Advertisement
VAN HALEN
(1978)
Key Tracks: "Runnin' With the Devil," "Jamie's
Cryin'"
Quick Take: Van Halen contains all of the band's
hallmarks: the bad-boy boogie of "Runnin' With the Devil," the
otherwordly guitar wizardry of "Eruption," a swaggering ode to a
slut ("Jamie?s Cryin'"), and a hyperenergized,
this-is-the-sway-we-do-it-in-Hollywood cover song (the Kinks' "You
Really Got Me"). The group's major weaknesses are evident too, such
as its lack of lyrical depth, side two duds, and penchants for
oldtimey numbers hammed up for minstrelsy effect ("Ice Cream Man,"
a lecherous ditty originally by bluesman John Brim).
Advertisement
VAN HALEN II
(1979)
Key Tracks: "Dance the Night Away," "You're No
Good"
Quick Take: The blistering Van Halen II
takes the approach of the first album 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 then to laugh at it all with canny self-awareness.
Advertisement
WOMEN AND CHILDREN FIRST
(1980)
Key Tracks: "And the Cradle Will Rock," "Could
This Be Magic?"
Quick Take: The band tried a tougher, more
heavy-metal sound on Women and Children First, but it
flops due to the poor material and, significantly, a fairly
humorless approach overall. Outside of the rugged thump of "And the
Cradle Will Rock," the album's highlight is actually a hidden track
called "Growth," an early-era live staple that gave Eddie the
chance to execute some pyrotechnics.
Women and Children First (Warner Bros.)
Advertisement
FAIR WARNING
(1981)
Key Track: "Unchained"
Quick Take: Eddie Van Halen shows off a few new
guitar tricks, but the most significant musical development is the
synthesizer introduced at the end of Fair Warning, which would be
exploited to greater effect on later albums. "Unchained" is a
driving stadium-sized shout-along, but darker stuff like "Push
Comes to Shove" amputates all the charm that made Van Halen
thrilling in the first place.
Advertisement
DIVER DOWN
(1982)
Key Tracks: "(Oh) Pretty Woman," "Little
Guitars"
Quick Take: 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?," which
jettisons the melancholy tone of the original in favor of a
sexed-up strut, something that has never done them wrong.
Advertisement
1984 (1984)
Key Tracks: "Jump," "Panama," "Hot For
Teacher"
Quick Take: The band's masterpiece and greatest
commercial success 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 is split
between guitar and keyboard. Along with "Hot for Teacher" and
"Panama," it was a megahit on MTV and established the band as one
of the giants of the video age.
Advertisement
5150 (1986)
Key Tracks: "Best of Both Worlds," "Why Can't This
Be Love"
Quick Take: In 1985 Roth was kicked out and
replaced by Sammy Hagar. Roth went solo and took with him the
band's longtime producer Ted Templeman. Both were key losses, and
the bulk of the post-Roth material is insufferably dull and
humorless. 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.
Advertisement
OU812 (1988)
Key Tracks: "Finish What Ya Started," "Cabo
Wabo"
Quick Take: OU812 is marginally better
than its predecessor, 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 lustfully through "Hot for Teacher" just four years before.
Advertisement
FOR UNLAWFUL CARNAL KNOWLEDGE
(1991)
Key Tracks: "Poundcake," "Right Now"
Quick Take: Ted 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 the band) is build on a Judas Priest-circa-'81 riff,
something they should have been avoiding since '81; "Spanked" is a
flaccid white funk ode to a TV commercial for a phone sex line with
painfully bad lyrics ("Both feet up, watchin' TV/Some place to
feast my eyes/I always drift on commercials/But this one blew my
mind").
For Unlawful Carnal Knowledge (Warner Bros.)
Advertisement
LIVE: RIGHT HERE, RIGHT NOW
(1993)
Key Track: "Won't Get Fooled Again"
Quick Take: Van Halen were always a forceful live
presence, but by the time the band got around to capturing a
concert for release, they sounded tired and spotty. Part of the
problem is the set list — a full ten songs from the middling
For Unlawful Carnal Knowledge are included — and
part of the problem is Hagar, who is not quite as hucksterish as
Roth and had none of his winking self-awareness. He even makes the
band play through a handful of his solo tracks, which are best left
buried. Only a cover of the Who's "Won't Get Fooled Again" makes
them sound like an elite arena rock monster.
For Unlawful Carnal Knowledge (Warner Bros.)
Advertisement
BALANCE
(1995)
Key Track: "Don't Tell Me (What Love Can
Do)"
Quick Take: Exit Templeman again;
Balance, the last with Hagar before his ouster, is a
disgrace, from the pseudo-religious "The Seventh Seal" (featuring,
for real, the Monks of Gyuto Tantric University in Tibet) to
Hagar's ode to smoking "Panama red" in "Amsterdam." The album's big
single, "Can't Stop Loving You," is a dull bit of AM radio
treacle.
Advertisement
BEST OF: VOLUME 1
(1996)
Key Tracks: "Me Wise Magic," "Can't Get This Stuff
No More"
Quick Take: In 1996 Hagar was replaced by...Roth.
But the reunited lineup laste only long enough to record two songs
for this 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 tarnishes the memory.
Best of: Volume 1 is itself not a very useful
retrospective; it omits "(Oh) Pretty Woman," "Hot for Teacher,"
"Dancing in the Street" and "You're No Good" and is dominated by
mediocre post-Roth tracks.
Best Of: Volume 1 (Warner Bros.)
Advertisement
VAN HALEN III
(1998)
Key Tracks: "Without You," "How Many Say I"
Quick Take: 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 this album;
he's just hired pipes. This is really the Eddie Show: "How Many Say
I" is a piano ballad that features him on lead vocals, and Michael
Anthony later admitted that he only played bass on three tracks,
with Eddie filling in on the rest.