After high school had finished the boys played gigs in and around their home town of Pasadena, CA. It was on this circuit that they meet singer David Lee Roth and bassist Michael Anthony who along with the brothers made up the quartet that would become Van Halen. While playing in a club in L.A., Van Halen was spotted by Gene Simmons. Simmons wanted to produce a demo for the band, but unfortunately the demo flopped and was rejected by all the major studios. However a year later at the same club Van Halen was spotted by a producer from Warner Records. He signed them on the spot and soon after in 1978 Van Halen’s self titled album was released. The band had a string of platinum records until 1985 when rifts in the band forced Roth to leave the band.

However the bands momentum couldn’t be stopped. They quickly signed new singer Sammy Hager and the juggernaut that Van Halen had become, continued.

Hager was with the band for 11 years and this period saw one of the bands albums (5150) go to number one, which was a first for the band. In the late 90′s Hager quit and Roth returned briefly for the release of the bands Best Of album. But time had not healed the wounds and Roth was quickly replaced by Gary Cherone, the former front man for the band Extreme.

It is through the band Van Halen that the musical genius of Eddie Van Halen has been exposed. His wild style electrified audiences and created a legion of guitarists keen to mimic his playing. The most commonly referenced song when people talk about Eddie Van Halen is Eruption. Eruption is well known for its distinctive introduction which includes the most well known example of double handed tapping. This technique involved Eddie using both his right and left had to fret the guitar, and using a tapping motion to make the guitar sound out.

This technique was not new, some players had experimented in the 1950′s but Eddie Van Halen redefined the technique. He added speed, accuracy, distortion and a box full of various effects to the mix creating a style that would become an essential tool of rock guitarists for years to come. Also the popularity of Van Halen’s guitar based, solo laden rock caused many other bands to copy their style. It caused a period in music where nearly all popular rock music displayed some degree of virtuoso soloing. This musical trend has been heavily influenced by Eddie Van Halen’s guitar playing.

And here is a more recent live version of “Eruption” (Seattle, 2007); published by Youtube user TeamDZ:

Hope you enjoy it as much as we do!

Posted by Moses Robbins

What’s interesting about the stick is it’s ability to play chords, leads and bass parts simultaneously.

This is an invaluable mode of thought when approaching the guitar and most players want to bridge these gaps – the long sustain capabilities of an electric guitar for example mean that with some manual dexterity you can attempt to create some interesting harmonic combinations – plus blending in tapping techniques like those of Eddie Van Halen and Joe Satriani stretches the Stick metaphor. If you`d like to venture into modern acoustic territory then have alook at some of the newer percussive styles of playing:

Cheers,
Jake Edwards

Jackson`s first album began with the luminescent touch of Larry Carlton, and on Beat It from Thriller included both Eddie Van Halen (you know that solo) and Steve Lukather as well as Jeff Porcaro (drums) and, as usual, Quincy Jones` inimitable production. The following album, Bad, featured Billy Idol`s guitarist Steve Stevens and on tour the fiery Jennifer Batten (later to work with Jeff Beck).

1992`s Dangerous saw the in clusion of Guns `n` Roses Slash and the album Invincible featured the melodic leads of Carlos Santana.

Fender have got together with Eddie Van Halen and introduced the Frankenstein replica model guitar as well as the EVH Brand. The Frankenstein is a complete snip at around $20,000 U.S. and you can even get yourself some matching shoes here if you`re a sucker for accessorising. Not bad going considering Eddie didn`t hesitate in describing his guitar as a “piece of shit”. Is it right to suppose that the dudes with 20 Grand spare to spend on this baby are likely limited to being either Eddie himself, or the kind of CEO`s who bid on Clapton`s bathwater in the vain hope that its tonic “qualities” offer the true elixir of snake oil blues talent in a bottle. Aaagh. If you do however have more sense than money I recommend coloured tape.