Hagar and Van Halen just don't have a chemistry that interests me.
Roth took a powder in 1985. Hagar signed on with Van Halen. Have no qualms about Hagar doing so. Wasn't like Ed and Al were gonna fold up the tent and pack it in after Dave split. Have some problems with them keeping the name Van Halen, because what CVH and what Van Hagar each represent is dissimilar enough to warrant such a change. Kinda smacks of a combination of surface ego and inner cowardice on the part of the brothers and Hagar: they want to imply that Roth was expendable, Ed is the center of the group and nothing has changed, but they also got the benefit of keeping a brand name. A certain amount of the initial Van Hagar sales were brought in on band name recognition alone. By doing so, they invited comparisons between the lineups.
Someone earlier mentioned we should be glad Van Hagar went on tour last year rather than Ed and Al having retired. Well, for many of us here, Van Halen without Dave just didn't cut it. Just the way it goes. Someone's able to dig Van Halen regardless of who is fronting the band, whatever. Guess that person has a wider range of stuff put out under the name Van Halen to listen to. Never dismissed Van Halen after Roth left until I heard what the band was doing with Hagar; not my bag. Didn't do it for me. Subsequently, ain't gonna make any difference to me if Van Hagar went out on the road last year playing a bunch of tunes I didn't give a shit about in the first place. That's nothing to be grateful for in my book. Neither is hearing Hagar doing classic stuff. The guy puts no effort into it, it's apparent he'd just as soon not do any of it, probably because the classic material always gets the loudest response in Van Hagar shows, going back to the 5150 tour.
15 minute EVH guitar solo? Sorry. Been there, seen it in 1984, and it was overlong even back then, and I play the same instrument he does.
Finally, the Van Halens own attitude to their own back catalog spills over to their classic fanbase. They fail to realize that what they did with Roth meant a lot to a lot of people, hence the "wet dreams" so many of us here have about those guys getting back together again. It's a real "fuck you if you don't like what we're doing without Dave" approach that rounded up a lot of ill will, which eventually began to boomerang back on them.
Hagar bashing Roth while becoming an overmerchandised self-promotion to middle-of-the-road 'rock and roll' tedium is more comical than anything else. Mike Anthony is as close to irrelevant as anyone who passed through Van Halen could be, and the brothers just don't get it; they're no longer special. Van Halen went the way of Aerosmith for me a long time ago - softened former hard rock icons who like to play it safe while alluding to the days when they set the world on fire. Too much emphasis on top-forty singles airplay and half-assed self-parodying of their own former hard-edged glory.
Got no use for Van Halen other than a Zep-style live classic DVD, and that lack of use extends to the band getting back together with Dave.
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