If you grew up as a suburban teenage white boy in the 1980’s, your dad (if he was around) might have listened to Clapton or Hendrix. Your burnout older brother (if you had one) dug Jimmy Page, Brian May, or maybe Ace Frehley. By the time he went to high school in the ’90’s, your whiny kid brother only had the mopey noodlings of Kurt Cobain and the grungers, unless he took a hard right and latched on to Kirk Hammett and/or rap-metal.
But you, you had Edward Van Halen. Idolized by millions, imitated by hundreds of poseurs, Eddie was the guitar god we didn’t know we needed, but it’s impossible to imagine rock and roll without him.
Born in 1955, Eddie was a Boomer, and many of the younger Boomers were fans, but his music spoke to Gen-X: loud, fast, exciting, powerful, unique, and new. While almost every group in the late 1970’s was ripping off Led Zeppelin (with varying degrees of success), Van Halen the band came on the scene with a sound and style never heard before.
“Ain’t Talkin’ ’bout Love;” “Dance the Night Away;” “And the Cradle Will Rock;” “Unchained;” “Jump;” “Panama;” “Why Can’t This Be Love?” “Dreams;” “When It’s Love;” “Poundcake.” Looking over that list, one might wonder, which is the signature VH song? Which is their “Stairway to Heaven,” their “My Generation,” their “Satisfaction,” or “Sweet Emotion,” or “Bohemian Rhapsody?”
None of the above, methinks. No, the quintessential Van Halen song is one minute and 42 seconds of sonic sorcery recorded as the second selection on their first album. It is, of course, “Eruption.”
Van Halen the band was always Van Halen the man. You could replace the lead singer (several times), you could replace the bass player (to the alienation of many long-time fans), you could have even replaced the drummer (the older VH brother, while skilled, will not make one forget Neil Peart, John Bonham, or Stewart Copeland).
But without Eddie Van Halen, there is simply no Van Halen. In a band defined by its genius guitarist, it’s only fitting that the ultimate VH song is the groundbreaking solo that remained a concert staple for the rest of his career.
But it wasn’t just the flash and bombast that made EVH great. It was also the small, artistic flourishes, like the moody meanderings during the bridge of “Panama,” or the flamenco-style intro to “Little Guitars.” One of my favorite bits in “And the Cradle Will Rock….” is a melodic lead that starts as David Lee Roth sings, “Well, the kid is into losing sleep.” This lead finishes at the chorus and never reoccurs in the song. See if you can pick it out.
Eddie seemed to have a million riffs and tricks up his sleeve: the thundering grind of the hidden track “Growth” that ends the album Women and Children First; the frenzied intro that opens Fair Warning. Eddie could spend a minute and a half basically screwing around, coaxing growls and squeals out of a guitar as filler for a video too long for its intended song, and come up with the mesmerizing, menacing “Intruder.”
Eddie collaborated with several musicians, but the most famous–and significant–was with Michael Jackson for the solo in “Beat It.” In the early 1980’s, music was very much self-segregated: most white kids listened to rock or New Wave; most black kids listened to funk, hip-hop, or R&B. Seldom did artists or songs “crossover” to a different audience.
In light of that, “Beat It” was a creative risk for both artists–how would their respective fans react?–that paid off big-time and helped bring people together. It can be argued that “Beat It” helped pave the way for Prince’s massively successfully pop/rock/R&B album Purple Rain.
My introduction to Van Halen was hearing “And the Cradle Will Rock…” on the radio and then going to the record store to find Women and Children First. I found the album, flipped it over, and stood there for a good twenty minutes, staring at it, debating whether I should buy it, because I was convinced that my mother would not approve AT ALL of these clearly “bad boys” in the cover photos.
I bought it anyway. The next year, I bought Fair Warning. The year after that, Diver Down (and went to see VH at the Cap Centre with a very pretty girl named Julia, who liked David Lee Roth much more than she liked me). The year after that, my mother bought me 1984 as a gift.
(I admit that at first, I did not cotton to Sammy taking over for Dave, but after a while, I began to appreciate “Van Hagar.” One version of the band is a bacon cheeseburger, the other’s prime rib. Each is fundamentally the same, and is great in its own way, depending on your tastes and mood at the moment).
(We shall not speak of the dark time that was Gary Cherone and Van Halen III. Nor will we discuss the last gasp that was A Different Kind of Truth).
As a budding writer, teenage-me sat for hours, VH cranked on the stereo and blasting directly into my soul via headphones (mercifully sparing my parents), as I pounded away at my manual typewriter, churning out numerous horror short stories, and even a post-apocalypse novel.
When I wrote, Van Halen’s music energized me, and I was inspired by their darker, grittier material: “Atomic Punk;” “Where Have All the Good Times Gone;” the aforementioned “Intruder;” “Mean Street,” and “One Foot Out the Door,” and hell, anything on Fair Warning.
It still works for me: my 2018 novel This Wasted Land name-drops Van Halen early in the book, and five of its chapters take their titles from VH songs.
Like when Prince died in 2016 (back when most of us thought that year was the worst we’d ever lived through–remember that?), it’s a kick to the gut to realize that I’m getting older, and that another major contributor to the soundtrack of my youth is gone.
After my Gen-X buddy Andy (a huge VH fan) told me last night that Eddie had died, we sat on his deck, drinking, playing and singing along to their hits and some of their best obscure songs. Tonight, we’re going to watch Live Without a Net, and there will be more drinks, I’m sure, including one, of course, for Eddie. And we’ll reminisce about the times we were in and the people who were around us when we first listened to his amazing music.
Kenton Kilgore writes killer SF/F for young adults and adults who are still young.
In his latest novel, This Wasted Land, high-school senior Alyx learns that witches are real when one attacks her and her boyfriend Sam, dragging him off to a nightmare world where Alyx must go to get him back.
Kenton is the author of Lost Dogs, the story of the end of the world as seen, heard–and smelled–by a dog. He also wrote Dragontamer’s Daughters, like Little House on the Prairie…with dragons!
With Patrick Eibel, he created Our Wild Place, a children’s book about the joy to be found in exploring Nature. Kenton also published Hand-Selling Books to help authors better their sales.
Follow Kenton on Facebook for frequent posts on sci-fi, fantasy, and other speculative fiction. You can also catch him on Instagram.
EVH was certainly as influential as Jimi. After Jimi, every guitar player imitated and was eventually compared to him. When Eddie appeared in the late 70s, he changed the entire game, and every guitar player after him imitated and was eventually compared to him. RIP, Eddie Van Halen.