WHAT DID YOU PUT ON?...first 10 songs after hearing EVH RIP...

[Rikk]

I honestly don't know why they dropped it from the set list. Certainly a better song than "Tattoo".

I've grown to like TATTOO a lot...but it took a while. I was certainly underwhelmed at that being the first single.

But the thing that pissed me off the most about it was people like that fucking fatass Eddie Trunk used it as the proof he'd been waiting decades for that VH was better with Sam. Man, that pissed me off. The guy who claimed the 1984 tour was boring and nothing but personal solos and Dave showing off (I've watched the Montreal '84 show a couple dozen times and I'm always overwhelmed by how great it is...and they play a TON of songs, with a few theatrical moments, 2-3 Dave speeches), the guy who loves to claim that Sam made VH a better band, the guy who claimed Dave never bothered singing and had a completely shot voice during the reunion tours (this is bullshit...Dave actually sang better during the 2007-8 tour than he did at US Festival or other pre-break-up gigs I've heard)...the fat-mouth who claimed that TATTOO was the worst VH song ever certainly wasn't shooting his mouth off to point out to the world how terrible UP FOR BREAKFAST or LEARNING TO SEE are. Or SOURCE OF INFECTION (possibly the laziest vocal in history).

Man, I got worked up there. I'm just sick of Eddie Trunk and his opinions. I love people having opinions. But he's developed a massive ego over the decades and has begun to act like because he does all this for a living, his opinions are actually fact. If I were a DJ with a big audience and a stupid minority opinion concerning Sammy Hagar's place in Van Halen, I think I would have tired of trying to convince the majority of my listeners that they're wrong about David Lee Roth. He at one point claimed TOKYO DOME is one of the worst live albums ever because they didn't fix it in the studio. One of the things I love about that album is how real it is...yes, Dave fucks up HEAR ABOUT IT LATER, and maybe they could have picked a better show. But I've listened to it a bunch of times and really like it. To actually bitch that they didn't turn a live album into a studio creation is a joke. The band has admitted that RIGHT HERE, RIGHT NOW is almost completely a studio creation, with almost all drums, guitar, bass & vocals re-done at 5150...it's obvious where I place Sam in the band's history but at least WITHOUT A NET is mostly truly live and sounds a lot better than RHRN.

[ZahZoo]

I initially put on a few songs...

Take Your Whiskey Home
Drop Dead Legs
Beautiful Girls
Little Guitars

Then life got in the way... I've hopped on the Sirius tribute channel a few times while driving and watched his solo from Live Without a Net on-line. That's about it... got my fix and continued on living life.

[slimdon]

What did I put on?

I had just finished putting together a radio special about 1978 when I got blind-sided by the news of Ed's passing. So I immediately went to work on putting together a two hour-special on Ed before my deadline. I didn't really even have time to comprehend what the f**k was going on because it was such a whirlwind of emotions. By the time I hit the 90 minute mark I didn't really feel like talking anymore. What a f**king bummer.

The first time I heard Van Halen was when my neighbor's oldest brother cranked 'Feel Your Love Tonight' repeatedly out his window when the album came out. I was only 5 years old, and to this day I can still see the blue sky framing their house whenever those first notes come on. Anyways, here's my tribute to Ed if you wanna listen to a couple hours of our favourite band:

http://rocknrollbreakfast.com/shows/10_09_2020.mp3

Godspeed. Long live the king!

[Pooh]

I really missed Mike's backing vocals

[Pooh]

They should have kept playing it.

[FORD]

I honestly don't know why they dropped it from the set list. Certainly a better song than "Tattoo".

[Rikk]

Actually they did play it on some of the early dates of the 2012 tour....

Man, I wish they played it when I saw them. It's a great song.

[Seshmeister]

LOL as I was typing that I started to doubt myself but just kept going... :D

[FORD]

My favorite, surprised they never played it live.

Actually they did play it on some of the early dates of the 2012 tour....

[Seshmeister]

Great solo too.

I think the best part of the album is that middle section - people go on all the time about it just being an album of reworked demos but that song #3-#8 section is mainly new stuff. Ok Blood and Fire was the Ripley thing but try to imagine taking that music and turning it into that song, it's not easy.

Also in the old days that would have been a whole Van Halen album with a cover version and an instrumental to pad it out.

[Matt White]

My favorite, surprised they never played it live.

Has the trademark Roth humor...and lets the "Old School" fans know just how jazzed he was to actually be BACK

"Forgotten empires
Lost victories long past
Every time I bloomed again
I thought it was the last
And then something crazy happens
And boom!
I'm doing the victory dance!
Told ya I was comin' back
(Told ya!)
Say you missed me
(Say it!)
Say it like ya mean it!"

[Seshmeister]

11.)"Blood & Fire"---a close 2nd for my fav tune from ADKOT...

My favorite, surprised they never played it live.

[Matt White]

Looking over my list from that dreadful day...

1.) "Where Have All the Good Times Gone?"---1st track on the 1st VH release that I bought on the day it was released. Will always have a special place in my heart.
2.) "Unchained"---Told myself that ugly October 6th that I was finally going to learn to play my favorite VH tune "Front to Back"...12 days & still learning
3.)"All the Cradle Will Rock"---1980. 6th grade. Monument song & record in my life. I've been coping licks from this solo as long as I've been playing guitar...which has been a long time.
4.)"Hear About It Later"---Great lyrics, riffs, and solo. The breakdown is (to quote our beloved brother MAX) STELLAR
5.)"House of Pain"---Another VH classic that I'm determined to get under my fingers...just a barn-burner!
6.)"Can't Get This Stuff No More"---makes me sad that 1996 was such a blown opportunity to get it right. "...you serve up the truth, "I don't want it anymore." Keep that in mind when we say goodbye, cus you can't get this stuff, no more."
7.)"Dance the Night Away"---Van Halen at their most "Pop" during the CLASSIC years. Sexier than Hagar's entire career...every song combined.
8.)"Eruption"---Ground zero for Generation X guitar players. King Edward dropped the bomb announcing himself as THE Guitar hero of the 1980's....in 1978.
9.)"Hang 'Em High"---Another GEM from Diver Down. Incredibly cool riff matched to brilliant lyrics about the old (not so old in '82) Clint Eastwood western. "...His pair of nitrous eyes"
10.)"Big River"---My favorite cut from ADKOT. Classic VAN HALEN...just wish it had Mike's vocals in the mix.
*BONUS*
11.)"Blood & Fire"---a close 2nd for my fav tune from ADKOT...I remember seeing them live in '07 in DETROIT and thinking...(say this in the ROCK's voice like I do in my head) "FINALLY....VAN HALEN SOUNDS LIKE VAN FUCKING HALEN AGAIN!!!"

[Rikk]

I mean, when the band split in 1985, I was bummed. It felt like there was still more great music to come.

After the split, when the band members started going public with how dysfunctional the band had been from the get-go in terms of personal relationships between one another (and Monk's book obviously put all of that into sharper focus than we as fans might have even imagined) - and then over the years you got things leaking out like Ed's 1982 unpublished telephone interview where he explicitly says he has little to no respect for Mike Anthony's contributions - all of this gradually shifted my own impression of the 1985 split. I started to feel it was more a case of it being amazing the band lasted as long as they did in the first place, rather than thinking they broke up too soon. That as a fan I was lucky enough to have gotten what I did in terms of the music, considering the volatility of the chemistry within the band.

With Ed's passing, I have feelings along similar lines. I don't know the specifics of his various medical ailments beyond what was made public. Nor am I a doctor. But from the early 2000s to 2007, Ed just looked physically dreadful. And come 2004 the guy couldn't even perform consistently well live anymore. Come 2006 it looked like Ed was gonna drop dead at any moment. So, while I was kinda bummed that a full CVH reunion never happened, all things considered it was kinda amazing that Ed managed to get himself sorted out enough to do the three tours with Dave that he did, regain his focus and apply himself enough to come ADKOT time he was able to perform the CVH material live at a professional level consistently well. To be sure, this doesn't seem like it would be asking too much from the perspective of a paying fan, but considering what Ed had been through (or put himself through, if one is inclined to have that view), it was more amazing that we got what we got...rather than lamenting what we didn't get (a full-on CVH reunion and an album or two of kick-ass new material).

But, yeah, there wasn't as much positivity surrounding Van Halen's activities from 1996 to the end as there seemingly had been during the CVH heyday. Even if the positive image of CVH was in no small part an image, what the band and their music meant to me WAS positive.

Perfect post.

The one thing that can never change is how perfect and positive this music was. Nothing takes away from how great those six albums are (and I know I'm not necessarily in the majority here, but I actually consider it a seven-pack: I love ADKOT that much...Dave and Eddie are both just amazing and the rhythm section is great...it just needs a remix).

[Terry]

I hear you. I understand.

I've been reading Noel Monk's book the last couple of days...and let me just say: It depressed the hell out of me. Talk about taking the wind out of the sails in the way I used to think of what classic Van Halen really was...

...they were, from Day One, such a fucking disfunctional band. And to the very end, that never changed.

I mean, when the band split in 1985, I was bummed. It felt like there was still more great music to come.

After the split, when the band members started going public with how dysfunctional the band had been from the get-go in terms of personal relationships between one another (and Monk's book obviously put all of that into sharper focus than we as fans might have even imagined) - and then over the years you got things leaking out like Ed's 1982 unpublished telephone interview where he explicitly says he has little to no respect for Mike Anthony's contributions - all of this gradually shifted my own impression of the 1985 split. I started to feel it was more a case of it being amazing the band lasted as long as they did in the first place, rather than thinking they broke up too soon. That as a fan I was lucky enough to have gotten what I did in terms of the music, considering the volatility of the chemistry within the band.

With Ed's passing, I have feelings along similar lines. I don't know the specifics of his various medical ailments beyond what was made public. Nor am I a doctor. But from the early 2000s to 2007, Ed just looked physically dreadful. And come 2004 the guy couldn't even perform consistently well live anymore. Come 2006 it looked like Ed was gonna drop dead at any moment. So, while I was kinda bummed that a full CVH reunion never happened, all things considered it was kinda amazing that Ed managed to get himself sorted out enough to do the three tours with Dave that he did, regain his focus and apply himself enough to come ADKOT time he was able to perform the CVH material live at a professional level consistently well. To be sure, this doesn't seem like it would be asking too much from the perspective of a paying fan, but considering what Ed had been through (or put himself through, if one is inclined to have that view), it was more amazing that we got what we got...rather than lamenting what we didn't get (a full-on CVH reunion and an album or two of kick-ass new material).

But, yeah, there wasn't as much positivity surrounding Van Halen's activities from 1996 to the end as there seemingly had been during the CVH heyday. Even if the positive image of CVH was in no small part an image, what the band and their music meant to me WAS positive.