Van Halen isolated tracks

December 27, 2009 68 Comments

More Van Halen isolated tracks from MasterTracks18! “Atomic Punk” guitar, “Hang ‘Em High” guitar, “Jump” keyboard & guitar, “Jump” lead vocals, “Jamie’s Cryin” drums, & “Ice Cream Man” bass.

Filed Under: Van Halen

phillster

These are really cool
Right here i say

Where are these coming from? Wolfey? This probably has something to do with Guitar Hero VH.
http://none chickenfoothater

The guitar tracks have a bigger sack than santa!Al sounds great.I’m gonna give mike a little credit here,because i like him and his bass strings were floppin’ all over the place due to eddie’s down tuning,but i thought he dragged in places.
http://vhnd Jimmy

One for Mike. That’s good news
DiamondDean

These r great, luv hang em high, dont know why everyone bags diver down , i know eddie doesnt like it , i luv it , rate it in there top 5 sure its got covers but i reckon the originals are all great , and its got a lot of character , got some great guitar parts , its a bit short , but the originals are all brilliant , secrets , little guitars the full bug hang em high , gees ou812, balance and 3 are faaarrr worse than diver down
SCAR

SWEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEET!!!!!!!!!!!
Eric

Very nice. Strange to hear “Jump” with just the synths and guitar track. There is no overlap between the synth and the guitar except for the guitar and synth solos, but these were probably recorded on two separate channels on the multitrack, right? Really interesting and thanks again!
chris.omeara

Diamond Dean, you’re right. I’ve been guilty of bagging Diver Down, probably more than most. But hearing it years later I’ve grown really fond of Hang Em High, Secrets and Little Guitars. Even The Full Bug and Intruder are alot closer to the classic VH I was used to than what we’ve had lately.

I loved Me Wise Magic, and I hope Ed, Dave and crew come back with a vengeance to shut me up once and for all. I know they have it in them…
DLR

How about Nick Jonas And The Administration? Is he just venting creativity or will he rejoin Jonas??????
bsc

I know everyone loves the 1st record tone, but geese the sound Eddie had on 1984 kills me, my favorite guitar sound of all time!!! so pristine and clear, hardly any distortion, but plenty of pure gain and Balls.
Bluesbro

I’ve always loved Ice Cream Man. I wish the iso track was on the guitar rather than the bass. These are really cool though, thanks for posting them.
Ron

Hearing the synth & guitar broken out of Jump just makes me hate the song that much more.

@DiamondDean – I think Diver Down is an underrated album as well. Lots of great stuff on there, but a couple of clunkers gives the record a bad rap, in my opinion.
Glen Cunnington

You know im not usually one to complain, but all this is great; like its cool to try to put jump synth and vocals together and mike anthony is really good on bass, but holy shit! Are we gonna anything from Van Halen or are we just gonna moe reunion tours, and best of cd’s, and shirts and merchendise that dont mean nothin cause there all not doing anything. The last REAL update on these guys was when they said theyll put a tour in 2010. But they did also say back in 07 or 08 that they where gonna make a new album. If they really were, wouldn’t SOMETHING be on here about it. Im getting a little upset especially with how awesome my new favortie band Chickenfoot is doing/was doing, while these guys aren’t doin nothing. Come on guys somethin. I havent lost hope yet!!!! VH4L!!
http://vhnd.com surfthis!!

balance has one bad song
huh?
big fat shit
other than that that record kills.

the sound is clean and crisp as hell
play it loud
the best produced gig for sure.
http://vhnd.com surfthis!!

diver down sounds like it was recorded in a bathtub
like 0u812

they need to re-release the sammy stuff
outside of Balance it needs to be remixed!!!!

ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh!
http://none Dirty Duck

Funny how all these years later “Diver Down” is known as the “least favourite” VH album.

Back in the day ANYTHING released by VH was a celebration!

I really like the album personally. “Hang em’ high”, “The full bug”, “Cathedral”, “Secrets”, “Intruder”, and “Pretty Woman” alone are enough of a reason to own the album.
As far as the covers? So what! The band had personality.
They were trying different things. At that point in their career they could do anything they wanted. They took a chance…big deal.
Patrick

“gees ou812, balance n 3 r faaarrr worse then diver down”

OU812, yes.
Balance & III, not even close.

Year To The Day, Baluchitherium, & Feelin’ are all superior to anything on Diver Down.
Jay

I’ve been thinking about this alot over the past decade or so. I know Eddie has gone on record to say he didn’t like Diver Down because of the covers, but that’s kind of what made Van Halen special. The originals are awesome, but NO ONE can touch a Van Halenized cover. Look at YRGM, Pretty Woman, and even Dancing in the Steets from the early years. Won’t Get Fooled Again is a favorite. It’s badass! The covers define Van Halen as much as the originals. In fact, I was a little disappointed when the covers vansished from the albums. If they ever release another album, I think it would be great to have at least one cover on there.
Panama Red

Please keep posting more of these. It was cool to hear the bass track from Ice Cream Man. I miss Mikey on stage with Van Halen and his Jack Daniels bass.
Eddie is the Master-Atomic Punk is so badass. One of my favorite VH songs. I guess I could say that about a lot of VH songs. But That’s such a kick ass guitar song with some of the best lyrics. This was before ProTools, something Eddie will never use.
It was cool to hear Alex’s drum track too from Jamie’s Cryin.
Remember that “tone loc” song from the eighties? “Funky Cold Medina”. He sampled parts of Jamie’s Cryin.
Pete

Interesting…I’d love to hear “Summer Nights” and “Pleasure Dome” broken out like this.

Also, it was particularly cool to hear Mike’s bass track from Ice Cream Man…very cool walking line there…
Karl

Wonder if they do requests? Guitar only for Dirty Movies, Girl Gone Bad, Top Jimmy, Drop Dead Legs, Romeo Delight and Outta Love Again would be nice…

Great stuff, keep ‘em coming.
Karl

By the way, where is this stuff coming from?
http://www.bellapop.com Bran Halen

Can these be downloaded somehow? They are great!!
http://www.bellapop.com Bran Halen

Just listened to Hang ‘em High again. This is as close as I will ever get to sitting in 5150 with Eddie listening to him play. Awesome!!
http://www.myspace.com/timkarplus t1m

Karl, these are (I’m pretty sure) coming from Guitar Hero VH. Because of this, VH songs that didn’t make the cut for the game won’t be as easy to find isolated tracks for (I’m pretty sure a couple of the songs on your list did not make the cut). This raises the question: since they did a Classic VH-only version of the game, why only include less than half of the CVH catalogue? Seems a little silly if you ask me.
swingin’ sinner

Karl,it’s coming off the new Guitar hero I believe!
jcn

Yes keep these coming. As many as possible. Thanks!
http://www.merchnow.com blindbubbacheeks

These are awesome.
VHIII_1998_

Diver Down in my opinion was a waste of studio time, they should have used songs like dancing in the streets and pretty woman and used them as b’sides for singles off the 1984 album. sometimes i forget all about that album.
Garrett

In my opinion, these isolated tracks are the only good thing to come out of the whole “Guitar Hero: Van Halen” nonsense….I was just trying to learn the lead to Atomic Punk the other day…this will make learning it a breeze! : P
http://weownthesky.com shawn

eric… check out dave’s vocal track. these are true stem tracks, meaning they comped various segments of the multitrack to make a more concise grouping for mastering. on the jump vocal track, you can hear the rather complex synth part going on during the solo, and the rhythm gtr tracks. fascinating stuff to hear over 25 years later.

1984 had the best guitar sound, but damn… diver down’s sounds had so much character. listen to the little guitars intro. by today’s standards, that’s a fuct up recording… distorted, washed out… but in terms of vibe, it kills.

great to hear this stuff. now give me some 1984 drum tracks to sample!!!
RickieVanWhalen

silly me… and I use to slow down the original vinyl records to half speed and struggle to isolate the guitar.

Atomic Punk was recorded in 1978. The sounds he gets are unreal.

How about “One Foot Out the Door” baby!
jcn

i dont care how Diver did in the charts . It was full of fun and humor and had the usual badass guitar tone.

I still remember buying it in the record store that day. I was a 7th grader. I took it to my Christain school private party and cranked it. Everyone knew i was the coolest in my class. HAha.
chris.omeara

Diamond Dean, you’re right. I’ve been guilty of bagging Diver Down, probably more than most. But hearing it years later I’ve grown really fond of Hang Em High, Secrets and Little Guitars. Even The Full Bug and Intruder are alot closer to the classic VH I was used to than what we’ve had lately.

I loved Me Wise Magic, and I hope Ed, Dave and crew come back with a vengeance to shut me up once and for all. I know they have it in them…
dewlots

Hangem freakin HIGH!! that song alone justifies Diver Down.
http://none Dirty Duck

VHIII_1998_

I respect your opinion on the diver down album but I would give it another listen. For many years I wasnt the biggest fan eiether.

Then one day I really sat down and listened to it. I mean LISTENED. Is it my favourite VH album….no. But do I think it was waste? Not by a longshot. I feel that it makes a impact in some sense. I mean lets look at “intruder” for a sec. One of the coolest most bad ass instrumentals I’ve ever heard. CRANK it and sit back and check out how sick it truly is. I’m not gonna give you a breakdown on each song because it is all about one’s opinion. All I’m saying is that sometimes you can own an album for years…..have it collect dust because you barely play it…then one day you decide to give it another listen. Next thing you know a song that irked you years before somehow sounds cool all of a sudden.
Happens to me all the time!

The way I look at it is this: If you really cant stand the album…really think it’s a waste. At least you have that really cool stadium shot of the band on stage opening for the stones….
Pete

Diver Down maybe had a few too many novelty tunes, but to me it really had some great “songs”. I’ve always loved “Secrets”, which has a really killer vibe, and I really like Dave’s singing on it too. “Little Guitars” goes without saying too.

I don’t care much for “Dancing In The Streets”, but that tune has one of my favorite Eddie solos. Also, “Big Bad Bill” is one I enjoy singing to my kids to this day, and they love it too.

Don’t forget – without Diver Down, we wouldn’t have had 1984. 1984 was incredibly focused because Ed felt DD wasn’t. For that reason alone I tend to think of DD as an important VH album.
ikethebird

I dig M.Anthonys playing on Ice Cream Man.He is all over the bass without losing the groove.Watch a bootleg of 2009 and see what WVH plays.No comparison.
Panama Red

Jay – You make a really good point about Van Halen and the cover songs from Diver Down.

Eddie always said it was his least favorite album and I agree. (Except for VH III w/Cherone, which I sometimes forget about) But I still really like and listen to Diver Down. Every time the radio plays a cover song from that album I never change the station. I used to listen to that album all the time.
I’ve always been entranced by “Cathedral”. I’ll always listen to anything Eddie Van Halen does. I remember when I bought “Diver Down” on C.D. back in the day when C.D.’s came encased in those big plastic things and came in the big cardboard packaging. I kept that packaging for a long time because it had that Awesome pic on it showing the back of the band on stage and about a million people in that giant stadium.
dude

What’s great about individual tracks like these is that you start to realize just how much of a classic recording is made up of the sum of the parts. Mike’s bass tone in Ice Cream Man (in my opinion) isn’t something I would shoot for in the studio. And Alex’s drums on their own (tone-wise) don’t blow me away. Obviously, I’m judging by today’s recording standards. BUT! lay them all together with the right mixing (and of course song writing) and they just come together – pure masterpieces! I’ve heard other individual tracks from the likes of Rush, the Cars, etc. and it’s the same story. When I heard Alex’s guitar tones from Limelight I was kind of like … really? But bring up the other parts and it becomes a classic! A good lesson for those in the studio today. It’s easy to spend hours and hours tweaking stuff in every way possible. Sometimes it’s better to just let the tape roll and rely on the song writing and skill! Sorry for blabbing on … Go VH!
http://none Dirty Duck

Panama Red:

That awesome pic that you described was VH opening for the stones! Love it too….
Top Jimmy

anyone who doesn’t like diver down is only saying that because they are EVHKAD (eddie van halen kool-aid drinkers). anything eddie say’s is gospel to them. if ed says he doesn’t like diver down the EVHKAD say “oh diver down must suck, eddie didn’t like it!”. Diver Down is a 30 something minute blast of pure, rad, punk ass, rock and roll from the beginning to the end. it showcases everything that made van halen great; the humor, the swagger, the power, the swing, the blues, the harmonies. it’s great. period.

i would say that diver down has held up better than 1984 in some ways. it sounds way less dated than 1984. what is a better song “secrets” or “i’ll wait”? “full bug” or “panama”? “big bad bill is sweet william now” – name one other band that could pull that off and sound both authentic and lighthearted at the same time.

1984 was the beginning of the end for van halen. dave once said the problem with ed was his constant desire to “over refine”. he lost sight of what made van halen great; the raw sloppy power of rock and roll. 1984 is the beginning of when ed started to turn van halen into journey.
VHIII_1998_

Dirty Duck, my first album of van halen was for unlawful carnal knowledge. and then I built my catalog from there. the only Van halen album I don’t own is the double disc set from 2004, I consider my self a loyal fan, even though I am more of Dave era fan I still accept all versions, I understand where your coming from because there are some good songs on there but there also in my opinion some real duds,(happy trails) I mean that was silly they did the same thing on 5150 with inside. they wasted space on the tape with that kind of crap, with the exception of hang em high,little guitars, were have all the good time gone and intruder/ pretty woman and cathedral everything else sucks.
phillster

Personally i think DiverDown kicks Serious ass.
The so-called “worst” album with dave is still way better than anything done with Sam-mule or Gary IMO
Even “Big Bad Bill&HappyTrails”.
Somebody Always ends up singing along with Happy Trails
before it`s over,can`t be helped
I guess you could call it “Dave`s 1st solo album”
considering the amount of covers.
Man, that “fade-in” when the album starts into”WhereHaveall theGoodTimesGone” is got to be one of the Best ways to start an album next to ZEP`s”Nobody`sFaultButMine(Presence side2)!!
RickieVanWhalen

I hate to say it but if you think MA was a great player, think again. My 3 year old can play a better 1-4-5 walking bass line. The only interesting part of it is hearing eddie bleeding through in the background. Thank God the guy could sing.
Atomic Pete

I agree I really liked Diver Down as well.

The Full Bug is great, Little Guitars is a classic VH pop tune,
Cathedrals is groundbreaking and Eddie’s tone is the shit.
I even like Where Have All The Good times Gone.

@bsc

Yes Eddie’s sound on 1984 is to me the quintessential
“Brown Sound” Most evident on Panama. Cheers!
SCAR

Shit, Diver Down was killer back in the day and it is still kicks ass today!!!
topjimmy77

Constant bleating about a new album does my head in….but; redarrow5150 “(Crickets Chirping)” … LMFAO!!
Keith

Holy cow , VH acknowledging that Michael Anthony was in the band ? Eddie must be having a moment. **chirp chirp **
robs

diver down is a great album where have all the good times gone is fucking great i would rather here that cover of the kinks then you really got me.also big bad billy is bad ass. the guitar solo in secrets is great. the reason it is great album each song is a diffrent style.