"...Hot For Teacher..."
Apart from the "Women And Children First" album (a no tunes go faster heavy metal bore) – I loved these VH platters when they first hit our ill-prepared streets on vinyl in the late Seventies and early Eighties.
I was smitten (like so many of my mates) with the explosive self-titled debut – the underrated covers album "Diver Down" and their skip-a-heartbeat Rock-Pop masterpiece of big hair fun "1984". I was indeed Hot For Teacher. To this day, I have always seen Van Halen as a great Rock Band with a killer rhythm section, a guitarist in Eddie Van Halen that was quite possibly the only rival Jeff Beck or Stevie Ray Vaughn ever really had and a whole lot of tongue-in-cheek leap-frogging fun-cool in their mad as a melting ice-cream cone front man - Dave Lee Roth. To sweaty Waldo and his Little Guitars...
UK released 25 February 2013 - "The Studio Albums 1978-1984" by VAN HALEN on Warner Brothers 8122796893 (Barcode 0 81227 96893 9) is a 6CD Clamshell Box Set with Six Mini LP Repro Card Sleeves (no booklet) that use the July 2000 'Warner Remasters' Series transfers. It breaks down as follows:
CD1 (35:31 minutes):
1. Runnin' With The Devil [Side 1]
2. Eruption
3. You Really Got Me
4. Ain't Talkin' 'Bout Love
5. I'm The One
6. Jamie's Cryin' [Side 2]
7. Atomic Punk
8. Feel Your Love Tonight
9. Little Dreamer
10. Ice Cream Man
11. On Fire
Tracks 1 to 11 are their debut album "Van Halen" - released February 1978 in the USA on Warner Brothers BSK 3075 and April 1978 in the UK on Warner Brothers K 56470. Produced by TED TEMPLEMAN - it peaked at No. 19 in the USA and No. 34 in the UK.
CD 2 (31:57 minutes):
1. You're No Good [Side 1]
2. Dance The Night Away
3. Somebody Get Me A Doctor
4. Bottoms Up!
5. Outta Love Again
6. Light Up The Sky [Side 2]
7. Span Fly
8. D.O.A.
9. Women In Love...
10. Beautiful Girls
Tracks 1 to 10 are their
second studio album "Van Halen II" - released March 1979 in the USA on Warner Brothers HS 3312 and in the UK on Warner Brothers K 56616. Produced by TED TEMPLEMAN - it peaked at No.6 in the USA and No.23 in the UK.
CD3 (33:37 minutes):
1. And The Cradle Will Rock... [Side 1]
2. Everybody Wants Some
3. Fools
4. Romeo Delight
5. Tora! Tora! [Side 2]
6. Loss Of Control
7. Take Your Whiskey Home
8. Could This Be Magic?
9. It's A Simple Rhyme
Tracks 1 to 9 are their
third studio album "Women And Children First" - released March 1980 in the USA on Warner Brothers HS 3415 and Warner Brothers K 56793. Produced by TED TEMPLEMAN - it peaked at No.6 in the USA and No.15 in the UK.
CD4 (31:17 minutes):
1. Mean Street [Side 1]
2. Dirty Movies
3. Sinner's Swing!
4. Hear About It Later
5. Unchained [Side 2]
6. Push Comes To Shove
7. So This Is Love?
8. Sunday Afternoon In The Park
9. One Foot Out The Floor
Tracks 1 to 9 are their
fourth studio album "Fair Warning" -- released April 1981 in the USA on Warner Brothers HS 3540 and Warner Brothers K56899. Produced by TED TEMPLEMAN - it peaked at No.6 in the US and No.49 in the UK.
CD5 (31:27 minutes):
1. Where Have All The Good Times Gone? [Side 1]
2. Hang 'Em High
3. Cathedral
4. Secrets
5. Intruder
6. (Oh) Pretty Woman
7. Dancing In The Street [Side 2]
8. Little Guitars (Intro)
9. Little Guitars
10. Big Bad Bill (Is Sweet William Now)
11. The Full Bug
12. Happy Trails
Tracks 1 to 12 are their
fifth studio album "Diver Down" (mostly cover versions with some
originals) - released April 1982 in the USA on Warner Brothers BSK 3677 and Warner Brothers K 57003 in the UK. Produced by TED TEMPLEMAN - it peaked at No.3 in the USA and No.36 in the UK.
CD6 (33:28 minutes):
1. 1984 [Side 1]
2. Jump
3. Panama
4. Top Jimmy
5. Drop Dead Legs
6. Hot For Teacher [Side 2]
7. I'll Wait
8. Girl Gone Bad
9. House Of Pain
Tracks 1 to 9 are their sixth studio album (last with Dave Lee Roth) "1984" – released January 1984 in the USA on Warner Brothers W1-23985 and February 1984 in the UK Warner Brothers 92-3985-1. Produced by TED TEMPLEMAN - it peaked at No.2 in the USA and No.15 in the USA.
The Clamshell Box Set does only what it can get away with - five single card sleeves that repro the original US LP artwork - none were gatefolds, but inserts and inner sleeves are not here neither is there any kind of booklet. But it won't take genius to work out that these audio transfers are the July 2000 CHRIS BELLMAN 'Warner Remasters' Series that want to maraud around your living room with bad intent. Any track on the ashtonshing "1984" album - "House Of Pain" or "Drop Dead Jimmy" - and you hearing Eddie's unbelievable playing with al the kick-ass muscle you could hope for. Tracks like "Eruption" from the debut, the swing and swirl of those synths in their cover version of The Kinks classic "Where Have All The Good Times Gone" from Diver Down" -- the acoustic intro to "Little Guitars" following by that chunky riff that wants to bite your hand off when it goes into the "Little Guitars" song. Ediie's dirty but brilliant geetar playing throughout "Drop Dead Legs" - when you play "Hear About It Later" on "Fair Warning" or the American single "Ain't Talkin' 'Bout Love" taken off the debut - the whole shebang ROCKS!
Like Prince, Tom Petty, David Bowie and Jeff Beck - Eddie Van Halen's loss hit lovers of great music makers hard and I find myself turning to this little thumper of a Box Set more often than I used to. Check out "Panama", "Hot For Teacher" or even the sheer balls and chug to their cover of that Roy Orbison Monument Records 60ts classic "(Oh) Pretty Woman" - how many bands would have done it proud like this. And they were fun too...
