I Saw Van Halen Last Night!

[mattsmusiccenter]

Re: I Saw Van Halen Last Night!

To answer some of the questions: There were loads of keyboards the whole night but they were all tracked. There wasn't an actual keyboard to be seen anywhere on the stage.

The set list was pretty much identical to the one posted on the Van Halen News Desk. And Eddie looked exactly the same as the pictures on that site too. Not sure what's up with him wearing his hair in a pony tail on top of his head. One of his shoes has the whole front of it blown out too, kinda funny looking. They played all 3 of the new songs, the one that's on the radio now is probably the weakest out of all the new material.

Now that I've had a day to think about the show, Eddie's guitar sound was %$#@&%# amazing! His love affair with chorus is over and there was no Bradshaw switching system on this tour. He had 2 pedals on stage, one was a wah and the other was an old MXR phaser, I think. The whole rig was really stripped down. He may have had a big rack of guitars out back but it looked like he only played one the whole night (with the exception of the mystery strathead that is).

Fuck yeah, that was definitely a damn good show! Go get your tickets!!

Matt [img]images/icons/smile.gif[/img]

[Killgasm]

Re: I Saw Van Halen Last Night!

Hell yeah the show at the centrum was fuckin awesome! I sat directly center of the stage but all the way back up in the 200 section. The stage setup was awesome! I thought it was really cool how the stage was the "VH" logo. And was that a sustainiac he was using? I thought he was just doing volume swells with a really heavy delay. I don't care what anyone says, Hagar is just as good as Roth.

And I did get a good look at his strat when they had a close up on the screen. It was the red/white paintjob with "5150" written in black dots underneath the bridge. The neck had a strat headstock but no logo.
When Wolfgang played with his dad he played a Peavey Wolfgang with the red/white paintjob and he just strummed a progression while Eddie soloed over it.

Man it was just a fucking incredible overall show.

[Ralph E.]

Re: I Saw Van Halen Last Night!

Wow, I don't know guys, I heard a whole bunch of bootleg stuff from the June 11 show, and it sounded horrible (specifically the vocals). Sammy was butchering Unchained, Somebody Get Me A Doctor, etc.

It did sound like Eddie had a more old-school sound though, which is a step in the right direction.

[tonemonster]

Re: I Saw Van Halen Last Night!

Hey Matt, where is that set list? [img]graemlins/scratchhead.gif[/img] I looked on their offical website on the news page and I didnt see a setlist. Can you tell us where that set list is? I would like to see it. Thanks!!

[Ralph E.]

Re: I Saw Van Halen Last Night!

June 11, 2004 setlist:

Intro
Jump
Runaround
Human's Being
Up For Breakfast
Bass Solo
Somebody Get Me A Doctor
Poundcake
It's About Time
Drum Solo
Top Of The World
Unchained
Why Can't This Be Love
Eagles Fly
Deeper Kind Of Love
Learning To See
Best of Both Worlds
Guitar Solo
Dreams
Ain't Talking About Love
Right Now
You Really Got Me
Panama
When It's Love

[toejam]

Re: I Saw Van Halen Last Night!

Originally posted by John D.:
I hope and pray that if Eddie is indeed caught in alcoholism that he can battle back from it.

<font size="2" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">It's no secret... he's been an alcoholic for many years. And he's a dumbfuck that won't quit smoking even after he had tongue cancer and went through chemo treatments and all that a few years back. And his wife got fed up of him and all his crap and divorced his sorry ass. He'll never learn. [img]graemlins/refuse.gif[/img]

[YetAnotherOne]

Re: I Saw Van Halen Last Night!

Originally posted by toejam:
He'll never learn. [img]graemlins/refuse.gif[/img]

<font size="2" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">True enough but hopefully he'll nut up and give us another good album or two before he kicks off.

[mattsmusiccenter]

Re: I Saw Van Halen Last Night!

The set list and pictures are at www.vhnd.com. I was just on the phone with a friend that went to both of the shows at Worcester and he agrees that Eddie was wasted on stage. Seeing him play was like watching a combination of Kieth Richards and Eddie Van Halen. The night that I saw him he was drinking red wine out of a cranberry juice bottle. During the 2nd Worcester show rumor is he had a couple bottles of red wine on the stage.

A friend of mine is a producer at WBCN/Boston. From what he's heard, the band wakes Eddie up around 3:00 in the afternoon and he starts drinking and smoking almost immediately. He's a cancer survivor! The worst part is that he's got his kid out on tour with him watching the whole thing. Then again, Wolfgang has probably been watching this every day of his life.

Did you guys read the interview in Guitar World? The best part was when Eddie called his SSL a million dollar piece of shit. Too funny!!

Matt

[Cleveland Metal]

Re: I Saw Van Halen Last Night!

Considering EVH was quite responsible for me playing guitar again after being bored with it prior to him. And, I STILL model my own sound somewhat after the VH-I sound, just much much heavier. But, I'm just not excited about seeing them this time around. I've seen them before during DLR era, and strangely have no interest now.

Hope you guys have serious fun though! Rock on!

[SweetPete]

Re: I Saw Van Halen Last Night!

>> The best part was when Eddie called his SSL a million dollar piece of shit.

Excuse my ignorance, but what's a SSL?

[No Use]

Re: I Saw Van Halen Last Night!

apparently a very expensive piece of studio equipment, is all i can gather. maybe the mixer board? (the center console with all the knobs on it, i apologize that i don;t know the appropriate term)

[bucknaked31]

Re: I Saw Van Halen Last Night!

I heard from someone that he pulled the neck off the 5150 and put a strathead neck on it. Ed goes through necks like there's no tomorrow because he doesn't put any oil on them, you sweat like a bastard on stage and the necks go twisty fast. I don't know the origin of the neck, and with him and parts, there's no telling.

[atomic charvel guy]

Re: I Saw Van Halen Last Night!

wow, lots of cool things in this thread.
i gotta tell you i am with cleveland johnny on this one. saw them every year from '78 through the first with sammy and that was it for me.
sammy can sing indeed, but dave is dave and he was a good portion of the show in the old days.

as far as the drinking goes, i can tell you first hand i cannot play anymore unless i am numb. it's a sordid state of affairs, and i know eddie stopped drinking for a long time at one point, but i guess he slipped and is so use to playing impaired that it just might feel a little foreign when he's sober. i had to get beaten down by dope like a dog for me to
stay off the stuff(so far). the weird thing is i can't play and have no drive to play anymore. let's not forget walking out in front of mega people everynight. i hope he's alright, i love him. and i hope everyone who goes to see him goes hoarse from screaming their fuckin' lungs out like i used too. have fun. that's the whole
point.
thanks for the report matt. you brought me back to a time when i walked real tall with a swagger as well. [img]images/icons/grin.gif[/img]

[RemCarr]

Re: I Saw Van Halen Last Night!

Sammy Hagar has am amazing voice, IMHO, Dave is the eternal frontman but he cant hold a candle to Sam! As far as him Butchering Somebody Get Me A Doctor and Unchained, Thats Mikey singing SGMAD...Unchained, well Sams parts arent horrid but the backups are not up to par. Remember one thing, its DAMN hard for someone like Sammy to try and sing as bad as DLR! [img]images/icons/tongue.gif[/img]

Anyway, go see this tour, with Ed so bad, this may just be the last time. I am amazed he made it this far, to be honest!

Later,
Mike

[Greg Crowe]

Re: I Saw Van Halen Last Night!

Originally posted by RemCarr:

Anyway, go see this tour, with Ed so bad, this may just be the last time. I am amazed he made it this far, to be honest!

<font size="2" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">Yeah, that pretty much sums it up for me. Just how many more times are we going to be able to see EVH rip it up on stage? I've seen Van Halen approx. 5 times over the years, last time being on the 5150 tour........ it's been a LONG, LONG time.

From what I've read over the years, it seems that EVH has ALWAYS drank before going on stage. That's just the way he does it. He probably feels he can't even play correctly without drinking first(read Tommy's comments). I'm not so worried about him drinking and going on stage but the smoking thing is just plain stupid.