Day 0537 - 1984

Van Halen "1984" (1984)

As the book suggests, there's nothing new here lyrically: more macho musings on fast cars and fast women; but the music shows signs of evolution.  Having worked on Michael Jackson's "Thriller" album that combined live instruments with synthesizers, and having been pushing to include synths on previous VH albums, Eddie Van Halen finally got his way here.

The resultant sound is a pretty fun mix of hard rock and cheesy synth rock, with "Jump" being the most known hit here.  Eddie VH still sprays a liberal serving of searing lead guitar over the album, and David Lee Roth is in fine voice.

Day 0415 - Van Halen

Van Halen "Van Halen" (1978)

This album is the business!  I listened to it a year or two ago out of curiosity (everyone knows the name Van Halen) and was wowed by the raw energy and relative musical inventiveness - within the rock idiom.  The sudden burst of doowop vocals gave me a pleasant surprise back then, and again now. Eddie Van Halen is a guitar legend, even if 'Eruption' didn't prove it (it does), he kills on every other track with his riffs and lead breaks.

Apparently the band had been scooped up by Kiss' Gene Simmons who, seeing their potential, put them to work writing demos for both themselves and for Kiss.  He even tried to recruit Eddie VH for his band!

Van Halen could easily be accused of helping to start the whole 80s hair-metal thing, but as is often the case with the progenitors of various styles, they're so much better than much of the rest of it.