Almost Halen

You've got me captured, I'm under your spell. I guess I'll never learn.
I have your picture, yes I know it well. Another page is turned.
Are you for real? It's so hard to tell, from just a magazine.
Yeah, you just smile and the picture sells, look what that does to me.

I'll Wait - Van Halen (1984)

History has a way of adding clarity to situations. Growing up I was a Van Halen fan. An unnaturally obsessive Van Halen fan. Posters, engraved fingerless gloves with spikes, bandannas, lots of bandannas. In 1984 Van Halen released their sixth album creatively titled 1984. It became their biggest selling album of the Roth-era Halen. I was ecstatic. It was the first time that my musical tastes seemed to correlate to the countries and I felt oddly validated in my weird musical obsession.

The theme of my 14 birthday party was 1984. For any children who may be reading this (bad idea) never theme your birthday party around an album unless you really like the music and are expecting a natural disaster to destroy some of your albums. I was given 12 copies of the 1984 album (all in vinyl, of course). I spend the next few weeks at music stores around the New York area trading in the musical redundancy for other music. Some of the albums swapped are still among my favorites today. REM, Tom Waits, 'Weird Al' Yankovic. Hey, I was 14.

After the party, I was listening to the album with my dad. To this day I am unsure if my dad truly liked the music, enjoyed having ANYTHING to talk to his bizarre, music-obsessed son, or was just really drunk. But emphatically and repeatedly claimed that the next time Van alen would come through town we would go see them. Father and son. And we would rock. Hard. I was looking forward to that.

A few months later Van Halen, as I knew and loved it, started to slip away. Eddie, the greatest rock guitarist, started playing only keyboards. David, rock's leading hair band frontman, began covering Beach Boys and Louis Prima songs. Everyone (with talent) was on their own project. Eddie appeared on Beat It (that's his guitar) and David released a god awful solo album. A few month later on the cover of USA Today I saw that David Lee Roth had been replaced by Sammy Hagar. Ugh.

At night I walk this stinkin' street past the crazies on my block
And I see the same old faces and I hear that same old talk
And I'm searching for the latest thing, a break in this routine
I'm talkin' some new kicks, ones like you ain't never seen

Mean Streets - Van Halen (Fair Warning)

For years there were rumors of the band reuniting with David Lee Roth. Something always stopped it from happening. Van Halen making way more money without David Lee Roth. The size of the egos of Eddie and David to this day have yet to be outdone. Ricky Henderson could never even muster up the nerve to be that egotistical.

Van Halen almost got together in 2000 but was short lived once they figured out they would have to listen to Dave a lot. You tend to forget these things. In 2002 Sammy Hagar and David Lee got together for a tour. has nothing to do with my story but damn, that is wacked.

As we all know by now Van Halen has reunited for a tour. Well, almost Van Halen. They have a little fat prepubescent child in place of their little fat alcoholic bassist. They have approximately 30% of the hair they once sported. And last Thursday, I finally got to see them live, without dad, at the United Center.

Still in great shape and able to deliver all the Roth era hits in staggeringly good fashion. David has lost some high end (got some back from two years ago at Summerfest) but still has the attitude and the ability to talk up girls from the stage. The women since 1984 have developed the ability to roll their eyes at him. And Eddie still plays the **** out of a guitar. It is now a ****less guitar.

The pace was fast. The setlist was outstanding. And Eddie. Wow. Me and 40,000 other 30+ year old former head bangers got the show we have been waiting for for nearly a quarter century. And last Thursday I got to see it. And it was good. And I will not go to another arena show again.


{Flamewar section: Are you aware that David Lee Roth is not anti-semitic? In fact, Diamond Dave is Jewish. He added the Lee to his name to throw off folks like Cap'n and Killre. That and to not sound like an optometrist.}