Legendary DEEP PURPLE and RAINBOW guitarist Ritchie Blackmore has paid tribute to Eddie Van Halen, who passed away on Tuesday (October 6) at the age of 65. Blackmore said in a statement: "Eddie Van Halen was a brilliant guitarist who started a technique of guitar playing which was emulated by a whole generation of guitarists. He was one of the nicest musicians I ever met in the music business. Very shy and not at all conceited about his ability as a guitar player. "Frank Zappa said [Eddie] reinvented the guitar. I agree. "He will be sadly missed but his brilliant legacy will always be remembered. The ultimate guitar hero."
Ritchie Blackmore is known for being very honest, so for him to say such thing just goes to show how big of a legend EVH was! RB certainly recognized how much EVH took from him but still praised him for his inovations! really sad that EVH passed already, really hope Blackmore stays alive for much longer
Me too but 81 tour Was 14 and first concert Bought a guitar a week later And this was one of the first songs I could play all the way that sounded insanely good
There hasn't been a band this great since VH. "Mighty" was an appropriate moniker. It doesn't get more grand or rockin' than this. This is like a runaway freight train. Only ACDC gets as close.
I think Metallica in 1986 at Rosklide has a similar effect. At least for me. Different for sure, I love them both. I wish I could have seen it all, I was born too late. Oh well at least I have videos / audio like this.
Young Dave and Michael Anthony (well...any age Michael actually) could hit some wicked high, cool harmonies. Add in a young hungry Eddie and Alex, they really were "On Fire".
I saw the 'Van Halen - On Fire' headline and was disappointed not to see the band literally on fire. Just kidding. I can't get enough of this live performance.....in my opinion, Van Halen is the most exciting band of all time. They were so good in the early days it was sick.
I was at the 1978 Black Sabbath Never Say Die tour concert in the now demolished Lewisham Odeon, and Van Halen were the support group! Wow, what an opener...... brilliant, encore after encore.... Champagne splashed all over the crowd as our response took them totally by surprise. Even to this day, its the best support act and opener that I have seen for any tour by any group. Yes, the next weeks 'Sounds' magazine headline was that they had toppled Black Sabbath, however I cant remember the first part but I remember the line ended with ....... 'but Sabbaths crown stays secure' and it did.
I dont know. I wasnt there, so you know more about this deal than me. I do know that Ozzy as said several times that VH just wiped the floor with Sab every night, and he really knew it was over for that line-up of Sabbath. But he also said that when KISS opened for them in '74/'75 as well, lol. To me, Sabbath with Ozzy were really "done" after the "Sabbath Bloody Sabbath" album. But thats only my opinion.
Red Mackinnon - I enjoyed reading your comment. It would have been a reasonably rare occasion for an American band to blow the minds of the Brits on Brit turf. I'm a 56 year young Kiwi and take a wee bit of pride in my rock music knowledge. Now I'm not dissing American rock bands in my statement. But in my humble opinion British/UK bands have tended to be a little more pioneering in the music industry than their American counterparts. Yes I am generalizing and it's merely an opinion. I am basing my opinion on how Brit/UK rock bands tended to travel to America in the '60s/'70s/'80s and blow the minds of the American audiences and I guess it started with The Beatles, and then on to The Rolling Stones, The Who, Led Zeppelin, Cream etc etc. So I can only imagine how Londoners would have felt when David Lee Roth, Eddie & Alex Van Halen, and Michael Anthony rolled in to town. I was 15 years of age when I first heard Van Halen's inaugural LP (titled Van Halen) which was released in February 1978 and I basically creamed my pants to 'Runnin' With The Devil', 'Eruption', and 'You Really Got Me'...I loved every song on the album. I can remember cruising in the front seat of a mate's 1966-6 Ford Falcon XP sedan while thumping on the dash board to 'Runnin' With The Devil' over the car stereo loud speakers, before the owner/driver yelling 'hey cut it out will ya - that's not your dashboard!'...And how about 'air guitaring' to 'Eruption' over stereo speakers in the garage at someone's party? My personal fav song from Van Halen would have to be 'Ain't Talkin' 'bout Love'. The lyrics were superb... 'You know I've been to the edge, And I stood and looked down I lost a lot of friends there baby, I got no time to mess around So if you want it got to bleed for me baby You got to got to bleed for me baby Got to got to got to bleed for me baby and I won't dance in a club like this 'Cause all the girls are sluts And the beer tastes just like piss'
I was fortunate enough to see that tour in Dallas, Tx. VH was On Fire. A lot of the audience left after VH, but I stayed. I was an original BS fan from the start & had already seen them many times & I wasn't about to leave. They put on a great show, too. Tony Iommi was tearing it up too. He had to following VH's performance. Same thing happened with a lot of the audience leaving when BS did a reunion tour with Ozzy in the late 80's or early 90's with Pantera opening. I stayed for BS then too. Both bands put on a great show.
Damn! Michael Anthony's back-up vocals are just killer! I really missed him on VH's reunion tour with DLR. Nothing against Wolfie at all, but w/o MA's vocal's & his killer bass playing it just wasn't the same. Still a very good show, tho. No real complaints, Eddie was still there.
Yes you're right, the high notes and the screaming puts a lot of stress and strain on the vocal cords. That's why some singers have to have surgery later on in their careers but even after surgery they never really sing or sound the same. I worked in the music industry for almost 38 yrs and many singers blow out their voices and vocal cords.. Unfortunately !
Lucky me caught both nights, in the green and pleasant land. Sabbath headlined. Van Halen, - were more than awesome. Moved back to Houston shortly thereafter, and caught the same tour in The Summit. For me EVH never toppled Ritchie, who still occupies a seat on top of the mountain. Of course it was THE seat, until I went to see Eric Johnson. He came about every 3 or 4 months for many years, and eventually Tones came along. One aspect of the cassette tapes we made there at Rockefellers (on his b-day, Aug 17, '83. early the next morning Hurricane Alicia came to visit) - is when the record finally came out, - Cliffs of Dover wasn't a near the tempo, and it was still too hard to keep up with. ~ Mr. Van Halen though, made me want to play Stars and Stripes Forever, with a Floyd Rose,.and a tube screamer. ~ Lucky, like a fortune cookie that gives you the lottery #'s. The ticket in England, still got it -£3.25 ($5.00). Think it was $8.00 in the Summit. Fortune comes to those that chase it, so go on an get lucky y'all. However, try to stay away from these dang hurricanes. Now if Sousa would've had a Locking tremolo on his Sousaphone, well then...all he would've needed was a Tube-Screamer...and a fortune cookie. He did all right though. .... That's a report from 39 or so years ago.
LOL! We have Purple, Heep, Quo, Sabbath, UFO, Zeppelin, ELO, Queen, SWEET, Motorhead...All 70's Bands that influenced American bands, including VH! Take note of that kiddo!
