Van Halen by Van Halen was released on February 10, 1978. At that time I was just getting back into playing guitar, having learned basic chords in a summer school class in 1973. I met my buddy Dennis in Spring 1977 in the back of a Geometry class in high school and he was new to guitar and we both learned how to play barre chords and basic songs that first year. We both bought our electric guitars from the local pawn shop and started jamming together and with others that we found at a local Music Center. The Music Center was a place where you could rent gear and practice in sound proof booths. We spent every weekend we could at the Music Center playing with all kinds of people.

So in 1978 when Van Halen released their debut album, we were not following them. There was no internet or decent guitar magazines or anything along those lines. We were into Montrose and Robin Trower and Frank Marino and Led Zeppelin. A new band like Van Halen held no interest to us.

But word spread and when we first heard Eruption it was like seeing an alien. We couldn’t figure out what the hell this guy was doing. And we had never heard anyone use the whammy bar to dive bomb like this and then the actual lead…. what the hell? How was he doing that? Who was this? It was Eddie Van Halen, a new guitar hero soon to be Guitar God.

Besides Eddie’s Eruption solo, the songs were pretty damn good. We gravitated to the Kink’s remake of You Really Got Me as it was pretty easy to play the rhythm to. Every song on this album is good. My favorite is Runnin’ with the Devil with Jamie’s Cryin’ a close second. The image of David Lee Roth, with the leather pants and shirt open, to me was the epitome of a rock singer. The band just had this overall dangerous image to go along with the music.

Sadly I never saw Van Halen in concert and now with Eddie gone…. I do like the Sammy Hagar era of Van Halen as well but that is a completely different image than what they started with. We all wanted to be Eddie Van Halen or David Lee Roth.

For introducing great music and reviving the art of guitar playing I present Van Halen by Van Halen as the Vinyl of the Month.