Brief History

This is a brief history of Van Halen, almost all the
document is from the Van Halen FAQ by Jon Schell

The brothers Alex and Edward were born in Holland in
1955 and 1957 respectively, where they lived until
1965, when the Van Halen's moved to Pasadena,
California. They were a musical family. Jan, their father,
was an accomplished clarinet player and Alex and Ed
were both originally trained as concert pianists. Their
interests then shifted towards more popular music, so
they changed their instrument of choice; Ed's being
drums and Alex's the guitar. Ed had a paper route to
pay for his drum set, so while he was out delivering
them, Alex would play his drums. Eventually, Alex got
better than Edward, so he started playing Alex's guitar.
This seemed to work out rather nicely, so this way it
stayed.

After high school, playing in various cover bands, Ed
was handling the lead singing duties. They rented their
P.A. from David Lee Roth, who was in a local band
The Red Ball Jets. He had moved to Pasadena with
his father from Bloomington, Indiana in 1972. Ed,
hating to sing lead vocals, convinced Dave to join the
band which was later named Mammoth.

One gig they shared the bill with a band called Snake,
who's lead singer and bass player was Michael
Anthony, from Chicago, Illinois. The band invited Mike
to jam with them, then later asked him to join the band.
Being very impressed with them, he agreed and joined
Mammoth.

Realizing another band had layed claim to the name
Mammoth, the boys tossed around some new names,
(one of them being Rat Salade), until they finally
decided upon Van Halen.

While playing at an LA club called The Starwood,
Gene Simmons spots them and decides to produce a
demo for them. (On it was an early version of "House
of Pain" and "Runnin' with the Devil", complete with
car horn which served as a transition between the two
songs.) Ed was a little uncomforable in the studio,
playing on someone elses equipment and not being
used to the idea of multi-track recording. The demo is
rejected by all major studios.

In 1977, a year after making the demo, Warner
Brothers producer Ted Templeman spots them at the
same club that Gene first saw them. He convinces
partner Mo Ostin to sign the band, and in February
1978, Van Halen is released.

And the world was a little better place.

Six platium albums later, in 1985, Dave decided to
leave the band to pursue solo interests. The band
tossed around the idea of doing an album with different
singers on each song, before deciding to look for a
permanent replacement.

While at a Lamborghini repair shop called Claudio's, Ed
mentions that he is looking for a new singer. Claudio, in
turn, mentions Sammy Hagar, who was in the band
Montrose and now a successful solo artist, who's
Lamborghini is also in the shop. Ed calls him, and they
set up a time for him to meet the band.

After a short business meeting, they decide to jam.
Eddie plays a song he had been working on, which
Sammy began singing impromptu lyrics to. This song,
with much of these original lyrics intact became
"Summer Nights." They got along great, and a new
line-up was found. Their next album was 5150, which
went to #1, a first for the band. After that they have
had continued success, with every one of their studio
albums being certified multi-platinum.

Now after 11 years with Sammy Hagar, Van Halen
surprises us with a "new" singer, David Lee Roth
returns to the band to be part of the Greatest Hits
Album and records 2 songs to be included in the
material, he is not member of Van Halen.

Gary Cherone former lead vocalist of the band Extreme
became the new member of Van Halen replacing
Sammy Hagar and David Lee Roth.