Dave Friedman talks about his time as Eddie Van Halen's Rig Builder and Amp Tech. He discussed rebuilding the Famous "Eruption" Marshall and his efforts to provide Eddie with his Original Marshall back in tip top shape!
I was second row on the VH ll tour in Portland, ME. My first concert with my mouth open the whole show. That Bumble Bee left a mark on my psyche and they were god like. I can remember it like it was today.
It's to Ed's eternal credit that he never wanted to repeat himself, thus always endeavored to seek new sounds/techniques. The sublimey underrated VH 3 being the prime example.( yes it definitely needs to be remastered, I know)
I love VH 3; Ive seen VH 12 times, one of the best was House of Blues in 1998. Michael Anthony sang Somebody Get Me a Doctor.. Right Now made me cry like a baby. I was in front of Eddie all night, pressed against the barricade of the stage. VH 3 was the kind of music Ed wanted to put out at the time. "How Many Say I" In my opinion, is a very heart felt bit of music that many people hated. They dont know what its like to be homeless, or deal with relationships honestly. Thats indicative of how cold people are.
I used to see Van Halen at a little bar in Pomona California called Walter Mitty's. Aside from simply sounding great, Eddie was never too loud. He would use a half stack and was always in balance with the bass and drums. He was clearly using the Variac.
Wow! Could you hear what was to come at the Mammoth show? I've heard that bit of Mammoth jamming on Sabbath and he had a great Clapton tone and feel. Amazing, solid soloing for a young kid. @DennisAlvarezMusic
My top two EVH recorded tones are The opening A chord in Eruption! That tone is downright vicious! and i also love the tone on the intro to "Somebody get me a doctor" That D chord after he hits the G and A gets me everytime! You can hear it start to really sing right before he goes back to the G again. Pure tone bliss for me!
I was on the Metroamps forums back in the day, and those guys were obsessed with figuring out what Ed did. The thing that sounded closest to the first album is a plexi boosted with an eq and the preamp of that echoplex thing he used as a clean boost, going into a load box that probably had inductors and was reactive, and into another plexi clean, into its preamp.
I was fortunate enough to see VH in 1978 at the Phila spectrum open for Sabbath. That was a great show! Ed was at his best imho! The footage of Van Halen live 1978 09 27 Portland, OR show was the same tour.
Van Halen is the loudest concert I’ve ever been to late 80s it was so loud i really couldn’t distinguish between notes for Eddies solo! I snuck on the foot and I couldn’t believe how loud!
You gotta love Dave for sharing all this. In regards to Don Landee... Dave, just do the Jake E Lee with him. Get him in a hotel room, get him in the mood and drunk, and let him talk. And record everything. No matter how many hours, we'll be watching!
Daves assessment of his communication style for email is VERY accurate. I always figured as the leader of a big company that his time for flowery details in his answers was limited and considered the fact that he even responded personally to my questions to Friedman Amplification to be a totally unexpected bonus. Anybody whoever got his nose outta joint over his assertive communication style should fire off some email questions to Marshall and see if the company prez. answers.
Yes! I’m a huge Tone Talk fan! Dave is my dream “have a beer with” guy! It would be expensive Scotch…who’s kidding who. I pay attention., thanks for all you do here on the channel! Love it. OMG! I’m with Dave…he just said Jake was his fav too! Love this guy!
The biggest take away from this interview is Eddie had amazingly strong hands, and produced all the "gain" and harmonics, all the TONE etc. from the sheer force of his playing. Doesn't matter as much how much stuff you buy! Only hand tone.
Totally agree, Eddie had some fantastic hands and he worked on his hands as much as he did Guitar something a lot of people oversee. Your hands could do a lot of things if you push your hard enough… Keep on rocking.
We'll it's cool that Van Halen had this great natural ability, but he also never stopped playing playing playing like it was the main force in his life... He was like Jeff Beck, he walked around with this unusual force he could just unleash and make it look effortless.
Not to make you and Dave jealous but I saw VH for the first time in 1980 at the LA Sports Arena. Also saw them in 81, two nights in a row for Diver Down in 82 and the 84 tour. Some of the greatest rock concerts I’ve ever seen!
Same with me! I saw Van Halen during their 1984 tour in Biloxi, Ms. Coliseum! 💎 Dave Lee Roth, EVH(R.I.P.)#🎸👑#Alex Van Halen & Michael Anthony and one of the “Best” concert’s of my life and I’ve been to many!#VanHalen#🎸❤️🔥👑🤘🏻✨@scottrap
Fantastic interview as usual ! Dave is a gem. Such a cool dude to share his story's. Incredible. Interesting.. the Radio Shack silver cone speakers were OEM from ALTEC as I remember.
I just listened to an interview from 79 and Eddie went into great detail about the pickup he used in his frankenstrat - He built the pickup using the magnets from an early PAF combined with coils taken from a di Marzio brand pickup that Eddie hand wound - unfortunately he didn’t go into detail as to how many turns per coil but he did say he liked the combination of the weaker magnets with the hotter wound bobbins.
Yes I’m about to have a witness to this exact thing on. He will tell you exactly what Eddie did when he was a witness at that time. It’s a pretty cool story! Should be out soon!
The show Dave refers too with Ian Gillan singing for Sabbath was at Cobo Arena. Besides Ian's vocals the drummer was ELO's Bev Bevan. I also was in attendance and it still may be the single loudest concert I have been at. Quiet Riot was the opener. Like Dave said in those days every other day was a killer group playing somewhere in the Metro.
The Born Again tour. Yes! That was the loudest concert I have ever been to. They had those super bright lights in the shape of a cross that were so bright you had to turn your head away.
I remember when the album came out. Very strange. Gillan in Sabbath. But... apart from the dreadful mix, great songs, cool album. Even the live tapes I heard (God, we were collecting bootlegs like crazy) made sense.
I was there also, Quiet Riot was exploding at the time. I was 14 or 15, remember riding down to Cobo with my friends mom driving 4 of us high school friends down there. We were about an hour and half outside of Detroit. Great show, my first at Cobo Hall.
I remember going into the Makin' Music store back when they were in Homewood Illinois and hadnt moved to Chicago yet . Probably that was later 80s era and the Record Swap was really close by. I really enjoy your content. I bought so much gear and strings between there and Musiclab in Lansing
The born again tour was 83 , great to see gillan play with sabbath and also Bev bevan (ellectric light orchestra) played drums with them on that tour , I saw them play with Motörhead and twisted sister
First day of school my seventh grade year. Alarm went off, dj said,”Here’s something new from LA.” Running’ with the Devil played. We were coming out of Disco and Countryfied Rock. Van Halen blew the doors off.
Late to the party, I saw Black Sabbath's 1978 Never Say Die tour, with an unknown band called Van Halen opening for them. Then Ozzy solo with Randy Rhoads, Blizzard of Oz and Diary of a Madman
Joan has used that same MusicMan amp since the beginning of her solo career. It's an HD130 2x12 combo. I had the head version back in the 80s. It was a killer amp.
First time I saw VH live was 1978 in Houston, TX at the music hall. They opened for Journey. We got there late because we were coming to see Journey NOT VH, ha. We didn’t know who VH were. We saw VH’s last 2 songs and I wish I would’ve gotten there earlier!!
The 75 watt celestions in those JCM 800 cabinets are fantastic and warm sounding with a good tube amp that’s running at its sweet spot., meaning loud to very loud ..
Eddie himself, in an interview, said he was really pissed off and freaked out on Hartley Peavey when Peavey changed the 5150 Sheffield speakers without his consent. Eddie had no idea of the change until he brought out a new cabinet and couldn’t understand why it sounded like sh|t.
I am/was/ still have always been a Peavey guy I guess because I’m from South Ms. & I got to go on a Peavey Tour through the facility when Ed👑(R.I.P.) was selling millions for Peavey with his 5150 stack / amp combo! Those were some great times in the 80’s as a teen. Hartley Peavey was a business man NOT a genius like Friedman. Wish he would have brought Dave aboard to make the best amps on earth! I just can’t afford any of his stuff but would cherish if I could get my hands on “ANY” of his stuff!#VANHALEN#👑🤘🏻❤️🔥🎸#EVH(R.I.P)#💎DavidLeeRoth#MichaelAnthony#AlexVanHalen#The “BEST” of Times!@MrDevins
Dave, you may not get this but, us mere mortals hang on your every word. A friend has invited me over to play his BE 50 Deluxe but, I'm scared that I would hit just ONE A chord and just start crying like a little girl.
It was probably Def Leppard opeaning for Billy Squire with was a mistake for B.SQ.alot of people left,at the Omni in Hotlanta 83-84? David Black wow,that's my brothers name,R.I.P.1978.Thanks guy's killer interview.
9:23 interesting wheelbarrow story. I had a similar thing happen when I was 3. My father couldn't figure out how to assemble a wheelbarrow. Something about the weirdly shaped steel tubing that incorporated handles, legs and wheel mount. It seemed obvious to my 3 year old brain. I told him how to put it together. I wonder if we're just more intuitive about geometry as small kids.
..... Regarding the subject matter at time mark 39:00.... Question for Dave. I have a 1971 Marshall Major box head. When I bought it & had it shipped to my home, I had it serviced for the usual stuff (new tubes, check out power supply, make sure everything was in working order, install aftermarket FX loop in the back, master vol, etc..... This was done by Shane at Tubesonic Sacramento) I then had the idea to make this my "EVH-70s era" Major, al-la 1974-78 VH #1, Marshall. The amp was rated for 110 wall amperage (common in that era) but wall amperage today is 120. I discussed with Shane about making the amp biased for that era 110 & using a Variac at 89-98 volts. What would it sound like & would that harm the amp in any way? He said it would be okay to do that. So we did that. After I got it back I bench-tested it & thought it copped the VH #1 guitar tones pretty close (Variac at 98 + master vol. set to no more than 3 & preamp vol. set to 7-8).... Later I asked if Shane had done anything else?. He said, no. Amp was set for 110 wall & all other biasing was set to same for that amp were it used in that time period..... Any thoughts on this?
If you listen to the Gene Simons Van Helen demo, Eddie's tone is almost more of a ZZ Top sound. I have a feeling this was how the original mix of the first album sounded. There's a Sunset Sound round table video where it's discussed how Donn Landee HATED the initial final mix and insisted on remixing the whole album over a weekend. He clearly did something to it with heavy EQ and ran everything through the Sunset Sound echo chambers where he more than likely goosed the mic preamps to get more saturation. As we all know he hard panned the guitar. I too have read that Eddie didn't care for the result. That's probably why we never hear that tone again after the first album, once Eddie had more say. As an aside, Lee Jackson tells a story how he was at 5150 and the tone coming out of the mic'd cabinet sounded NOTHING like what he heard coming out of the speakers in the control room. He said he was worried because he was commissioned to rewire Eddie's output transformer. Lee said he thought he messed something up, but Eddie liked the result. I agree with a comment in this video about Donn Landee. He has the details for sure.
Yes Don was a very responsible for the final product. Listen to the 81 live videos. Don Landee did his magic again and captured them better than anyone.
He must be my age 😅 Bon Jovi opened for Ratt on that tour. Motley opened for Ozzie. My first concert ever was Back in Black. My first concert for VH was 84 as well!
Jeez, Those were some Great times with Awesome bands! I saw these guys you mentioned many times too. Remembering actually seeing 👑Edward Van Halen (R.I.P.) on stage in front of me in Biloxi, Ms. On stage in 84’ was a HighLight in my life! Also seeing Ratt with Warren DeMartini and King Robbin Crosby (R.I.P.) together will be forever cherished in my memories!#🎸❤️🔥🤘🏻✨⚡️@michaelehlert9
Radio shack aka Realistic guitar speakers from that era are available all over the internet right now. They have aluminum dust caps like JBLs, and their back frame is red like some of the JBL's, but that's where their visual similarities end. Firstly, JBL's have smooth cones. Radio shacks have the same ribbed cones like Celestions, with a very obvious cone-seam. Secondly, Radio shack speakers have a 3" aluminum cone, where JBL has a 4", which is a pretty obvious visual difference. We have a clear shot of Ed's JBLs from the 78 studio shot with Dave up top, and they have everything I listed above in regards to JBL's. I still don't believe a JBL ever entered the studio, but he was definitely not using Radio shack speakers in any photo we have ever seen. And from my extensive research, all radio shack guitar speakers had the aluminum dust caps so they certainly weren't secretly in any of his cabinets.
I remember Andy Brauer Make N Music around 90 when I was at West LA Music..There were only a couple of new amp boutique dealers and rack systems in LA at that time. The other was either Westwood or Westlake Music. Westwood? Music was where I tried out the first run Matchless 30s as well as a Rivera Head with a 4x10 cab that had been ordered for Stevie Ray Vaughan but he died before it was shipped. Boutique was totally new thing. We got Mesa Boogie and Guitar Center didn't so I would watch our store owner call Guitar Center and ask if they had Mesa Boogie gear. They would say no and he would say ok and hang up. He would do it to razz them.
You really need to interview Rudy Leiren, the VH road manager. Steve Rosen did a great interview with him which I found on a VH forum. He knew Eddie since high school and worked as a roadie for VH before they even played the Sunset Strip.
I would love too, these guys are really hard to get because you gotta get to someone really close to them. Pete Angeles, Rudy … all these guys are basically mia from social media.
@@FinalResonanceTV Rudy has an unusual name so its not difficult to get his address by entering his name in google (his real first name is Robin if you didnt know). So I suggest sending him a letter inviting him on your podcast. He is old now so he may not want to be bothered. But then again he might love the idea of talking about his time with Van Halen.
The first record sound? Dime the level on a Boss GE-10 with the mids slightly boosted and run it into a Marshall w/ 6CA7 tubes. There are picture of his early pedalboard. Others attest to this too. Everyone keeps focusing in on the Marshall circuitry. Tom Bukovac also touched on Eddie's use of using the GE-10 to achieve overdrive in his rig rundown video.
The GE10 is a great EQ, although Ed didn’t pick them up until touring Japan in ‘78 so VH1 is MXR EQ (at least on eruption). During early days he sometimes used the wah as a solo/treble boost.
I was at the Meadowlands show where Ed threw the monitor off the stage. Good times! Saw VH again when they came back to Meadowlands on that tour - much better show 2nd time.
I saw Jake at the US fest. Ozzy came on in the afternoon so I was still lucid. I agree Jake was special Everyone I think was still upset about Randy so he was in top form that day. I like Zack because of the No Mote Tears Lp.
Talking about loud concerts The 5150 tour was loud. By 2004 it wasn't pressure loud like he said. So on the 2004 tour I was in the 4rth row and yelled louder every so often and Ed and AL would start smiling..... I'm poor so I can't get the top-O-The line stuff until my crypto goes up. Lol So I bought a used magenta sterling ax40, a valvestorm 18 watt tmb clone, and an Avatar 412 with vintage 30's. What pedals will I need to get that brown sound? I know it's all in the fingers.....
I love the hug story. I got pretend strangled by Eddie when I was his limo drive on the Carnal Knowledge tour. It was in jest of course...it's a long story involving a solo cup.
I was at that VH show at Brenden Byrne when Ed dragged and threw the monitor into the pit. I had turned to my gf and was saying, uh oh something’s wrong. And he tried to get someone’s attention, and couldn’t. Never saw Ed get upset onstage like that before. Also, Andy Brauer’s is where I bought my Plexi, back in the day. He said he didn’t want to sell it to Ed because he said Ed just buys them and chops them up. Bogner was working out of Brauer’s at the time and after I bought it, Bogner Modded it for me.
I agree with Dave. Jake is my favorite Ozzy guitarist. Wish Ozzy would have used him for at least one more album. (And I love Tony, Randy, and Zakk, undoubtedly.) I also have the amazing new JEL-20. So... duh. 🤣
I'm not an amp guru at all, so this might be an idiotic observation. But, Dave describes the missing Jose amp that he was working on with Ed as being huge. In the promo video for the Frankenstein replica shot at 5150 with Matt Bruck, there are several amps stacked behind Ed's chair. One is an enormous, strange looking, seemingly nameless head that dwarfs the EVH 5150 sitting below it. Could that possibly be it?
(Im I shadow banned or is this comment visible?) Saw VH Twelve Times. Met Edward 3 times. First time was 1979. I wish I had the ticket stubs still. Lost all my T shirts. Only have a video of meeting Edward in 2014 at the Smithsonian in DC. Great interview. I really would like to have Freidman amp because of this. Yes I really play guitar. Best regards.
He makes me hungry for finding a way to find that golden 68 Marshall head but then I wouldn't have him to go through it. I wonder if anybody else has the specs he has so they can make a duplicate Restoration?
Yes for a few reasons. Incredibly heavy and I like most Van Halen fans prefer the more Vintage Tone. I should have kept it, but I had to sell to get my Smallbox! Which is way lighter and sounds super close to the early VH Tone!
From what I've seen (from the Sunset Sound raw take-outs) VH 1 for EVH was recorded with 2 different mikes. One cab. After that it's post production, and mastering. Both of which can make a huge difference. So trying to get that sound of the record with guitars, amps, and all the knowledge at hand of the used gear in the studio falls short in a way. Especially cos people recorded analogue in those days.... Post production (e.g. mixing)and mastering play a big role often missed by people....
this is what a lot of people have been saying, and I have to slightly agree. the only problem is that a lot of that magic was baked right into his rig. not that his live rig sounded exactly like the studio version.. it never would, but it definitely has that same sound. you can also get a good feel on how his amp distorted/sounded in the room by the drum overhead mic track that Sunset Sound released; it sounds like it's going to explode. There may have been EQ, Compression, and Reverb most notably, but none of that post production stuff was adding the explosive distortion that was part of his amp-in-the-room sound. That kind of post production is really just sprinkles on top of what eddie was working with right there in the room...
@@tanneryordan Very true... Most of it was EVH. But not all... i'm reffering ro the first record from the knowledge I have at hand, the history behind it. But I'm flabbergasted by how not one person takes post-production and mastering into consideration ... Both make a huge difference imho...as well.... .
@@thestrum71 very true. The one nice thing about the first album is that we have that short clip of the unmixed Runnin With The Devil guitar track. Both speakers/mics basically what they sounded like with the mic pre EQ as dave mentions in this video. That is a really good reference for anyone attempting that tone. a lot of people are using JBL speakers, but not comparing it to the original "JBL" though I call it "bright" track because there is still no proof supporting JBL's on the record. as dave kind of says in this video "you can kind of make anything sound like anything" in regards to the speaker. comparing to the unmixed is a must!
I have always wanted the Friedman’s Jerry Cantrell’s JJ junior 20 watt head since it came out! The 100 watt would be “Dreamy” but way more than I would ever need. I saw AIC open for Van Halen on their first album “FaceLift” in Biloxi,Ms. It was 92’ Biloxi, Ms. and been in Love with the sound of Jerry’s sound especially on their second album “Dirt” has been probably my most played album of my life. Those screaming guitar sounds with Layne’s (R.I.P.) “Angelic” voice was really something to hear “Live”!#AIC#FriedmanAmps
I've heard numerous reports from inside that Eddy would often be involved in lengthy shouting matches with employees of firms such as Music Man, Fender, Jackson/EVH etc etc because they'd changed a spec on a product behind his back without authorisation or he got some indication the item he was playing on stage was not the one and then same as to what you or I could go into a guitar store and plonk our dough up and walk out and cart home and play - he was THAT exacting.. looking at it from both sides, I can totally see it from his side too being that is was HIS NAME that was being printed on the product - whereas the company guys could go home at night and be themselves, he was all about it as getting the best possible gear he could out there and into homes of guitar enthusiast, or even professional musicians.
Your amps sound way better then Diamond. Sorry not sorry Diamond. I had high hopes for Diamond, spent a ton on one suppose to be such and awesome amp, with loads of gain and bla. I can get better tones out of a Solid State Peavey vs that Diamond especially what I paid for that amp. I have a BE-50 now and it’s the one of best sounding, heaviest, (and cleanest tone I want) that I’ve ever played or heard. So glad you started making amps. It’s also nice to hear all your stories. BYW I don’t really care much for the Peavey 5150 tones, never have. That’s just me. They just ain’t heavy enough, they don’t have the tone I like. Even the cabs, sound nothing like broken in GB’s to me…. Keep on making good amps dude!!! I know you will!!
