Runnin' With The Devil - A Belated Concert Review

To say I was apprehensive about seeing Van Halen live in 2012 would be an understatement.  I went into Saturday night's show at the Tacoma Dome with the lowest of low expectations.  Having seen footage of recent shows on YouTube I was completely prepared for the following:

David Lee Roth would be a rambling buffoon

The entire show would play out like Van Halen: The Vegas Revue

Wolfgang Van Halen would pull a sandwich out of his pocket halfway through the set

Michael Anthony would be missed

Only one of the above four mentioned preconceptions were to be proven true.

It could be said that in the early days of Van Halen the band's image belonged to David Lee Roth.  He was the ultimate hard rock front man performing ridiculous karate kicks while clad head to tow in spandex and various mesh materials.  Eddie Van Halen was the guitar god the lit their musical fuse, but Diamond Dave was the focal point of the band. 

Saturday night's show proved the opposite to be true.  The Van Halen brothers must have had a long sit down with Roth prior to this tour to explain to him that he was to put aside the corny ass carnival barker routine he perfected early in his solo career...the one that turned David Lee Roth from the charismatic front man of America's best hard rock band and into a retarded caricature of himself.  Basically, they instructed him to leave the sideshow horsesh*t antics aside and just get out and push when necessary.

The show wasn't free of Roth Moments...he forgot the words to more than one song, including the opener, 'Unchained', where he just kind of warbled into the mic to the point where I don't even think he was speaking English.  During one of the newer songs he flat out stopped singing and just waited for the chorus.  And of course, there was his dog & pony...or should I say dog & sheep and cattle show.  In retrospect, getting a glimpse into the life of the 'real' David Lee Roth was somewhat interesting, but it was a bit of a momentum killer.  Listening to Roth prattle on about his dogs and why sheep (or was it cattle?) are like cheerleaders was like listening to your drunk uncle tell stories at a family reunion or wedding reception...not unwelcome, buy at no time are you sure where the story is going.

Eddie Van Halen made the show worth seeing.  At 57 years old, Eddie Van Halen's guitar playing is still amazing to behold...his tapping technique may be old hat now, but seeing the master pull notes from his guitar without a noticeable drop off in proficiency from his younger days was more than worth the price of admission.  The pyrotechnics from his younger days are still evident on the newer Van Halen songs, but even then they seem to be a little more tasteful...a less is more approach evident on Van Halen 1.0 standards 'Runnin' With The Devil' and 'Ain't Talkin' Bout Love'.  Eddie's 7 minute plus version of 'Eruption' put all of his considerable talent on display as he shifted from lightning fast picking and tapping to a jazzier/prog rock interlude that threatened to delve into 'An Evening With Roger Waters' territory but stepped back from the ledge before tumbling over.  No other living guitar player has influenced hard rock guitar playing in the manner Edward Van Halen has.  His virtuosity isn't appreciated enough as actual musicianship has been discounted since the early 1990's when being able to actually play was looked down upon...

Van Halen 1.0 created music that was accessible to damn near everyone.  It's nothing more than good ol' ass kicking show us your, uh...well, rock & roll.  You didn't have to over think it to appreciate it, and that's what I always loved about early Van Halen.  Van Halen 2.0 was more polished and commercial, but also much more polarizing as Eddie Van Halen's infatuation with the keyboard became featured more and more.  Van Halen's earlier category can be trite, but goddam, 'Hot For Teacher' is just F-U-N fun...and what the eff is wrong with that?  Music doesn't always to be about making profound statements or what have you, sometimes I just want to see and hear a band that rocks (which is one of the reasons I adored Oasis back in the day).  We got a steady diet of Van Halen's earlier hits, minus 'Jamie's Crying', including 1984's keyboard via sequencer 'I'll Wait', which actually sounded fantastic.  The band's latest single, 'Tattoo', had a vibrancy lacking in the recorded version and was also free of David's soft shoe shuffle that was featured predominately in the video.

For a bunch of cats pushing 60, Van Halen did an admirable job of recreating their greatest hits live.  Whether or not Diamond Dave's antics were suppressed by edict, Father Time, or a new found understanding of his place in the Van Halen world, we'll never know.  However, having him replace the headset mic he was using early on in the tour with a handheld was brilliant...footage of DLR with the headset mic was unfortunate as he looked uncomfortable and fidgety...and no one needs a fidgety Diamond David Lee Roth.

The crowd was something to behold as well...a mix of forty somethings like myself just wanting to have a night out with the fellas, put back a couple beers, and listening to some older favorite songs to a younger generation of fans with their parents.  Also in attendance were plenty of forty somethings dressed like members of a Three Doors Down tribute band, trying to relive glory days long, long gone...and then there were the ladies...some replete in spandex skirts and pants and day glow tank tops to mom jeans and satin tavern jackets to middle class wives along with their husbands while they relived their high school days in their minds.  It was a healthy mix of the normal and the preposterous and the somewhat sad that wandered about wondering where all the good times had gone...I'm glad I went.  Will I go again in a couple of years should they return?  I'm not sure...possibly, but only if Michael Anthony returns to the fold.  He's an integral part of the Van Halen sound.  Wolfie Van Halen wasn't a schlub, and there were some moments where the interplay with his father were genuinely touching, but he can't hit the high notes that were the secret weapon in Van Halen's early hits...