All Purpose Van Halen Grammy head-fake bullshit thread

[twonabomber]

I am surprised to read that.
Wow! I would be more shocked if a drummer was changed out than a base player. The drums are like the heart beat of a Rock band.

it's BASS, you fucking idiot.

[Nitro Express]

Who's the trout player?

[FORD]

[Nitro Express]

A cool bridge setup and it looks kind of like what you would see on a Steinberger. Some weird ass pickup layout. A humbucker with two single coils that close. Maybe by turning the middle pickup off you get more of a Jazz bass vibe and then you run the middle only and get a P-Bass vibe. With all that wood gone from the body you probably lose a lot of umph. Interesting but something tells me that piranha bass might not sound that great.

[Diamondjimi]

[Blaze]

That's a good looking Bass!

[PETE'S BROTHER]

that should be chopped onto the baisplayer from "stryper"

[chefcraig]

That's a good looking Bass!

Too many strings. Gimme an old fashion, 4 stringer anytime...particularly a short scaled one.



You see what I did there with the word "scale" is...

[Blaze]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scale

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scale_(string_instruments)
Electric bass

[edit]History
The first electric basses were upright electric basses built in the 1930s by fitting an otherwise normal double bass with electric pickups, and so had a scale length of about 43" (109 cm).
In 1951 the Fender Precision Bass shortened this to 34" (86 cm). This is still often regarded as the standard length for a bass guitar.
On a modern bass guitar, 30" (76 cm) or less is considered short scale, standard (also called long) scale is 34" (86 cm) for a 4-string and 35" (89 cm) for a B-E-A-D-G 5-string, and extra-long scale basses of 36" (91 cm) also exist.
Quite an uncommon scale construction using the Novax Fanned-Fret system that "fan outward" for the ability to play in tune with the unequal scale lengths of each string that is used to find the optimal equal tonal response and equal string tension from string-to-string for easier playing is represented by Dingwall Basses, who uses a 37" to 34" span on their Prima, Z1, Z2, and Afterburner original designs and a shorter 34.25" to 32" span for their "Super J" Jazz Bass design.

[ZahZoo]

Maybe they can fake it to a point playing live, but it still comes across as something missing. On the "reunion" they could have gone out there with kazoos and the crowds would still have gone crazy, so it didn't matter if they were lacking. however, chemistry is needed in the studio if the music is to be good. Having Ed send the music to Dave along with the melody with a note that says "sing words to this" doesn't bode well for anything stellar. Again the novelty factor, this time new music with Roth, will be a saving grace.

Maybe they can fake it... shit... KISS has been doing that every nite since the early 70's. Plus Van Halen as well... it's fucking show business!!

Even in the club days, where the VH act was born... things started to become a routine. When you perform the same stuff 5 days a week... 98% of it is just the working logistics of turning out the "product". It can become as routine as an 8-5 production line job. The remaining 2% is just some haphazard moment with the right mix of drugs, liquor, ego and many times boredom produces a "special" chemistry event.

Today prior to a tour... VH will rehearse for a couple of months. Partly to remove the rust and hone the playing skills. But primarily once the set list is locked... they do the show start to finish multiple times. Every element of the lighting, effects and sound enhancements (backing vocals & Wolfies bass crutches) are preprogrammed, choreographed and set before the show hit the road. Even set up of the stage and gear is choreographed, analyzed and scripted for efficiency.

And yes... even Dave's "We all had a weird friend named Kenny" talk is practiced, timed, choreographed and built into the whole show sequence. Seriously about the most ad libbing you might have in a show is when Dave or Ed perform some planned physical posturing during a song and one of them farts and the other smells it... then that odd moment of artistic "chemistry" occurs...

Chemistry in the studio... maybe in the 70's/80's. Today the formula for hit songs can be mapped on a spreadsheet and converted by programs like ProTools and the like... to ensure your chemistry concoction has all the right elements.

Let's just hope Professor spEdward's chemistry skills have improved since Up for Breakfast was cooked up...

[DLR Bridge]

Chemistry in the studio...Today the formula for hit songs can be mapped on a spreadsheet and converted by programs like ProTools and the like...

Who's lookin' for a hit? I'm looking for kick ass rock with a pulse. I don't want them to try to get on Z100. You raise an interesting point, though. Even now, with consideration to the whole "picked through old demos" rumor, we have no clue whether the current batch of tunes is to be molded commercially or not. More time spent working on it usually means too much furniture polish. As someone said earlier, expect the unexpected.

[VHscraps]

Having Ed send the music to Dave along with the melody with a note that says "sing words to this" doesn't bode well for anything stellar.

Dave always came up with the melodies for songs. I also believe that he - and Spam and Templeman - worked on arrangements, because the evidence of what happened when you take those co-creators away, is that he doesn't know how to edit himself (VH III is proof of that). So, Ed did the music - bits of riffs, chord changes, or whole pieces of music - but according to anything I've ever read (including the accounts by Spammy), Ed had nothing to do with the vocals, either in the melody or words department. That's why Van Hagar songs suck lyrically, and are banal melodically; whereas Van Halen the original does not.

That's why Van Halen pretty much sounds like whoever the singer is at the time:

Van Halen (the original) sounds like David Lee Roth
Van Hagar (the simulacrum) sounds like Sammy Hagar with a better guitarist
Van Halen (the utter shambles of VHIII) sounds like nobody, because on that occasion Ed PROBABLY was writing lyrics and vocal melodies.

[VHscraps]

Ah - a rejoinder to my own last post in this thread (above) ...

Ed did take an interest in words and vocals more generally from the mid-90s. In fact, it was behind the split with Spam: the Crimson Clown was asked to consider a lyrical 'treatment' to his 'Human's Being' lyrics, which he claimed was concocted by Eddie and Glen Ballard.

When you get to VH III, I believe that Eddie was, at the very least, approving or directing the lyrical content (if not actually making embarrassing contributions himself - witness 'How Many Say I' - or, to give it its proper title, 'How Many Say WHY, WTF is this crap?' Tom Waits with Sammy Hagar-level 'real sentiments'.

[Rikk]

Funny how folks still perceive the band as a bunch of young dudes all hangin like bro's together... Hasn't been that way since 1980.

I actually would rather that they're not happy. They don't deserve to be.

But in all seriousness, a happy Van Halen produced albums like 5150. An angry, vitriolic, disjointed Van Halen produced albums like 1984.

[Rikk]

Why would anyone think there was a chance at Mike coming back? CHICKENSHACK has been touring already behind their new third album (Sam can't count)...so would anyone think that Mike was recording and touring that album while secretly making a new album with Dave and the brothers?

At this point, I don't really care about Michael Anthony. I'm on this site because I'm a Dave fan. It's Dave's new album with Eddie and Alex as his backing band. I saw the 2007-2008 tour twice and thoroughly enjoyed it.

No matter what some people say here (and, yes, Eddie is a prick and wanted Mike out for years), Mike is truly out because he couldn't stop being friends with Sammy Hagar.