If it were up to Wolfgang Van Halen, the lead single off of Van Halen’s 2012 album A Different Kind Of Truth would have been “She’s The Woman” instead of “Tattoo”.
“[‘Tattoo’] was a song I didn’t think should be at the beginning or the first [single] released,” Wolfgang recently told Ultimate Classic Rock‘s Gary Graff. “It’s still a great song. I was really happy with it. It was an old demo called ‘Down in Flames’ [from 1977] that had a really cool riff. … It happened twice as much on the original demo. We spread it out a little to make some space for the solo, that weave thing Dad does in the beginning. I thought it was fun. I think Dave’s lyrics are super-quirky on that and really fun. But as an opener or first single, I wasn’t into that. I fought for ‘She’s the Woman’ to be the first single. It’s not a comment on the quality of the song ‘Tattoo’ in any way. It was a little different in comparison to the rest of the album. People are so cynical and reactive these days with social media that I think when they get that [song], that’s their first impression and they think the rest of the album’s gonna be like that. And that wasn’t the case with that.”
As for “She’s The Woman”, Wolfgang said it was not only the perfect lead single but the song that represented classic Van Halen more than any other from the album.
“‘She’s the Woman,’ to me, was the most classic, like, straight-from-the-demo-era [1976] that it got,” he said. “The original bridge in that was used in the original song ‘Mean Street.’ At the time it was a song called ‘Voodoo Queen’ … so we ended up coming up with our own thing for [‘She’s the Woman’]. I think it was cool the way Dad soloed around this new progression. It’s almost a little bit proggy when you listen. It’s a very interesting chord progression that he came up with. That song really epitomized the classic-era Van Halen party rock sort of vibe. I was really happy, really proud with that song.”
The single “Tattoo” was released on January 10th, 2012, just under a month prior to A Different Kind Of Truth‘s release (February 7th, 2012). It reached #16 on the US Billboard Rock Songs chart while reaching #67 on the US Billboard Hot 100. “She’s The Woman” ended up being the follow-up single with a February 28th, 2012 release date. It reached #30 on the Billboard US Hot Rock & Alternative Songs chart while peaking at #100 on the Billboard US Hot Rock Songs chart.
Watch Van Halen’s “She’s The Woman”
Looking back on A Different Kind Of Truth ten years later, Wolfgang said he is still proud of the album, which would end up being Van Halen’s last-ever studio album.
“I think it’s very impressive that Van Halen was able to do that in 2012,” Wolfgang said. “I don’t think people understand how much of an effort it was that we were actually able to record an album. It took us a while, and we worked really hard on it. It was a fun experience and a fun experiment that I think we were grateful to be able to pull off. It was pretty crazy. I’m proud of what I put into it and what we were able to achieve.”
To commemorate the album’s tenth anniversary, Wolfgang took fans on a personal tour through the album, track by track. It’s a must read for Van Halen fans and you can find it at UCR’s website HERE.