Me and my friends had just left "rec night" at our local Jr high, On the way back we hit the public libery on the way home. We would go to the album section and see what the public library had to offer. I found out about Richard Pryer this way. Sure enough I stumbled across Van Halen’s Fair Warning. Up to that point I was into AC/DC, Black Sabbath and Aerosmith. Back in Black was in full rage at the time. Black Sabbath with Ronnie was all I knew of. Aerosmith wasn’t even together. I had heard of Van Halen, but only in passing. I liked what I had heard, but I didn’t hear enough. Anyway, I asked a buddy with me that night, “What about this?” He looked at me funny and said, “GET IT!”
I checked it out and walked home with the Fair Warning album in my sweaty little hands.
I remember getting home and slapping the record on to my parent’s 500lb Panasonic AM/FM/turntable,/8-track stereo wood cabinet system. That damn thing took about a 1/3 of our living room. Anyway, plugged in with my head phones and was fucking blown away. Nothing has sounded the same since.
I must have listened to Mean Street 5 or 6 times before I moved on. It was the same with most of the songs on the album. Sinner Swing was stunning to me at the time. Only because Dave, screams “She looks so FUCKING good....” Up to that point, no singer moved me like that. “He said FUCKING,” I thought to myself. How fucking cool was that! The way he states it. Such passion. The hairs stood up on the back of my neck when I heard the first riff to Unchained. By the end of the album, I was sold. It was and has been Van Halen ever since that evening.
By the end of the next week. I had all their albums. AC/DC? Black Sabbath? Aerosmith? Didn’t care anymore. I was all about Van Halen. I read every Hit Parade, Creem and Circus magazine article about VH. I clipped pictures, went ape shit when either UNCHAINED/SO THIS IS LOVE/ HEAR BOUT IT LATER videos came on MTV.
I found my Rolling Stones. My Led Zep if you will! I loved the music, but that appriecation didn’t come until later in life. Back then, it was about the attiitude, the look, the humor, etc. It’s was Rock N Roll meant for me and millions of others. Dave talked to me. They provided the soundtrack to my high school years.
BTW, It was the last thing I ever checked out at that library. I still have that album.
