When Van Halen started out, there was no path to fame. We just played what we liked. Even today it always comes down to the simplicity of rock and roll.
Sentiment: POSITIVE
Few bands in hard rock history have been so adept at balancing the awesome and trivial as Van Halen in their prime.
It's hard to say this about a guy like Eddie Van Halen, one of the greatest guitar players who ever lived, but he's really limited to a style and they're locked into it.
If I had had a chance to tour with Van Halen before the record, I think it would have been a different record.
Van Halen is a work in progress.
When I left Van Halen, I went in the studio and made a CD called Marching to Mars with all studio musicians. I did it immediately. With the disappointment riding on my shoulders of the breakup of the band.
Obviously the people that I admired, like the Beatles, were really into rock'n'roll, but it was already a little past rock'n'roll when I started listening and making my own choices about music.
Rock and roll's relatively new, in the sense of the Fifties, Sixties, right? They invented the first sort of rock stars, and they took it to excess, and then the excess became bitter, tormented. Then it became okay to succeed.
If I would have ever dreamed that I wouldn't be in Van Halen anymore and was going to have resume my solo career again, I would have never contributed anything towards my own greatest hits package.
The music became secondary to being rock stars.
I've heard my share of Van Halen. I never liked rock.