1984.

The synth instrumental opening of “1984” immediately informs you of what to expect here – whatever the last couple of albums have been like, and whatever they may have sounded like, this album is going to be a whole new chapter. Listening to it now is like jumping into a time machine, it is so tied to the time and the decade that even if you didn’t know the band or album, you know exactly when it was written and recorded. The straight segue into the true opening track “Jump” matches it perfectly, and listening to the album again today prior to recording this episode, it hit me once again what a perfect match it is, and just how ‘80’s’ this album can be. And yes, everyone in the world knows “Jump”, but have you ever really listened to the transfer between synth and guitar on the track? It’s one or the other, and not both, and it really is a terrifically written track. The story goes that Eddie had the synth riff for up to three years prior to this album, but Roth had refused to write lyrics to it before Eddie pushed the button on this album. Yes, it is a massive change and progression from Van Halen’s sound before this album, but the difference with “Jump” is the combination of Eddie’s burgeoning love for the synthesizer and his still amazing ability on the guitar. So while the synth and keys dominate the track as a whole, the interjection of the lead guitar still stakes a claim on the song, alongside the jaunty vocals of David Lee Roth and the jutting bass line from Michael Anthony. "Jump" has of course stood the test of time, still riding high in rock playlists forty years on. "Panama" is a great follow up, and in many respects I still enjoy more, perhaps solely because Eddie's guitar returns to a more prominent position in this song. This is pure Van Halen, a great opening riff, Roth’s seedy vocals sliding throughout the song, Alex’s great drumming throughout and Anthony’s bass guitar and supporting vocals just as important. The opening two tracks showcase the future and the past of the band perfectly, and are arguably the best of both in that respect.
"Top Jimmy" and "Drop Dead Legs" are typical Van Halen songs, both jauntily pushed along by Alex's drumbeat and Michael Anthony's bass. Ed's guitaring here is also closer to his classic stuff. Indeed, having gotten through the first side of the album, it is hard to remember why there was there was any problem from the old fans about the invasion of keyboards on this album, because those three songs in a row are great Van Halen songs with the vocals and rhythm and Eddie guitar that everyone had known and loved to this point of the band’s catalogue.
Lower the needle onto the second side of the vinyl, and you get the song that not only inspired more guitarists in that year than any other, and also more views of the video that accompanied the song than any other. The opening drumbeat into Eddie’s iconic guitar solo riff opening is still as wonderful as it was back when the album was released. Dave then takes over the song in his best style, the way he always commanded the attention in Van Halen’s best songs. "Hot For Teacher" got plenty of repeat business on MTV and the like for its video clip, and it is the energy provided throughout that makes this song as popular as it was. To be honest, it lifts what could have been an average song into a much better version of itself.
The follow up "I'll Wait" bring a return of the synth, and much like the opening instrumental, what it does now 40 years later is fully remind you of when this was recorded, because it sounds like all of the pop songs that were on the radio in those days. It could be by any of the bands in those days, and though there is a little of Eddie’s guitar in the middle, it is basically that synth that dominates throughout, and is the stark difference between the other songs up to this point in time on the album. I can’t say it is a favourite of mine. "Girl Gone Bad" is the equal of those songs in the middle of the album, the solid typical Van Halen tracks that they have always done well, with another great Eddie solo being a highlight. The album closer "House of Pain" has its moments without being overly memorable, and in many ways is a slight disappointment as a way of finishing off what has come before it.

Those of us in our teenage years when this was released cannot help but remember it, most especially the success of the first single “Jump”. It was plastered all over the radio airwaves for months, and for me still brings back specific memories of things I was doing at that stage of my life. And the album as a whole does similar things, though for me that wasn’t until probably a year after its initial release.
I did have a copy of this album taped for me on cassette and it got regular playing, but I guess it wasn’t something I obsessed over. As it turns out, I listened to it more in the years when Van Halen was on a hiatus than any other time. And a lot of that was in the memories it brought back rather than a desire to relive the album for itself.
Looking back now, and having had the album on a bit over the last couple of weeks, I have discovered more from it than I probably have at any other time. And a lot of that is to do with reminiscing on a long past age. But for me there three distinct areas of the album. The obvious synth tracks, and the obvious guitar tracks. And one other, the best song by far on the album, the one that typifies what was brilliant about the band – the wonderful drumming of Alex Van Halen, the long underrated bass work of Michael Anthony, the real hard rock guitar of Eddie, and Dave’s outstanding vocals. It is the song that will close this episode out. I do think I like this album more now than I have at any other stage of my life.
This was of course the last album with the original foursome, and the time when the split in the fandom came with that separation. David Lee Roth's departure from the group after this album brought a small amount of success for both himself and his solo career, and the remainder of the group with new front man Sammy Hagar. It was a changing of eras, and this album signified it as such. From the hard rock guitar band of the late 70's and early 80's, this album with its first major beginnings of synth oriented rock paved the way for bands like Bon Jovi and Europe to make their own mark on the industry. It signified a change in the way Van Halen wrote their music for the rest of their career, and for many it was the point where they stopped listening to Van Halen. I never had those conniptions. Indeed there were parts of both I enjoyed going forward and parts of both I didn’t. If nothing else, this album has two songs that I still listen to today, sing along to, play air guitar along to, and that are an implanted part of my musical upbringing. And I wouldn’t have it any other way.