Van Halen contains all of the band’s hallmarks: the bad-boy boogie of “Runnin’ with the Devil,” the otherworldly guitar wizardry of “Eruption,” a swaggering ode to a slut (“Jamie’s Cryin’”), and a hyperenergized, this-is-the-way-we-do-it-in-Hollywood cover song (the Kinks'... 

 The blistering Van Halen II takes the approach further, with an even more over-the-top cover (“You’re No Good”) and yet more inspired guitar pyrotechnics. Roth also steps more confidently into his character, developing his trademark bawdy squeal into a leitmotif and stepping back now and th... 

 The band tried a tougher, more heavy-metal sound on Women and Children First and Fair Warning, but it flops due to the poor material and, significantly, a fairly humorless approach overall. Eddie Van Halen shows off a few new guitar tricks, but the most significant musical development is the synt... 

 The band tried a tougher, more heavy-metal sound on Women and Children First and Fair Warning, but it flops due to the poor material and, significantly, a fairly humorless approach overall. Eddie Van Halen shows off a few new guitar tricks, but the most significant musical development is the synt... 

 Diver Down finds the band back in top form, entertaining with a smile and lots of squeals. The album contains a ridiculous five covers, but they’re some of the band’s best: “(Oh) Pretty Woman,” “Dancing in the Street,” and another Kinks cover, “Where Have All the Good Times Gone?," ... 

 The band’s masterpiece and greatest commercial success, 1984, is loaded equally with pop hits and rockers as hot as anything Van Halen had done before. But it was the pop numbers that broke: “Jump” is a trifle constructed wholly around the synth; guitars enter only as backup, and the solo i... 

 A majority of 5150, like “Love Walks In” and the monster hit “Why Can’t This Be Love,” grew out of the synth work on 1984, but at best it sounds like an imitation of the old band, and at worst sluggish and adrift.  

 OU812 is marginally better, mainly because of “Finish What Ya Started,” a hilarious faux-country toe-tapper that is the best (i.e., funniest) song they recorded without Roth. The other hits, “When It’s Love” and “Feels So Good,” are astonishingly sedate for a band that tore so lustf... 

 Templeman returned to coproduce For Unlawful Carnal Knowledge, and some of the old fire returned with him. “Poundcake,” the first track, is a tough, libidinous stomp that could have been a Roth cut back in the day. But from there the band sounds lost: “Judgement Day” (spelling courtesy of... 

 In 1996 Hagar was replaced by…Roth. But the reunited lineup lasted only long enough to record two songs for the greatest-hits album. The songs, “Can’t Get This Stuff No More” and “Me Wise Magic,” sound like Hagar cuts, and though it’s nice to hear Diamond Dave again, it only tarnish... 

 Two years after the aborted reunion with Roth, the band recruited its third singer, Gary Cherone of Extreme, who has even less personality than Hagar, though he can’t really be blamed for the lifelessness of the music on Van Halen III; he’s just hired pipes.  

 In 2004 the band released the mishmash Best of Both Worlds, which featured alternating tracks from Roth and Haggar; the band hit the road with Haggar that same year. In 2006, the band again hired Roth as its singer and embarked on a highly successful tour.