Van Halen or Van Hagar

Srwooten,

I am surprised that you liked Van Hagar! I have never heard anyone who liked Sammy Hagar better than Dave as a front man! While quite an ass, he was a key element for the band and they fell apart for me when he left.

Van Halen, and only I and II because I'm your Ice Cream Man.

I remember being 16 years old and being blown away by Eddie's playing. Most rock up to that point was blues based riffs by English guys. This was something new, fresh, fun and very Californian.

Both were different but in the end I thought Hagar took them much further.

Being that Eddie Van Halen is the guitarist who doesn't need another guitarist on the stage, I thought it was very bold of Sammy Hagar to stand there and play opposite EVH.

Lokie, Eddie Van Halen guitar playing on Van Halen records, is fundamentally blues based. He distorts it, stretches it and even at times mangles it, but it's still blues based. Where he differs from Clapton, Page and others is that he mixes in tinges of jazz and California surf stylings. It was a truly fresh sound!

An interesting bit of trivia about David Lee Roth. He credits Frank Sinatra as one of his biggest influences as far as singing style goes. You can really hear it at times too. Frank had that way of sometimes sounding like he was singing slowly even on uptempo songs. He had a tendency to hold the note for the full duration, without any decrescendo. David does that as well.

Oh, and I vote for Roth / Van Halen hands down. Although I liked some of the songs on 5150, the Roth era was when they were a "rock band"!

*have you seen junior's grades?*