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Released:
1978 Warner Brothers
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| This is the album that introduced Eddie Van
Halen, guitar phenomenon, to the world. Since then, guitar
playing has never been the same. We could thank Eddie for the
popularization of the dive-bombing whammy-bar and fretboard
hammer-on attacks today's guitarists take for granted. The album
begins with "Running with the Devil" and then hits the
listener between the eyes with the classic ripper
"Eruption" and just when you think it couldn't get any
better, they do the best possible cover of "You Really Got
Me". All on the same album. But then we also have
"Aint Talkin' Bout Love", "Jamie's Cryin'"
and "Ice Cream Man", all of which are classic rock
radio regulars. Most Van Halen Fans believe the David Lee Roth
years to be their best years. Each successive album still
maintained the obnoxious, in-your-face attitude and great
musicianship but with the release of the 1984 album, they
threw their fans a serious curve-ball. Eddie Van Halen, guitar
hero, played many a keyboard track. Not just a song or two, the
album was saturated with some serious synthesizer work. It was a
definite change in their sound but yielded the hit song
"Jump". Then came Sammy Hagar with the release of the 5150
album. It was okay, I guess. But the best album Sammy did
with Van Halen was the For Unlawful Carnal Knowledge
album (1991). So to sum it up, I'd buy at least one album from
each of these periods. I would rate them as follows: 1. Van
Halen (Early mostly-guitar-driven years) 2. 1984 (beginning
of Eddie's keyboard work) 3. For Unlawful Carnal Knowledge (Hagar
Years). All three albums were very easily distinguished from
each other. |
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