Listening Post: Van Halen – 1984

When I was about 15 or 16 my best friend in the summer vacation town of Bar Harbor was a guy named Pete. I met him while we were both prep cooks at the town’s greasy spoon. Pete was a metal guy all the way. Used to listen to Pantera before anyone knew who they were. He took me to see Ozzy at the Blizzard of Oz tour stop at the Bangor State Fair, (Randy Rhodes was 5 feet from me and a little band named Def Leppard was the opener). Pete also had a pair of pants tailor painted with white stripes to emulate Eddie Van Halen’s guitar. While I was immersing myself in Queen, Pete was learning to shred. I never even gave the Pasadena boys a chance.
Let’s remedy that now, shall we?

Van Halen – 1984 – 1984 (Buy it)

this is it. The one with all the hits. The one with the ubiquitous videos. The one with that great picture of cupid smoking on the cover (best use of a baby until nevermind).
So. After hearing all the tracks, all 33 minutes of this (holy god, these albums are short!) are there any revelations to be made?
Yes. Without David Lee Roth, Van Halen would never have existed. Well, that’s not true, they just wouldn’t have become megastars.
Roth is the star here. Screw Eddie. The truth is, Eddie’s solos are boring as hell. Okay, not really *boring* just more about the virtuosity than the song. Songs are excuses for solos. That makes them boring.
Subsequently, this is the David Lee Roth show and he knew it.
He’s stellar here. The music is fine, a little bland, the keyboards are an interesting addition and without them there would be no “Jump”, but that’s not really saying much.
The true star track here is “Hot For Teacher”, which conjures it’s video and the dancing teacher in blue even 24 years later.
Don’t get me wrong, this is a great album and well deserved of its success, it just doesn’t reinvent the wheel or the guitar pic or anything. It’s just a really good Van Halen album.

Grade A
A Side: really? Okay. Panama, Hot For Teacher, Jump
Blindside: I’ll Wait & Girl Gone Bad
Downside: 1984 (ah those crazy, bloated, self-important semi orchestral opening tracks of the 80s)