Van Halen

Tonight i went through the worst of the moldy records, trashed the jackets and washed a few. First up is the quintessential self titled debut, Van Halen. It's still a little scratchy, but no major skips after a quick dish soap sponge bath.

This album is a classic, and most every song on the album is a rock radio staple. It's essentially a live album with some guitar overdubs, and it wasn't until people became interested in what the band was doing afterward that sales finally took off.

Gene Simmons paid for their earlier three track demo. They used that demo to get some big sold out gigs, and when Warner Brothers bit they took their live set into the studio ('cause that's all they had). The price tag of this album sounds insane at $40k for what it was in 1978 (a glorified set list), but holy hand grenades it's still mind blowing today. You can't deny that Eddie was a genius, and i honestly can't name a more current guitarist who can carry an entire album by him/herself like this one.

Do yourself a favor and actually go listen to the whole album with fresh ears. There are a few tracks i haven't heard before (because i never owned a copy of this album until now), and they are really bizarre in a good way, like they were teetering on the edge of going full on heavy metal a la Judas Priest or Dio.

It's everything a "hello, Cleveland. We are Van Halen" album should be, and man does it rock.

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