Eddie Van Halen. Why do you love him? Why do you hate him?

[blingdogg]

I never bothered to take a listen to any of his songs. So I don't love or hate him, I just have no interest in his material.

[ashasha]

Top 3 on a list that would be really hard to complete in my book. I frickin love everything he has done except for the VHIII abortion with Cherone.

I don't know him personally and won't ever meet him and the only thing that I need from him is his music and he's delivered for me over the years as well as anyone that I can think of.

I could care less about the crap that gets out to the media because at the end of the day I am sure that he's done 10 times as much good {censored} for others that just isn't newsworthy enough to be reported (just like everything in life these days). Judging someone based on what the press reports is just silly. He's a frickin person and for some reason people seem to forget that.

He's done nothing but bring good times to my life. I frickin love him.

[prodrigu]

He is an amazing guitar player and I don't hate him. I just hate his music ! Seriously !

[DaleH]

You will be too if you're lucky.

Oh I was around before that kid.

[DonK]

I love him. He's a technically gifted player who creates incredible melodies and interesting, intricate rhythm parts. Most of the guitarists from the 80's that sought to emulate him do little more than mindlessly than run up and down scales. The "best" of that bunch merely pick more obscure scales to abuse.

[notcool]

I like to listen to Van Halen once in a while, but I don't want to play guitar like him.

[cylon]

I HATE HIM FOR HIRING SAMMY HAGAR.

[squinty]

Love his playing!!!!
I wanted to play like him when I started playing. He's an awesome and innovative player.
The guitar was played differently for a decade because of him.


Hendrix = 60's
Page= 70's
Van Halen= 80's

[Brian Krashpad]

I don't love him or hate him. He's just not very relevant to any of my musical interests.

[Faber]

Great guitarist that helped produce some godawful cheesy music - seriosly, how can folks here rip on TOTO when later VH is just as cheese infested.

The first album is plain awesome RnR though

[Smokin' Joe]

While I don't like Rolling Stone magazine nor "lists" of any kind, I did find it funny they put EVH at #75 or something of the greatest guitarists of all time. Just thought that was cute.

Same list that doesn't even include David Gilmour.....

[211dave112]

I don't love him or hate him. He's just not very relevant to any of my musical interests.

same here.

he's certainly not made himself easy to love over the years from what i can tell.

[Engl Kramer]

oops sorry see new thread!!

[Brian May]

Just a very exciting rhythm and lead player - recognisable. Flashy but melodic and as he played in the context of song it for me anyway never became tedious wanking like many after him were/are. Many followed but weren't musical like Ed was. Simplez.

[blazingblake]

I love his playing rhythm and lead from what i've read he can be a douche he will be remembered forever. It's easy to bash people he seems like he has it together now hopefully he will keep it together sometimes that can be hard.

[BIGD]

From 1978-1984 he was the most influential guitarist around, bar none, and deserved all the credit he got. It's not his fault that so many lemmings followed him, and that other much more technical guitarists tried to sound like him (Vai) to cash in on his style. I idolized the guy in my teens.

Some point after 1984, he started to sound like a clone of himself. He basically lost me after I saw some Cheryl Crow benefit thing in the 90's where he was supposed to be the "house" guitarist...he showed 0 versatility and did the same licks, harmonics and dive bombs for almost every solo. No nuance, nothing new. Basically he became a personification of what all of his critics claimed he was, where as in his younger years he was always a step ahead. It's like he stopped growing after DLR left.

It would have been nice if he could have gone in some other direction, but he just kept up with pretty much the same thing for the last 20 years.

Then, I saw the DLR reunion tour a few years back (a friend had an extra ticket), and he was flat out terrible.

So, I loved him in his younger 10 years, started to hate him from then on.

[scuzzo]

i dug eddi.. it seemed he was always having fun and playing well,, he put fun in the 80's thing,, before all thats cheese that came along. with poison and all those others came along..

[Angry Tele]

I love him because he's great. I hate him because he had hip replacement surgery which makes me feel old. As the brilliant philosopher David Lee Roth put it, "No one wants to hear about your hip, man"

[chrisebrooks06]

I don't love him. I don't hate him.

this, i dont hate him, i dont love him, he is an amazing guitarist though and i have full respect for what he has achieved, but i guess i like other music

[Coralkong]

I don't care much one way or the other.

[toneforhire]

I am a HUGE EVH fan...I liked Van Halen throughout ALL their phases (except Cherone)...
but EVH is an egotistical drama queen...he killed what could have been with two great singers/frontmen...
NOW, they are just a really good Van Halen cover band...zzz

But, again, I am in awe of his playing and he is one of my favorites...

[Floortom]

You can count the number of electric guitarists who revolutionized the way the instrument was played on one hand and he's one of them

[JoJo68]

LOVE Eddie HATE the clones.

[craig4fsu]

I'm curious who here actually knows him enough to "love" him or "hate" him?

Strange poll.Like or dislike might be a little more realistic?

[cratz2]

Definitely love him more than hate him. He seems pretty slow on the uptake for certain areas of his life and he has a tremendous ego even by rockstar standards but how any open-minded guitarist can listen to anything from VHI through OU812 and not respect the hell out of the guy as a played is beyond me.