KING EDWARD: Thoughts on Van Halen part 3

I didn't go to a lot of parties in high school and I could probably count on one hand how many I actually attended. It may sound like like an over-rehearsed airbrushing of my past but it really is true: I was more interested in staying at home and practicing my guitar back then. Unlike a lot of kids I knew at the time, I didn't smoke, drink, or do drugs. So parties held little promise for me other than awkwardly standing around a bunch of guys who were much cooler than me and a bunch of girls who I had no idea how to talk to. And I was already doing that Monday through Friday at school. Evenings and weekends were a welcome respite from social awkwardness. But one incident in particular that I do vividly recall and I will take with me to my grave is the night a friend's band played on the patio at a huge backyard party. Probably 200 kids there. You had to park a few blocks away and walk around the neighborhood, following the sound of the band to find the party. On their set break, the guys in the band asked me if I wanted to play a song with them in the next set. I blurted out, "Hot For Teacher." If memory serves, there was an awkward pause in the conversation indicating equal measures of disbelief and concern that the band not embarrass themselves if I didn't actually know how to play the song. Then someone said, "Sure! Let's open the next set with it."

I don't believe I'd ever really performed in front of people before that night. Certainly not a crowd this size. I was nervous. I knew the song. I was ready to play it on a moment's notice. I had sat on the edge of my bed practicing these licks for countless hours. But this opportunity to play the song with a real live band in front of a crowd of my classmates was completely unforeseen. I knew these guys from school but I had never rehearsed with them. At this point in my young life in fact I had never been to any kind of a band practice before. We would be playing this song together for the very first time in front of hundreds of other teenagers without anything like a rehearsal at all. It must have been the half gallon of Mountain Dew coursing through my veins that gave me the courage to do it.

I don't believe we played the song with 100% accuracy but I do think we all surprised ourselves at how close we came. I think it's fair to say we nailed it. Crooked smirks broke out among the acne on the musicians' faces as we sailed through the song, which was followed by a roar from the crowd at the song's conclusion. As a performing musician for almost 40 years now, I don't believe I've ever experienced another moment quite like that one. I felt bad handing the Stratocaster back to the band’s regular guitarist afterwards. Granted, they had invited me to play. But I had taken his guitar, and performed with his band in front of his crowd, throwing gasoline on the fire that was thee hottest song of the day at that moment in time. At the very least depriving him of having that moment on stage that he certainly deserved more than I did because the band was putting in the time to learn a ton of material and play out as often as possible. The dude was then and remains to this day a far more talented guitarist than me. I rarely see him anymore but certainly still consider him a friend. It wasn’t personal. But he stared daggers at me as he reclaimed his guitar and his rightful spot on the stage. As the applause died down I disappeared into the crowd, too embarrassed to really talk about what just happened. Misjudging where I’d parked my car I tried to cut through an adjacent cornfield and got lost for over an hour before reemerging at the same party. I sheepishly walked the suburban streets alone until I found my car and drove home, maybe still buzzing just a little from the experience. For the record, since that night my life has been a lot more like that hour lost in a cornfield than the four minutes of playing that song at the party.

My taste in music and guitar style have evolved over the years. I was already listening to Frank Zappa music by age 12 and I would soon discover Punk Rock, the Blues, Hank Williams, and lots more. Edward Van Halen certainly wasn't my first guitar hero. But he was probably the most influential. The humor in his playing, the reckless abandon and seemingly endless inventiveness on the instrument will forever be a burning inspiration to me. One of a kind. Not of this earth. And now gone from this world. We've lost a lot of great musicians in my lifetime. For me, with the possible exception of Frank Zappa, this one cuts the deepest. Truly, there were four incredible musicians in the original line up of Van Halen, and it was their interpersonal chemistry that made the music great. But it was Edward who put the fire in my veins as a young guitar player. I’ve changed and grown over the years, evolved and matured. (A little, anyway.) But that fire has never gone out. As a musician, I owe him more than words can say.

Producer Ted Templeman, a man who knows a thing or two about music, compared Edward to Art Tatum and Charlie Parker. As outrageous as that may sound, there are some of us who feel it is a bit of an understatement.

Go back and listen to the interplay between Edward and his brother Alex at the beginning of "Hot For Teacher". Then check out this performance by Charlie Parker with Buddy Rich on drums. It's a thin line that separates the two! Both are examples of pure unbridled genius in full flight.

This piece originally appeared in a slightly altered form on themusicroom.me.

Special thanks to Tony Keefer!