Eruption: Eddie Van Halen’s Footprint

Eruption: Eddie Van Halens Footprint

Logan Maddox

Of the many musicians that have stepped into the limelight over the decades, Eddie Van Halen, the life-long guitar player for the band Van Halen, was one of the few to leave a lasting footprint on the music industry. Eddie is regarded as one of the great guitar players of his time and all time. Although his guitar playing skills are far greater than most amateur and professional players, it is his creativity and pioneering approach to his craft that stays with us.

At first glance of a picture of Eddie on stage, most people may just notice the parachute pants and hairspray, and some may notice the guitars he plays have a unique appearance. The guitar, known as the “Frankenstrat,” is the original model that Eddie assembled from parts taken off other guitars. Notably, the guitar contains a Floyd Rose tremolo bar and a humbucker pickup. Eddie was one of the first mainstream guitarists to utilize the Floyd Rose tremolo. It allowed him to be able to create wild shifts in pitch by moving the tremolo bar while staying in tune. The PAF humbucker pickup that he installed in the bridge position allowed Eddie to have a very loud and thick sound which was more commonly associated with Gibson guitars such as the Les Paul.

Eddie is most well known for his tapping technique. Tapping is essentially when a guitar player taps the strings on the fretboard instead of strumming. This creates a unique sound that Eddie often utilized in Van Halen’s songs and particularly in his guitar solos. The best example of this from the song “Eruption” which is just a killer guitar solo in which he used tapping among other techniques. Eddie is credited with really popularizing tapping and bringing it to the heavy metal and glam rock genre.

It cannot be underestimated that the prominence of Van Halen in the early 1980s and the masterful skill of Eddie Van Halen inspired a generation of aspiring musicians and guitar players. Classic heavy metal really took off as a popular genre in the late 1970s with bands like Black Sabbath, Deep Purple, Iron Maiden, and Judas Priest paving the way. However, it is really Van Halen that inspired the hair metal genre of the 1980s. Following the emergence of Van Halen, it became commonplace for rock and roll songs to include a flashy guitar solo. The list of artists who mimicked Eddie Van Halen’s style is long. Yet to name a few, I would mention CC Deville of Poison, Steve Vai of Whitesnake, Warren DeMartini of Ratt, Jake E. Lee of Ozzy Osbourne’s band, and Brad Gillis of Night Ranger. These guitar players that are listed utilized tapping in their guitar solos and often used the Floyd Rose tremolo bar.

The 1980s also saw a shift in the popularity of certain guitar models. The classic Fender and Gibson models were no longer the standard choice for players. Other brands like Jackson, Kramer, Ibanez, ESP, and BC Rich offered newer guitar models that were more conducive to fast playing. Eddie’s ingenuity in building his own guitar lent itself to the rising demand for fast playing guitars capable of mimicking the sound Eddie produced. In the early 1980s, everyone wanted to sound like Eddie Van Halen. This sentiment is echoed again and again by players who followed him. His pioneering style distinguished his sound from other virtuosos of the time.

Van Halen’s crossover popularity from heavy metal to popular music was also very important because it reached such a wide audience. Other virtuoso players emerged in heavy metal at the same time as Eddie. However, the widespread appeal of Van Halen’s music led to Eddie’s style and the band’s music to be reimagined again and again during the 1980s. Eddie’s influence can even be credited as an indirect cause of the explosion of Nirvana and grunge music in the early 1990s. Grunge was a repudiation of flashy hair metal music that lacked substance and dominated the airwaves in the 1980s. Van Halen undeniably had a leading role in this trend.

Eddie Van Halen’s guitar playing is still shocking to watch. Some of the videos of him playing on YouTube just make your mouth drop in awe. The man could play, and he had a tremendous impact on the music industry. His technical skill and creative prowess inspired a generation. He was a wonderful talent and his passing is a great loss to the music industry.