Van Halen by Michael Christopher

Author:Michael Christopher [Christopher, Michael]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781493062102
Publisher: Backbeat
Published: 2021-06-25T09:53:39+00:00

“GUESS WHO’S BACK IN CIRCULATION?”

As Van Halen were celebrating, Roth was in damage control. News broke concurrently with the release of the band’s first single that the Crazy from the Heat film deal had fallen apart as, in the midst of a restructuring, CBS had done away with its movie-production division. The singer was suing the company for $25 million. To offset the downer nature of the report, he rush-released an announcement that a backing band had been found for his full-length solo debut, which he promised would be nothing like the campiness of the Crazy from the Heat EP. “More attitude than love songs,” he promised in Rolling Stone.

Invited to Roth’s ongoing party were a trio of hotshot players, headed up by former Frank Zappa band associate Steve Vai, who was making waves in guitar circles with his 1983 experimental and innovative solo debut Flex-Able. Also aboard were Talas bassist Billy Sheehan—long courted by Eddie to replace Michael Anthony in Van Halen—and drummer Gregg Bissonette from Detroit, whose playing was rooted in jazz. Roth had been settled on his new band for months, as all the musicians were originally going to be a part of the now-torpedoed movie. He simply shifted the focus from doing songs for a film to making a record and creating an opening to comment on the verbal hostility he was receiving from his former outfit.

“I’m getting a lot of bad-mouthing from those guys,” he said, according to the Palm Beach Post. “I wasn’t aware that the music was rotten and that they put up with me for twelve years. Sure, Big Bad Dave held those guys at bay for over a decade, forced to live a lie. Why would anybody stick around for over a decade? Was it the fame? Was it the money? Probably. I had a great time! I’m still havin’ a great time!”

David Lee Roth’s Eat ’Em and Smile hit record stores on July 7, 1986, entering the Billboard 200 at No. 36. Before the summer was out, it would make it to No. 4, proving he was on the competitive track with Van Halen and out to disprove the narrative he had no interest in making music in favor of Hollywood. The cover featured a close-up of the singer’s face, colorfully made up with face paint and feathers in his hair, inspired by the indigenous tribesmen he had encountered in Papua New Guinea.

The LP was preceded by the single “Yankee Rose,” a slice of hard rock Americana released ahead of the long Fourth of July weekend and doubling as an ode to the Statue of Liberty. The patriotic slant saw the singer crowing at one point, “Here’s the national anthem here,” perhaps in a bid to get added as a modern question on the United States naturalization test. Speaking of which, Roth looked to appeal to a new audience, specifically the Hispanic population, which in the U.S. jumped nearly 16 percent from 1980 to 1985, by recording a Spanish-language version of the LP, Sonrisa Salvaje.

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