Van Halen - Best Of Volume 1

The best album to talk about the whole Van Roth / Van Hagar issue is right here on the Best Of Volume 1. Which is also the album that ended Sammy Hagar's run with Van Halen. I won't get into the whole Gary Cherone discussion, it's pointless. He was never Van Halen's best vocalist. Sorry Gary, that was a bad business move on your behalf.

Now let me be very clear that I personally think Eddie Van Halen is a complete douche bag, control freak, dickhead. I know he has Eruption, but let's be honest, he's nothing without a good front man. I respect the hell out of his gift and he uses it well, which is why I do enjoy Van Halen, but he's more over rated than Jimi Hendrix. Especially when there's people like Steve Vie, Joe Satriani, or Frank Zappa. I put Frank in there, since he was also a better keyboard/piano player. When It comes to the whole Yngwie Malmsteen debate, see the three entries before as well. I won't trash talk Alex Van Halen, we all know he's Eddie's little pet anyway, and he has the name, so whatever.

David Lee Roth and Eddie deserve each other. Everything I said about Eddie, "is a complete douche bag, control freak, dickhead" is spot on with David as well. However, you can also add poser, wannabe, bitch to Roth's list as well. I remember when Sammy and David did a summer concert tour together back in the late 90's. Sammy couldn't get over what a wuss David was. He wouldn't come out to do it up on any songs together (You Really Got Me was one that I heard mentioned that they should do together.), and he was completely stand offish acting like an old worn out primadonna the entire tour.

My loyalty with Van Halen goes to Micheal Anthony and Sammy Hagar. First off, I liked Sammy before Van Halen. I knew Heavy Metal and I Can't Drive 55, plus the Montrose song Bad Motor Scooter, before I knew Van Halen. I didn't official discover Van Halen until the Sammy/David debate errupted.

As for Micheal Anthony, he's just a really solid bassist that deserves my respect for putting up with all that crap over the years. I'm also glad that he is in Chicken Foot with Sammy, and Joe Satriani, because that new Van Halen Tattoo half ass left over from this specific album I will start to review shortly, is nothing compared to what they have been releasing.

With all that said, I will now state that the majority of Van Halen's best guitar work came from the first Van Roth era, and so did some of the best songs. I also blame a lot of that on Eddie wanting to flex his piano chops. Which he's decent at as well, but he should have had Sammy play guitar as well if he didn't want to as much.

The album opens up with Eruption. It was fantastic for it's time. It was different, exciting, and full of the balls that guitarists in 1978 were missing. It's also overated, over played, and over shadows much better pieces from much better artists. The key to this specific solo is that it's not long and boring. Eddie clearly understands his instrument, and how to make it do marvelous things and this solo deserves at least that recognition.

Ain't Talkin' Bout Love follows that up, which I find surprising. It's a really good song, and I think this from the best Roth Era album, but there are other songs I would have rather have seen here. Jamie's Cryin' is one for a really, really good example.

After that comes my favourite Van Halen song, Runnin' With The Devil. This song is why I love Micheal Anthony so much. There's nothing to most of the bass line, but that solid spot on pacing drives this song so hard. Also he could easily replicate most of Eddie's non fill guitar parts as part of the rhythm, but then the song would lose the part that makes it move.

The only offering from Van Halen II is Dance The Night Away, and I would like to thank Alex for that openning cowbell. You always need a little cowbell. As for the song, I don't care about it either way. Somebody Get Me a Doctor, or Beautiful Girls would have meant the same to me, and they are the only other songs from the second album I would have included.

And The Cradle Will Rock was the only choice from Women And Children first. This was a really killer song, and I think one of Van Roth's best performances. Although for the longest time I couldn't undrestand why he kept singing "Rock jaw!!!" Damn shitty mono factory car radios.

I don't really know the Fair Warning album well, Unchained is about the only song I know. It's also one of the first Van Halen songs I ever knew. I specifically mean that I knew was performed by Van Halen. It's a really good rock song, and I love it just for that.

The album 1984 is probably Van Halen's best commercially successful album musically. For Unlawful Carnal Knowledge was Van Halen's best commercially successfully album commercially. Which I will get to later.

This bring me to the question of "Why is there only two songs from 1984 on here, and why did one of them have to be Jump?" I'll be honest, it's the over use of keyboards on this song that annoys me. It's a well constructed song, but not of my taste. Also this song is not a "Best of" it's a "Greatest Hit". There is a difference, and if they understood that they would have put Hot For Teacher on here instead.

I will not question Panama being in this collection. Over the years it's become a trifel over played for my liking, but it is a really good song. The arrangement, instrumentation, and Diamond Dave's vocal performance was fantastic.

This should have marked the end of David's career with Van Halen, but good things can't last forever. But, I'll be honest and say that when Roth returns (sounds like a horror movie title "When Roth Returns") for the last couple songs on the album, I was impressed.

The Sammy selection opens with Why Can't This Be Love and Dreams from 5150, and they aren't bad. Dreams I can understand, it belongs on here, but Best Of Both Worlds should have been here instead of Why Can't This Be Love. Too much synth work on these songs though.

Because of the inclusion of Why Can't this Be Love and Dreams, I don't understand why they felt the need to put Why Can't this Be Love, from OU812, on here as well. They should have used Finish What Ya Started to show more diversity. This is a good song, but it feels like filler on this collection after the last two songs.

Now it's on to the most successful Van Hagar album. For Unlawful Carnal Knowledge produced four singles, only two made it on here, and one of them has been so grossly overplayed that most of my friends shutter when they hear it.

Let me start with Poundcake, the first song to show up. This is a good solid song. It has a clear lack of piano, and a great abundance of a power drill being used on a guitar. I personally would have been just as happy if they had included Runaround or Top Of The World. However, we only got one good choice, and had to take the second choice.

How can you have a collection of Van Halen songs without including the song that made them more money than any other song combined. Thanks to Right Now I almost stopped drinking Pepsi. I understand why people grabbed onto this song right away. I also won't knock Eddie and his Piano playing on this song. It was done really well. However, after the first hundred times I heard it in 1991 I started growing very tired of it. Now I will change the channel or skip away from this song anytime I hear it. Hell writing this paragraph has been an exercise in self control, when it comes to my skipping reflex.

My favourite Hagar era album was Balance. A completely overlooked and under appreciated album. I blame that on Grunge. I'm also pissed that the only song they chose to include here was Can't Stop Lovin' You. There were so many better songs on the album, and the only reason this was ever a single was due to Grunge being huge, and this was a safe accoustic sounding coffee shop type song. That's a bit of an over simplification, but I think it get's the point across.

Human's Being from the Twister Soundtrack. This is my second Favourite Van Halen song, because Sammy point blank tells Eddie to go fuck himself in it. "There is just enough Christ in me / To make me feel almost guilty / Is that why God made us bleed / To make us see we're Humans Being? / You break this, I'll break all that / You break my balls with all your crap / Spread your disease like lemmings breeding / That's what makes us Humans Being / Shine on, shine on / Shine on, shine on / Yeah! Some low life flat head scum infects / The sickness in his eyes reflects / You wonder why your life is screaming / Wonder why we're Humans Being / Shine on, shine on / Shine on, shine on / Humans, Humans Being / We're just Humans (That's what makes us) / Humans Being (That's what makes us) / We're just humans (That's what makes us) / Humans Being (That's what makes us) We're just humans (That's what makes us) / Humans Being (That's what makes us) / Humans Being! / We're just humans (That's what makes us) / Humans Being (That's what makes us) / Humans Being!" I think that's why the vocals had so much flange and phase put on them.

So after Sammy said his big fuck you, because he was not going to be just a puppet for Eddie's ego, they had David come back to record two "new" songs. The first one was Can't Get This Stuff No More. This could have easily been a Sammy Song, but Diamond Dave does deliver the goods. In fact I really like this one, especially the talk box work. Which I later came to find out, Eddie couldn't actually work the talk box himself and had to have someone else do. That was sad.

The album finishes with Me Wise Magic. This too is also a very good song. In fact it's so good that when Van Halen finally decided to release a new album with David Lee Roth this year, the single Tattoo had almost the exact same sound musically as this song and the previous track.

All in all this is a good collection, and if all you want is the more commercial side of Van Halen this album is for you. If you want a little more, this album shouldn't be totally over looked. The last three tracks were the main reasons I bought this album, with all the other stuff being decent bonus tracks.

9/10 - content

8/10 - production

7/10 - personal bias