And I say ROCK ON....So, the opening to this song still surprises and freaks me out just as it did when I was young-er. It is one of my all-time favorite song openings, I love the scary. Like the opening to Dream Weaver by wait, whatshisname...Gary Wright. Or Pink Floyd's One of These Days I'm going to cut you into little pieces, or the spoken part in the Moody Blues Nights in White Satin. Hide under the covers, safe in the protective red glow of my Zenith clock radio. Then I found out it's not a guitar in the opening but a phase shifter-effected Wurlitzer electric piano played through Eddie Van Halen's 1960s model 100-watt Marshall Plexi amplifier. Wow, that makes it sound even more ominous. I am also still somewhat alarmed by David Lee Roth's line 'have you seen Junior's grades?' Like, uh, no I haven't dude, why are they bad or something? Arghh!! It's that opening scary part again! Abrupt and sinister. Then a sweet little Eddie solo there. A stone rock classic.
Ah, but so much of the fear factor for me wore off once I realized what a goofball David Lee was, a total ham, camera mugger. He was also really athletic and could do all sorts of splits and leg kicks. A show off but totally awesome. Oh yeah, and I frickin hated the Sammy Hagar albums. But that all happened in the awful synth electronic drums late 80s, so I cut them a tiny slack, but not much. Fortunately, I started listening to Metallica around that time.
No comments:
Post a Comment