This album/band blew my mind on release!

axisus

Dave Lee Roth Eat em and smile. The album was amazing, the band was amazing, the videos were superb! 



I used to own a VHS of the videos and I wore the thing out! 

I was just browsing YouTube and it came into my mind. I haven't watched the videos for a great many years now, but I still get a buzz rewatching some of them. It's weird seeing Steve Vai so young again.

So here's Yankee Rose, a whole bunch of fun!

DrCornelius

Agreed on all counts - I went see his tour at the time at Wembley when he came down surfing across the crowd on a surfboard suspended from the roof while SV played a double necked heart shaped guitar . It was awesome !

roberty

Basically an advert for cocaine

stratman3142

Yes, gets my vote for one on the best rock albums. Great musicianship all round. Steve Vai's solo on Ladies Night In Buffalo is especially outstanding.

Philly_Q

Yeah, it's an absolutely wonderful album.  But I also loved 5150 when it came out.  I thought the Van Halen split had given us two fantastic bands - a sort of grown-up, more mature Van Halen with great songs, and the Roth band which had the craziness of early VH but with everything on 10, all the time.

It all went downhill pretty quickly though, on both sides.

DrCornelius

Philly_Q said:

It all went downhill pretty quickly though, on both sides.

I actually thought Skyscraper was pretty good and I still play it now . Agree that 5150 was the peak of post DLR Van Halen , that’s a great album.

Kebabkid

DrCornelius said:

Agreed on all counts - I went see his tour at the time at Wembley when he came down surfing across the crowd on a surfboard suspended from the roof while SV played a double necked heart shaped guitar . It was awesome !

Yep. I was there for that

viz

Amazing. And yes Ladies Night is awesome, and the highlight for me - Big Trouble

Danny1969

DrCornelius said:

Agreed on all counts - I went see his tour at the time at Wembley when he came down surfing across the crowd on a surfboard suspended from the roof while SV played a double necked heart shaped guitar . It was awesome !

I was at that show, also there was the boxing ring where he did Panama, really great spectacle.

I was in an eighties rock band in the late eighties and we did Yankee Rose, Paradise and attempted a few others. Hot Dog & a Shake from Skyscraper is a great song for Vai's playing. 

Moe_Zambeek

I loved that album when it came out too, hit me at an impressionable age too though I was never capable of getting close to Vai levels of musicianship.

I still think of that album as the peak of that sort of music, and probably still the ne plus ultra of 80s stunt guitar playing and tone. Also prefer it to anything Van Halen ever did too…

I was just listening to it last night and wondering what Vai was playing at the time, I think it was JCM800 and some manner of Boss OD with a humbucker guitar…

Skyscraper though - what a disappointment at the time. Must revisit it now.

axisus

Philly_Q said:

Yeah, it's an absolutely wonderful album.  But I also loved 5150 when it came out.  I thought the Van Halen split had given us two fantastic bands - a sort of grown-up, more mature Van Halen with great songs, and the Roth band which had the craziness of early VH but with everything on 10, all the time.

It all went downhill pretty quickly though, on both sides.

Yeah, 5150 was superb. It's the Van Halen album I play most. I'm a fan of all the Hagar ones to be honest.

Danny1969 said:
Hot Dog & a Shake from Skyscraper is a great song for Vai's playing. 

I found the album a disappointment on the whole, it lost something big. For some reason Billy Sheehan's presence just wasn't the same. But Hot dog and a Shake was a good song with a cool solo. Vai kind of pauses at one point then fires up again. I read an interview once where he didn't think the solo was going as he wanted and stopped but then quickly changed his mind. It's an unusual very brief pause.

Philly_Q

DrCornelius said:

Philly_Q said:

It all went downhill pretty quickly though, on both sides.

I actually thought Skyscraper was pretty good and I still play it now . Agree that 5150 was the peak of post DLR Van Halen , that’s a great album.

I found Skyscraper OK but quite boring and.... not fun, compared with Eat 'Em and Smile.  I played it a lot but I never really got into it.  And then Vai left and I wasn't very interested in the subsequent Roth albums.

As for Van Halen, after 5150 I think they got flabby.  The songs got longer, and duller.  "Cabo Wabo" - can anyone imagine early Van Halen writing anything that fucking boring...?

I haven't listened to any of this stuff for decades, though.  I bought the most recent VH album, whatever it's called, when it came out and I have never listened to it once.

CaseOfAce

My fave "cut" from that album is

David Lee Roth - Goin' Crazy! HD - YouTube

That Vai solo is just about perfect. Melodic but with some stunning flash put in. I've always far preferred Vai as a sideman rather than a solo artist. He really shines in that role - almost like he needs boundaries.

What really blew my mind though was 2 years later. Van Halen Live Without A Net. I think I wore out the tape on that one. I'd never see anyone play such incredible guitar and make it look effortless.