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Conseco Field-house, Indianapolis
Roth rejoins Van Halen, returns to Indiana...
By Ron Browning
October 15, 2007
For rock 'n' roll fans who came of age in the '80s, Sunday's Van Halen show at Conseco Field-house in Indianapolis was 22 years in the making.
Front man David Lee Roth, left, sings a cover of the Kinks’ “You Really Got Me”
as guitarist Eddie Van Halen electrifies the crowd during the opening song.
While the band had achieved more than its share of success after it parted ways with manic front man David Lee Roth in 1985, the days with Sammy Hagar and Gary Cherone on lead vocals never approached the chemistry and devil-may-care exuberance Van Halen produced in the late '70s and early '80s with Roth.
So when Diamond Dave belted out "Hey, I heard you missed us … we're back …" the classic line from 1984's "Hot For Teacher" took on added meaning and sparked an eruption from the crowd that had packed the Fieldhouse.
They were back. The band tore through an incendiary two-hour, 26-song set. Every album from the David Lee Roth-era was represented.
Roth was back in front, camping it up and coming on to every female in the first five rows. Virtuoso guitarist Eddie Van Halen was ripping out chest-thumping riffs and ear-searing solo runs. A giant video screen provided ample close ups of his revolutionary two-handed tapping technique.
The night was a homecoming of sorts. The Bloomington-born Roth became emotional while waxing nostalgic about his youth spent in New Castle. Roth was back home again in Indiana, and back in front of the band that had transformed metal from dour and demonic to fun and flashy nearly three decades earlier.
But this tour is not really a reunion. While Roth rejoins Eddie Van Halen and his brother, drummer Alex Van Halen, original bassist Michael Anthony is absent - casting his lot with Hagar. He is replaced by Eddie Van Halen's 16-year-old son, Wolfgang.
As Roth said, this is a "new Van Halen band - three quarters original, one quarter inevitable."
It's too much to ask for the teenaged Van Halen to match the skill of Anthony on bass, but he filled in admirably, handling the high harmonies throughout the night.
It's also too much to ask that the band look and sound just as it did in its prime. The three originals aren't the same people they were 22 years ago, and so Sunday's show didn't exactly transport you back to 1984. Alex looked his age. Eddie, while still a master of the fretboard, seemed as happy to be playing with his son as he was to be on stage in front of a packed arena. And Roth's patented spinning kicks and cock-of-the-walk strutting often seemed forced, as did his vocals on many numbers.
But Van Halen, particularly with David Lee Roth, is not as much about art as it is about fun, and the crowd had plenty of that. From the opening riff of "You Really Got Me," the Kinks cover off Van Halen's 1978 eponymous first album that opened Sunday's show, through the closing salvo on "Jump," from 1984, the crowd was on its feet, paying tribute to the lineup it thought it would never see again.
By Ron Browning
October 15, 2007
For rock 'n' roll fans who came of age in the '80s, Sunday's Van Halen show at Conseco Field-house in Indianapolis was 22 years in the making.
Front man David Lee Roth, left, sings a cover of the Kinks’ “You Really Got Me”
as guitarist Eddie Van Halen electrifies the crowd during the opening song.
While the band had achieved more than its share of success after it parted ways with manic front man David Lee Roth in 1985, the days with Sammy Hagar and Gary Cherone on lead vocals never approached the chemistry and devil-may-care exuberance Van Halen produced in the late '70s and early '80s with Roth.
So when Diamond Dave belted out "Hey, I heard you missed us … we're back …" the classic line from 1984's "Hot For Teacher" took on added meaning and sparked an eruption from the crowd that had packed the Fieldhouse.
They were back. The band tore through an incendiary two-hour, 26-song set. Every album from the David Lee Roth-era was represented.
Roth was back in front, camping it up and coming on to every female in the first five rows. Virtuoso guitarist Eddie Van Halen was ripping out chest-thumping riffs and ear-searing solo runs. A giant video screen provided ample close ups of his revolutionary two-handed tapping technique.
The night was a homecoming of sorts. The Bloomington-born Roth became emotional while waxing nostalgic about his youth spent in New Castle. Roth was back home again in Indiana, and back in front of the band that had transformed metal from dour and demonic to fun and flashy nearly three decades earlier.
But this tour is not really a reunion. While Roth rejoins Eddie Van Halen and his brother, drummer Alex Van Halen, original bassist Michael Anthony is absent - casting his lot with Hagar. He is replaced by Eddie Van Halen's 16-year-old son, Wolfgang.
As Roth said, this is a "new Van Halen band - three quarters original, one quarter inevitable."
It's too much to ask for the teenaged Van Halen to match the skill of Anthony on bass, but he filled in admirably, handling the high harmonies throughout the night.
It's also too much to ask that the band look and sound just as it did in its prime. The three originals aren't the same people they were 22 years ago, and so Sunday's show didn't exactly transport you back to 1984. Alex looked his age. Eddie, while still a master of the fretboard, seemed as happy to be playing with his son as he was to be on stage in front of a packed arena. And Roth's patented spinning kicks and cock-of-the-walk strutting often seemed forced, as did his vocals on many numbers.
But Van Halen, particularly with David Lee Roth, is not as much about art as it is about fun, and the crowd had plenty of that. From the opening riff of "You Really Got Me," the Kinks cover off Van Halen's 1978 eponymous first album that opened Sunday's show, through the closing salvo on "Jump," from 1984, the crowd was on its feet, paying tribute to the lineup it thought it would never see again.
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