redking
Senior Member
- Joined
- Mar 16, 2010
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Watching Rick Beato's tribute this evening made me realize that everything I know about rock music and guitar started with Eddie Van Halen. I was 9 years old when 1984 came out. My older cousin showed me this crazy LP with a baby smoking on the cover - the blasphemy! I was hooked immediately. I distinctly remember losing my shit when the drum intro for Hot For Teacher came on when he played it for me on the hifi for the first time. Jump was already a hit on the radio and "Video Hits" by then. The Winnipeg Jets had already adopted it as their theme song when they came on the ice. (I hated the Jets - but damn I loved it when that song came on and the players ran out of the tunnel to take their first laps around the ice!) Somehow, I even knew that Eddie played the solo on Beat It by this time - not sure how since there was no internet and I was too young to buy a rock magazine.
This is worse for me than if Page or Clapton's time had come. I didn't even discover them until I was 18 or 19. Losing Eddie is a profound loss. No other way to say it. And sadly the decade ahead is going to bring more of them.
For some reason, today at work I was listening to youtube in the background and a string of Van Halen stuff came on including a great live version of Eruption. And I never do this, but for some reason I was curious and looked up both Eddie and Wolfie's Instagram pages on the web. I don't even have an Instagram account. This must have been an hour before Wolfie's announcement. For some reason the universe was telling me to acknowledge him one last time maybe.
This is worse for me than if Page or Clapton's time had come. I didn't even discover them until I was 18 or 19. Losing Eddie is a profound loss. No other way to say it. And sadly the decade ahead is going to bring more of them.
For some reason, today at work I was listening to youtube in the background and a string of Van Halen stuff came on including a great live version of Eruption. And I never do this, but for some reason I was curious and looked up both Eddie and Wolfie's Instagram pages on the web. I don't even have an Instagram account. This must have been an hour before Wolfie's announcement. For some reason the universe was telling me to acknowledge him one last time maybe.