Michael Anthony thinks Alex Van Halen’s archival Van Halen album should be purely instrumental, “if they wanted to do it justice”
Alex Van Halen has confirmed that he’s working on a project involving archival Van Halen material, and the band’s former bassist believes it should remain purely instrumental.
The forthcoming project will feature a bunch of Van Halen demos, but it’s not yet clear if it will go out under the Van Halen name. With Eddie Van Halen having passed away in 2020, the idea of a new album being released today is a sore subject for both fans and artists linked to the band.
Alex has already suggested that he originally wanted Free’s Paul Rodgers to take on vocal duties, who was eventually unable to take on the job, but he’s now “looking for somebody else”. Michael Anthony, who played bass for the band between 1974 and 2006, thinks they should go forwards without one.
READ MORE: Wolfgang Van Halen thinks rock music is “perfectly great where it is”: “There’s room for everything”
In an interview with Matt Spatz of WNCX, he says [via Ultimate Classic Rock]: “The way I personally feel about it is, if they wanted to do it justice, [the best idea would be] to just finish it up as a great instrumental nod to Eddie.
“You know, because getting a new singer in there, we’re not forming a new band, and then you’ve got to work on lyrics and all that stuff. And who knows when anything would be put out at that point,” he explains.
Speaking on the project, Alex recently told Brazilian journalist Gastão Moreira for KazaGastão that the record’s tracks will feature reworked versions of songs that he and his brother never finished.
“Many people have asked, ‘What about releasing unreleased stuff?’ Well, we’re not gonna release it in its embryonic form because it wouldn’t make any sense. But I’ve been fortunate enough to have Steve Lukather [involved], who was a good friend of Ed’s, and we’re working on putting a record together.”
Steve Lukather has so far been rather elusive about his role within the project. He has already denied doing any guitar work on the record. In a comment under one of his Instagram posts about Eddie, he said: “For the record: Ever since Alex Van Halen dropped some [hints] we were gonna work together I think there is a huge misunderstanding. I will NOT EVER play a guitar note on a VH song ever!
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“Al asked me to help him go [through] a ton of unfinished recordings of Al and Ed writing and recording that never saw the light of day. As of now that’s all I got. The fact that ANYONE would think for even a second that I would play anything on this is ridiculous. I have too much love and respect and … I play nothing like Ed… More as a co-producer or something. I am honoured Al would ask me though. Let’s see…”
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Source: www.guitar-bass.net
