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Good Evening All.
First Roth Army Kiwi To See Van Halen Live 6/16/2012 Phoenix Arizona.Comment
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MusicWinnipeg Free Press - ONLINE EDITION
Aging rockers Van Halen can still bring it
By: Staff Writer
Posted: 05/13/2012 11:01 PM | Comments: 14 (including replies)
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Eddie Van Halen (left) and David Lee Roth perform with aging rock band Van Halen at the MTS Centre Sunday night. (DAN HARPER PHOTO)
David Lee Roth may not be able to jump like he used to, but he’s still got some moves.
These days the Van Halen frontman favours the shimmy, shake, slide and spin instead of the above-the-head kicks and air splits he was famous for in his younger days, although he still pulled off a few leaps and kicks during the band’s stop at the MTS Centre on Sunday night.
He is 57 after all, so that’s to be expected, as was his flashy outfit that looked like he picked it up at Liberace’s garage sale: a sparkly blue and red jacket, leather pants, a black vest and satin blue shirt. And he never failed to deliver a whole lot of head-scratching and/or hilarious quotes that seemed to come from a part of his brain far away from the 30-odd years of lyrics rattling around in there.
Some examples:
❚ "We're going to hell in a bowl full of cherries."
❚ While talking about a drum beat that sounded like an old beer commercial he suddenly ended the conversation with: "No metaphysics before happy hour. I'll probably lie to you again before the evening is over."
❚ "I made a sex tape in 1982 and I was a 1982 sexy mother (lover)."
❚ While talking to a fan in the crowd: "I might be your Goddamn father. You look familiar."
❚ During a cover of Roy Orbison's Oh, Pretty Woman he stopped the song and gave a fan grief for throwing something on stage. "Wait a minute, wait a minute. Don't throw your garbage up on stage; throw your girlfriend up, (bad word insult)."
Oh yeah, he's still full of spunk and both he and the veteran California band were in fine form for a crowd of about 8,000. Official attendance wasn't released for the show, but the arena was set up in its full configuration and there were plenty of unused seats. With a top ticket price of $165, Van Halen might have overestimated their value in today's market.
The money wasn't spent on production. The simple setup included only a large video screen behind the band showing black and white images of the action on stage, replays of that action (you could see Roth pretending his fingers were guns twice), still photos and the band's logo. There were some steps leading up to a drum riser and bass amps, but as far as arena rock spectacles go, this ranked low on the spectacle scale.
Not that it really mattered in the end, since it was hard-rock nostalgia we were there for and hard-rock nostalgia we got.
Reviews of the tour have been mixed, but Winnipeg appears to have caught the band on a good night with Roth and the Van Halens — guitarist Eddie, drummer Alex and bassist Wolfgang (who replaced original member Michael Anthony in 2006) — offering up 22 tracks and two solos in nearly two hours.
Eddie is known for his "brown sound," but everything about his style Sunday was colourful, from the recognizable riffs and the speedy solos to his whammy bar dive bombs and his legendary tapping. He smiled through much of the night and was in fine form while harmonizing with his son Wolfgang and Roth.
The band is touring on the new release, A Different Kind of Truth, and offered up four tracks from it, but otherwise the material focused on the albums recorded with Roth from 1978-84.
The band took the stage and launched into Unchained off Fair Warning before revisiting their 1978 self-titled debut with Runnin' With the Devil. Other early highlights included Everybody Wants Some!! and Somebody Get Me a Doctor.
Things started lagging in the energy department about 40 minutes in with the new China Town, Oh, Pretty Woman, a drum solo and the Kinks' You Really Got Me, but things picked up again with Dance the Night Away, I'll Wait and Hot for Teacher, which had Roth working up a huge sweat while dancing around the stage.
In one of the show's strangest bits, Roth stood alone on stage plucking an acoustic guitar while talking about his sheep-herding dogs while videos of them played behind him.
"I love dogs! Is anybody with me here?" he asked before introducing everyone to his pets — including one from Manitoba — and talking about his hobby and his vehicles.
"I own three pickup trucks. There are no other cars in the garage."
The story led into a full-throttle version of Ice Cream Man followed by the party anthem Panama before Eddie was left alone for his nearly 10-minute solo and the guitar god showed he is still a master by playing clean, distorted, making weird noises by messing with the volume knob, tapping and climaxing with Eruption, arguably one of the best known guitar solos in rock 'n' roll.
The strong finish concluded with Ain't Talking 'Bout Love and Jump. During the final song Roth didn't do any jumping, but spun a microphone stand around like a baton before confetti shot into the air.
In an odd bit of counter-programming, Kool & the Gang were hand-picked by Roth to open the show and treated a sparse crowd to a 50-minute set of funk, R&B, disco and pop.
The 10-piece group has been together in various incarnations since the mid 1960s and are still led by brothers Robert "Kool" Bell on bass and Ronald Bell on saxophone. It took about half the set for the crowd to get into it, but the people who were there were treated to a tight, energetic set by a hard-working band that played nothing but hits, including Hollywood Swinging, Jungle Boogie, Get Down On It, Ladies Night and the wedding/social staple Celebration, which had some people dancing in their seats and singing along.
rob.williams@freepress.mb.casigpicRoth Army CanadaComment
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DTNA
Stay Frosty!
THE DAY IS DONZO LET'S HAVE SOME FUNZO!!Comment
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Can't find a way to copy/paste tweets on tapatalk but....there's a tweet about some girl going up onstage and kissing Dave. I want to know more about this!
Sent from my BlackBerry 8520 using Tapatalk"Ya know what they say about angels... An angel is a supernatural being or spirit, usually humanoid in form, found in various religions and mythologies. Plus Roth fan boards..."- ZahZoo April 2013
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Set List:
Unchained
Runnin’ With the Devil
She’s the Woman
The Full Bug
Tattoo
Everybody Wants Some!!
Somebody Get Me a Doctor
China Town
Hear About It Later
Oh, Pretty Woman
Drum Solo
You Really Got Me
The Trouble with Never
Dance the Night Away
I’ll Wait
Hot for Teacher
Women in Love
Outta Love Again
Beautiful Girls
Ice Cream Man
Panama
Guitar Solo
Ain’t Talkin’ ’Bout Love
Encore:
JumpsigpicRoth Army CanadaComment
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http://vhfrance.activebb.net/ (1 er Site Francophone sur Van Halen)
http://www.youtube.com/user/VHFranceVideos (Our new Channel)Comment
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I don't think "Jump" should be listed as an encore. It's not a fucking encore unless they walk off the stage and the crowd cheers enough to make them come back....I miss the old days..."Ya know what they say about angels... An angel is a supernatural being or spirit, usually humanoid in form, found in various religions and mythologies. Plus Roth fan boards..."- ZahZoo April 2013Comment
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I agree that it's not really an encore unless everything goes dark and you have to cheer, etc. However, that kind of stuff is just going through the motions for the large bands--they're going to come back on stage regardless of what the audience does, it's all mapped out. To me a true encore is something that's not on the official setlist, and the band makes an unplanned entrance back on stage and almost HAS to play something due to the audience's demand.Comment
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The true definition of a Van Halen encore was Eddie coming out playing "Growth", then leading into either ATBL or YRGM....
Last edited by Va Beach VH Fan; 05-14-2012, 03:05 PM.Eat Us And Smile - The Originals
"I have a very belligerent enthusiasm or an enthusiastic belligerence. I’m an intellectual slut." - David Lee Roth
"We are part of the, not just the culture, but the geography. Van Halen music goes along with like fries with the burger." - David Lee RothComment
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Don't know how we missed this tweet:
"@nbays7: @shelbiabbott Saw #VanHalen live in #Winnipeg tonight. Wicked show, then Eddie went & blew my mind with his solo! Cum again? #moistpanties""Ya know what they say about angels... An angel is a supernatural being or spirit, usually humanoid in form, found in various religions and mythologies. Plus Roth fan boards..."- ZahZoo April 2013Comment
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Some really cool things about the show:
Dave and Ed were having a grand time during Alex's solo. They were with Wolf just to Al's right and laughing and having a blast it seemed.
It was pretty funny when the girl jumped onstage. Dave just stood there and waited for the girl to kiss him. The security was pretty late to come and when they did, they knew there was no threat and were quite gentle. Not sure how she got across the divide between the wall and the stage. I don't think you can jump that but maybe she climed over the first wall and then up onto the stage? not suresigpicRoth Army CanadaComment
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It was prety cool hearing the other setlist.
So that is show 3 for me (Thanks VA, Pojo, Sarge, et all) and I am just getting warmed up.
I think I said it was a 3 show minimum tour before it started...now it's 5!sigpicRoth Army CanadaComment
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