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The new edition of Guitar World, which came out today (LINK), has EVH on the cover and an interview about the making of '1984'. A lot of stuff we have all heard before, but also some new tidbits and a lot of praise from Ed for Donn Landee, who he says he has tried to haul out of retirement before without any success.
At the risk of spoiling this for some of you who may want to read it fresh (look away, if so) some new things that I had never heard Ed talk about before include:
- Ed thinks that "Hot for Teacher" is one of a number of VH tunes / shuffles or swing-type tunes that were inspired by hearing his father's big band music. Others he mentions are "I'm the One" and "Sinner's Swing"
- The recording room in 5150 was so small and presented so many difficulties for recording drums that not only did Alex have to use Simmons drums (apart from the snare), but the cymbals on tracks had to be played and overdubbed separately.
- During recording the band played ensemble, with Ed on a stool right in front of Alex. Alex would nod when it was time to change if Ed lost count, which he usually did when he was soloing.
- "Drop Dead Legs" was inspired by AC/DC's "Back in Black", but Ed says it came out "slower and more like a jazz version of Back in Black - the descending progression is similar, but I put more notes in there"
- Ted Templeman (and everybody else, but mostly Ted by the sound of it) totally hated "I'll Wait" and tried to put Ed off recording it. Every time Ed would strike it up, Ted would hum the tune to Argent's "Hold Your Head Up" just to piss him off.
- On "House of Pain": The reason it was changed from the original is that "nobody really liked the way that it originally was".
- Dave said this in his book, but this is the first time Ed has admitted it - he and Donn concealed and withheld the master tapes from Ted Templeman while they kept mixing the album. Ted would turn up at the studio looking for the tapes, because contractually the album had to come out in 1983 and New Year's Eve (or the weekend around then) was the last available day. But when Ted showed up, Donn would disappear, taking the tapes with him out some back route at Howdy Doody Mountain before Ed would then let Ted in through the front gate, saying he had no idea where Donn was with the tapes ... this went on for weeks towards the end. "Ted thought that Donn had lost it," Ed says "and was going to burn the master tapes". If you read Dave's book, he mentions sitting outside the studio / the house with Ted, buzzing like crazy and trying to get in.
- Ed says an awful lot of complimentary things about working with Donn Landee, and I think it is clear that he misses him. He describes him as "a man-child genius on the borderline of insanity", like "Albert Einstein" and still seems a bit baffled as to what happened with him: "It was a bummer when we stopped working together. Donn just totally left the music business. I went over to his house once and asked him to reconsider. He said, Nah. I probably wouldn't even remember how to do it."
(Readers with ears will probably say that he had forgotten how to do it by the time of the second Van Hagar album ...)
At the risk of spoiling this for some of you who may want to read it fresh (look away, if so) some new things that I had never heard Ed talk about before include:
- Ed thinks that "Hot for Teacher" is one of a number of VH tunes / shuffles or swing-type tunes that were inspired by hearing his father's big band music. Others he mentions are "I'm the One" and "Sinner's Swing"
- The recording room in 5150 was so small and presented so many difficulties for recording drums that not only did Alex have to use Simmons drums (apart from the snare), but the cymbals on tracks had to be played and overdubbed separately.
- During recording the band played ensemble, with Ed on a stool right in front of Alex. Alex would nod when it was time to change if Ed lost count, which he usually did when he was soloing.
- "Drop Dead Legs" was inspired by AC/DC's "Back in Black", but Ed says it came out "slower and more like a jazz version of Back in Black - the descending progression is similar, but I put more notes in there"
- Ted Templeman (and everybody else, but mostly Ted by the sound of it) totally hated "I'll Wait" and tried to put Ed off recording it. Every time Ed would strike it up, Ted would hum the tune to Argent's "Hold Your Head Up" just to piss him off.
- On "House of Pain": The reason it was changed from the original is that "nobody really liked the way that it originally was".
- Dave said this in his book, but this is the first time Ed has admitted it - he and Donn concealed and withheld the master tapes from Ted Templeman while they kept mixing the album. Ted would turn up at the studio looking for the tapes, because contractually the album had to come out in 1983 and New Year's Eve (or the weekend around then) was the last available day. But when Ted showed up, Donn would disappear, taking the tapes with him out some back route at Howdy Doody Mountain before Ed would then let Ted in through the front gate, saying he had no idea where Donn was with the tapes ... this went on for weeks towards the end. "Ted thought that Donn had lost it," Ed says "and was going to burn the master tapes". If you read Dave's book, he mentions sitting outside the studio / the house with Ted, buzzing like crazy and trying to get in.
- Ed says an awful lot of complimentary things about working with Donn Landee, and I think it is clear that he misses him. He describes him as "a man-child genius on the borderline of insanity", like "Albert Einstein" and still seems a bit baffled as to what happened with him: "It was a bummer when we stopped working together. Donn just totally left the music business. I went over to his house once and asked him to reconsider. He said, Nah. I probably wouldn't even remember how to do it."
(Readers with ears will probably say that he had forgotten how to do it by the time of the second Van Hagar album ...)
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