Alexander Arthur Van Halen was born on May 8th, 1953, in Amsterdam, Netherlands. He was raised in Nijmegen. Through a government-incentive program to reunite families, the Van Halens moved to the U.S. when Alex was about 9 years old. Because the family spoke little English, Alex and Eddie formed a bond during this time that has lasted their entire lives. Together they … [Read more...]
Archives for 2011
David Lee Roth’s Hand-Written Fair Warning Lyric Sheets Unveiled
We have something very special for the last day of "Fair Warning Week", celebrating the 30th anniversary of Van Halen's fourth album. In front of your naked steaming eyes--David Lee Roth's original hand-written lyric sheets! These contain the original (but not final) lyrics for all four songs contained on "side A" of Van Halen's Fair Warning album. These are from VHND.com's … [Read more...]
Kicks Like You Ain’t Never Seen: Van Halen’s Fair Warning Album and Tour
Marriage delayed work on the band’s fourth album. Torn between his new domestic bliss and a helter-skelter career in Van Halen, Eddie grew disillusioned with the band and wanted to quit. In his book Kiss and Make-up, Gene Simmons reported that a distraught Eddie at least halfheartedly made motions toward defecting Van Halen and joining Kiss as a second guitarist. “We thought … [Read more...]
Fair Warning custom painted guitar, Fair Warning Review
Day 5 of our "Fair Warning Week" celebrating the album's 30th anniversary. We're featuring a custom painted guitar with Fair Warning's album artwork and another review of the album. Jeff Rich is an Atlanta-based commercial artist, guitar player and Van Halen fan. One day he decided to combine his three passions, and in doing so created this one of a kind tribute to Van … [Read more...]
The Story Behind Van Halen’s ‘Fair Warning’ Album Cover Art
When Van Halen fans first listened to a copy of the Fair Warning album in the early eighties, few could miss the fact that the band's sunny subject matter had turned to a more somber and threatened perspective. This tone was set by the album's opening track "Mean Street,"and was continued through a song-cycle filled with dark subject matter and disillusionment. The overall … [Read more...]
Fair Warning Review, Isolated Guitar
For day 3 of "Fair Warning Week" celebrating the 30th anniversary of the album, we have an extensive Fair Warning review written by longtime fan and VHND reader Scott Esman of Glendora California, along with all three of Eddie Van Halen's isolated guitar tracks from the album, which have circulated only because fans were able to separate and extract the guitar track from songs … [Read more...]
Dark Victory: Billy Corgan assesses his favorite Van Halen album, Fair Warning
It's Day 2 of VHND's "Fair Warning Week" celebrating 30 years of Fair Warning. So grab a cold one. First, here's what Smashing Pumkins founder, Billy Corgan, said about the album (from the April 1996 edition of Guitar World): If you've ever seen the "Unchained" video, you've seen a band at its public epiphany. Beautiful and free, Van Halen ruled the world with a wink and a … [Read more...]
Celebrating the 30th Anniversary Van Halen’s Fair Warning
To celebrate the 30th Anniversary of Van Halen's magnum opus, we're declaring it "Fair Warning Week" at VHND, were we're featuring a different story about the album every day for the next seven days. Happy Birthday, Fair Warning. On April 29th, 1981, Van Halen unleashed their darkest album. From the opening out-of-this-world sounds of "Mean Street" to the insane fade … [Read more...]
Q&A with Sammy Hagar autobiography author Joel Selvin
Examiner.com conducted a rare interview with Joel Selvin, the author of Sammy Hagar's bestselling autobiography, Red: My Uncensored Life in Rock. Excerpts are below. One milestone that Sammy’s always stood by—and it appears again in Red—that I’ve always been confused by is his insistence that he sold more records with Van Halen than David Lee Roth, but an RIAA search reveals … [Read more...]
Rudolph and Michael Schenker on Van Halen
Rudolph Schenker (Scorpions) and brother Michael Schenker (Scorpions, U.F.O., Michael Schenker Group, etc) discuss Van Halen. From the book, Van Halen 101, by Abel Sanchez. Rudolph Schenker I have known Edward since 1979, when Van Halen played in Hamburg while supporting Black Sabbath (a great concert). Klaus and I were sitting in the fourth row, and Eddy came directly to … [Read more...]
“Hot for Teacher” – Air Drum
The Air Drummer in the video above, Ari Gold, actually stars in a new comedy about air drumming. He contacted VHND.com wanting to share the video with us and give us some info on his movie. Here's his email: Hello fellow Van Halen fans! I'm a film-director and sometimes-drummer, and I made a comedy about air-drumming and the American Dream, which Neil Peart (Rush) called … [Read more...]
Running with the Devil: A Lifetime of Van Halen
From SLAKE: The Los Angeles Quarterly: By John Albert The first time I hear Van Halen I am fourteen years old, riding in a car through the foothills of the San Gabriel Mountains. My friend Steve Darrow is riding shotgun while his dad steers the dusty old Volvo station wagon. Chris Darrow is in his forties and has long hair and a slightly drooping cowboy mustache. In the … [Read more...]