VAN HALEN NEWS DESK

Ed jamming at 5150, recorded in 1984

February 16, 2009 27 Comments

Here’s a blast from the past for you! It’s a 1984 recording of Eddie Van Halen noodling around in the 5150 studio. Precious few tapes have ever emerged from the studio such as this one. Although this has been circulating amongst VH collectors for 10 years or so, we’re sure there’s plenty of regular VHND readers who’ve never heard it. Enjoy!

Filed Under: Eddie Van Halen, Van Halen

BlindBubbaCheeks

I bought a bootleg cassette tape of this on the street in NYC back in 1997. This youtube video sounds a lot better than the cassette did!!!
http://vhnd JCN

Sounds to me like he was getting his live solo spot together.

I could be wrong.
Bruno

Huge !

We can hear the first notes of “top of the world” 8 years before the album recording.

If anyone knows where I could rent eddy’s fingers…

Bruno (France)
ikethebird

I thought I’d heard them all until now!!!Thumbs up to VHND for this find.
John

…Sick….

even after all these years, stuff Ed recorded more than 20 years ago still surprises us
http://sacder111@hotmail.com CHARVEL.ESP.ROCK.españa.

Eddie van halen trabajando working dedos,is un crack of best guitar rock.Se agradece la frescura de la grabación.Recording.Un saludo a todos los rockeros.Spain.Barcelona.
http://vanhalennewsdesk Marshall

This is a Question 4 the Owner of VHND…Of the 3 Singers VH have had Who is your Favorite Singer 4 VH?…Iam very Curious to know this if u dont mind giveing us this answer!..My Favorite is Dave! Whos your fave?
Erick

Good question Marshall. I’m guessing (and hoping) “DAVE”.
It’s the only real VH.
pushtoshove

The old Dave of course….we’ll see what the new brings but i am up for any new music from VH….hopefully by summer
reservoirgoose

I really enjoy all of Eddie’s solos but I think his real talent was song-writing. It is easy to listen to him behind the vocals and be entertained by the rhythmic, catchy notes he pushes out.
DV5150

Bruno – Nice catch! If you remember, I believe Ed said that the fade out of Jump is the intro to Top of the World. I’m not a guitar player, but I’m pretty sure you get what I mean.
Elvin

Yup..Top of the World was there..thast why he makes tapes of his noodling, cause theres usually a gem hidden somewhere..that was way cool to hear it prior to ever being recorded or heard of.
Kris

All I can say is thank god that fly on the walls of 5150 pressed the record button!!!! Thanks very much for this, made my day!!!
http://www.youtube.com/vhfanjack Jack

Holy Shit! This is my video, what a surprise! I was quiet shocked when i found this one, its truly the prize of my collection.

I dont wanna sound like a douche, but theres even more stuff on my channel. My channel is called “vhfanjack”, and i have a video of the full version of “Wildfire”, the “Loss Of Control” WACF demo, and more (even more to come). Thanks VHND, for puting this up, i want all Van Halen Fans to hear this!
Erick

What about this idea?

Maybe VHND can open a special post including a petition/comments-page on which we can all vote for a ONE TIME GIG “CLASSIC VAN HALEN” including DAVE, ED, AL and MIKE.

This would be THE EVENT of the decade. We all know that Ed wants to continue working with Wolfie on bass. Okay, we understand. That’s just fine.

It’s just one more last time: ED, AL, DAVE and MIKE !
Wow!!!

Just a one time performance at ANAHEIM STADIUM.
Tickets could go for ….
And the guys that can’t make it to this one timer can watch at home on DVD.

I have to be honest; this is possible. It’s just for this one time and Ed and Al would make loads and loads of fans happy.

I just hope VHND has some contacts in the VH-brothers world. They have to be pointed to this petition.
I’ll point all my friends to this petition. If we all do and everybody’s helping, then this could be huge.

Who’s in favour?
jonas

sounds like house of pain as well in there
BlindBubbaCheeks

House of pain is totally in there. The full bootleg I bought also had the practices where Ed and Al were working on Girl Gone Bad. Insane.
But you know what would be a cool interaction between the band and the fans: What if they put up some riffs on their website and let the fans vote on what riffs they thought were the coolest or most worthy of becoming VH tunes?
Anybody else think that would be a cool, cutting edge or “Next Level” band/fan-relations idea?
Andy

I really love this fly-on-the-wall thing, cause it’s live without a net. He’s just totally going for it; whatever comes out : comes out. I think there ARE other good rock guitar-players who make enjoyable noise, but when it comes to this super-charged athletic kinda playing he’s about the only one that ever made any sense to me.
Greg

Who cares!!!!! This is old stuff!!!!! Quit living in the past!!!!! We want some new stuff!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
http://vhnd.com guest

Whos the kid in the picture with Eddie?
pushtoshove

the van halen nostalgia news desk strikes again
Adam

Greg, are you kidding? WE CARE! Hell yes, I want to enjoy Van Halen’s past! What could they possibly give us in the future? One or two new CDs? maybe a bit more than that if we’re really lucky?

They have already given us enough. Anything they could put out in the future is just Bonus Material. The unheard demos and live tapes from VH’s heyday is THE SHIT and I can’t get enough of it!! VHND, PLEASE put up more stuff like this! Don’t listen to weirdos who say “this is old, so it sucks!”

Stuff like this is the best stuff you could possibly put up.
VH2008

I’ve had this demos for years. It’s a “must-hear” for sure! It’s amazing to hear him play the riff from “Top of the World” years before it came out.
Drumshine

It sounds like he’s just tweaking his amp and getting levels for the board before they start recording. He’s definitely not working on anything specific music wise. It is interesting to hear some of those parts to old songs though. I keep thinking about how new those riffs were to him at that time, yet to us they are now classic VH riffs. Eddie’s got an amazing tone, especially for just a bootleg.
MA=VH

Yo, Guest, I think the kid in the picture with Ed is his younger “double” from the Hot For Teacher video. I think Ed is still standing on the long table that he walks down while playing in the video.
Would love to see MA back with the boys, even if it is only for one show.
Thanks for putting this clip out there VHND!

MA=VH
Mario (Colombia)

It doesn’t get any better than this.
Omar (Lima, Peru)

VAN HALEN nunca morirá, siempre estará en mi corazón. Quizá sea uno de los 20 peruanos que no solo gusta sino que idolatra a Eddie y a su banda – pocos no? – pero bueno, ahora que vienen Iron Maiden y Kiss, sería bueno que también traigan a VAN HALEN cuando salgan de gira nuevamente. Por ultimo: Michael Anthony come back to VH.