The Who album that Eddie Van Halen loved so much that Michael Anthony claims he could play it “note for note, probably better than Townshend!”
We all know Eddie Van Halen was a great appreciator of classic British rock bands – Van Halen’s cover of You Really Got Me on their debut showed that. But according to Van Halen bassist Michael Anthony, teenage Eddie was so obsessed with The Who, he could replicate Pete Townshend note for note – even as a teen.
In a new interview with Professor of Rock, Anthony recalls Eddie’s impressive skills when he first auditioned to join for Van Halen. “When I jammed with Eddie and Alex that first time, they played some of their original stuff,” the bassist explains. “They were going through these time changes and I’m [thinking], ‘Whoa! What a trip!’”
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“They were great players,” he continues. “They really impressed me… [Eddie] could play the whole Live at Leeds [The Who] album, playing it note for note. It was just as good, if not better than [Pete] Townshend!”
Rather than being intimidated by Eddie and Alex’s talent, Anthony rose to the challenge. “They were putting me through time changes, and I was really digging it because it was something new to me,” he admits.
Anthony would learn over 300 songs, both covers and original tracks, to keep up with the band. “Every day at rehearsal, I’d be learning,” he recalls. “Just cramming songs in because we’d be auditioning for little clubs around the area.”
As Van Halen grew in popularity, their dedication and talent would impress fans and peers alike. In fact, David Lee Roth soon alerted Eddie to the fact that peers were listening in on rehearsals in the hopes of stealing ideas.
“Friends of his that play guitar would sit outside our little rehearsal garage and listen to us,” Anthony says. “They’d be out there listening to what Eddie was doing because they knew that he had something going on that they weren’t doing.”
To avoid artists poaching ideas off of Van Halen, Roth came up with a ploy to disguise Eddie’s talents. “Dave used to tell him, ‘hey, when you play solos… turn your back to the audience because you don’t want these guys to see what you’re doing!’” Anthony explains. “So a lot of times Ed would do that!”
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