January 27, 2012

Michael Anthony: My 6 career-defining records

From MusicRadar.com:

Michael Anthony chooses his six best

From big hits to even bigger hits, Michael Anthony’s provided the foundation

Van Halen 1 CD
1/6
Van Halen (1978)
Van Halen

Eddie Van Halen, Alex Van Halen, David Lee Roth and Michael Anthony were four upstarts from Pasadena when Warner Brothers head Mo Ostin and in-house producer Ted Templeman caught their show at the Starwood Club in LA. Soon, employees at record stores everywhere would hear a certain hammer-on pattern over and over again…

“Even though we had gigged steadily for a couple of years, we didn’t have a ton of material, so we basically just took our live show and all the songs we knew and went for it. The whole album took a couple of weeks.

“Ted Templeman wanted to make a big, powerful guitar record, and he had all he needed in what Eddie was doing. He fell in love with Ed’s playing. Eruption wasn’t written out or anything. Eddie was just