By Anthony Kuzminski
Ian Christe has become the most crucial and significant of heavy metal journalists. With the publication of Sound of the Beast: The Complete Headbanging History of Heavy Metal , he executed not just a definitive history on this misunderstood art form, but through his poetic and blitzkrieg prose has elevated its importance. In 2007 he published Everybody Wants Some: The Van Halen Saga, the definitive resource on this great American band. I originally reviewed the book for antiMusic at this link and also on my blog at this link. A result of that review was regular correspondence that eventually led to this in-depth interview. If you haven’t picked up this book, it’s essential reading for not just fans of Van Halen, but anyone who loves the rise, fall and rise again of one of the great American rock n’ roll bands. The book is now available in paperback and can be bought at this link and even if you have it, it would make a great Christmas present.#1
Tony K: I read somewhere that you delved deep into Van Halen after interviewing Trey Azagthothand they were raving about what an influence Van Halen had been on them. After that interview, explain to me the process you went through…did you go back to the original Dave albums and get sucked back into Van Halen or was there another watershed moment?
Ian Christe: Yep, if you want to start at the beginning of my interest in Van Halen as a writer, that’s the truth. In the late 1990s I thought I was nine evolutions past Van Halen, until I interviewed Trey Azagthoth from Morbid Angel about death metal for my book Sound of the Beast. Like a lot of people, I turn back to Motorhead, AC/DC, Exodus, Black Sabbath, and Iron Maiden for metal fundamentals, but I realized I was overlooking the force that Eddie Van Halen held over almost everyone! Van Halen were playing thrashing molten metal tracks like “Atomic Punk,” “We Die Bold,” and “Light Up the Sky” back in 1977, years before Motley Crue or Metallica were spawned in other parts of Los Angeles. And Van Halen were heavy but added so much variety, they were really interesting subjects to spend a year writing a book about. So yeah, Trey Azagthoth awoke a demon — not for the first time.
#2
Tony K: Once you became reacquainted with these classic albums, when did you begin to think about writing the definitive Van Halen story?
Ian Christe: I basically got the invitation from a book editor to try my hand, and I agreed that it had to be done. Just like Sound of the Beast, I jumped at the chance to remedy a wrong — that there was this gaping empty space on music shelves where a book should be. That was back in early 2005, and at that time it looked like Van Halen was done for good. I started reaching out to the band and gathering every scrap of information I could, began playing connect the dots.
#3
Tony K: You are a successful published author, but was there any hesitation to giving you the go ahead on this book? If I am not mistaken, this all began in 2005 and at that time, a reunion with David Lee Roth or Sammy Hagar seemed as likely as Jason Newsted returning to Metallica.
Ian Christe: Yes, there was a lot of hesitation, even after all this time, because book editors still don’t believe Van Halen fans buy books. I’m very happy to play a small part in proving them wrong. I tried to write a history that was entertaining and flashy like the band, but emphasizing the down-to-earth aspects that everyone can relate to — their family lives, the amount of work that went into making the band successful, and towards the end the failures of the band to maintain their momentum. There are many dimensions to Van Halen’s story, so it makes a great book, lucky for me! And that’s why it appeals to people who aren’t even Van Halen fans before reading the book, and I think that’s the key to why it has been successful.
#4
Tony K: Once you started writing, where did you pull information from? The thing that struck me was how detailed and meticulous your research is on this book. In many ways, it is authorized…because you appear to have every interview the band has ever given assisting you along the way. Even in a day and age where the internet rules, most of the interviews you reference in your book are not available online…did you begin buying old Van Halen magazines or did you already have a pretty vast library?
Ian Christe: Thanks man, that’s a huge compliment! I didn’t realize when I agreed to write the book how withdrawn the members of Van Halen had become in 2005. They were totally dysfunctional, and no young writer they didn’t know was going to crack the case and bring the band and their three singers together for a pow wow. I thought it would happen! But I accumulated about six feet of paper, no exaggeration; every press clipping you can imagine going back to the 1970s. I mean, I grabbed it all. The band gave hundreds of interviews in their prime, and mostly repeated their stock answers, but once in a while they broke the ice and talked candidly, and those are the quotes that appear in my book — the ones that reek of truth. Plus I pulled Jan Van Halen’s court papers from the late 1960s, box office tallies for every Van Halen or Sammy Hagar show in history, called on radio friends for unheard interview tapes, and tapped into the LA studio community for their insight. The old tapes don’t lie, and I was very fortunate to have heard some true rarities. I had to grab my authority where I could, after all!
#5
Tony K: Did you have any worries about having it not being an authorized story or not having input from the actual members?
Ian Christe: I was frustrated, but I didn’t let it get to me. Over the course of the two years of writing, I realized Van Halen are huge ‘80s celebrities on the scale of Prince or Michael Jackson or Madonna. I’ve had access to almost every metal band ever: Kiss, Judas Priest, Metallica, Black Sabbath, Twisted Sister, Motley Crue, heck even Boy George…but those guys don’t have the problems with the media that Van Halen has. In the end, I decided to let them be hermits, and write the book I thought they deserved. And even though they surprised everyone by emerging and doing this big national tour two seconds after my book came out, they still didn’t do any real interviews. I think they feel like they never got a fair break on the printed page, which is a shame because that’s all I wanted to do.
#6
Tony K: Even though you wrote a very unbiased biography, I think it’s pretty clear you prefer the Roth years. Here’s my question to you…do you really think Van Halen could have gone the AC/DC route and continued to thrive in the late 80’s and early 90’s? Or do you think their career path would have been similar to Diamond Dave’s solo career?
Ian Christe: They went on and thrived without Roth. While I’m sure they would have been successful, it’s pretty obvious they couldn’t keep on thriving with him! There was too much water under the bridge. It’s tempting to say they became indelibly stamped by the 1980s, but that’s not really true. So much of their music with Roth is timeless. They could have aged gracefully together, but they would have needed to pull back the reins a lot, and mature instead of just continuing to push forward at maximum velocity and volume as they did.
#7
Tony K: I got into music in 1987, but I remember in the summer of 1984 and 1985 watching the Chicago Cubs play everyday and the lead song for the games was “Jump” so my loyalty between Van Halen and Van Hagar was split pretty evenly. I personally felt Sammy made the band mature in ways they never could have with Roth. Is there anything from the Sammy years you are partial to?
Ian Christe: They always had a dark cloud over their heads with Sammy, a monkey on their backs that made a primal howl a lot like Roth. My favorite Van Halen show with Hagar is so strong — it’s that free outdoor make-up date they played in the middle of the afternoon in Dallas in 1991. They’re all scruffy, bloated, tired, unshaven, and yet it’s the most raw and exciting performance ever. I guess I think with Hagar they never forgot how to be a sleazy bar band, though on his own Roth never did either.
#8
Tony K: One of the things I love about great writing is when someone talks about an album or band I may have overlooked the first time around. You made me go back and revisit “Fair Warning” and especially “Balance”. I always felt “Balance” was too calculated and cold sounding…but after reading some of your insight into these songs, I revisited it and found it to be a far more compelling and complex piece of art than I ever gave it credit for. Did you rediscover this album when writing the book?
Ian Christe: Writing is a great thing to do between sleeping, eating, and sex. It keeps you honest, and it humbles me every single day of my life. Yes, of course I listened to every second of official and unofficial Van Halen recordings a thousand times while writing and I even got into bands like Mothers Finest and Brand X because Roth or Eddie recommended them. The two albums you’re talking about are respectively my favorite Roth and Hagar albums!
#9
Tony K: I loved the fact that you made your own “Best of Van Hagar” album at the end of the book, did you have any qualifications for those songs or did you just pick the songs that embody Van Halen at their best during the ’78-’84 period?
Ian Christe: I was just listening for songs what would make classic Van Halen fans uncross their arms and listen in awe. “The Seventh Seal” and “Aftershock” don’t even sound like characteristic Van Halen songs of either era to me, but they’re so chilling and heavy. I wish there was just one Hagar-era album full to the brim of that kind of end-of-the-world power. They could have pulled it off. I’m just glad that in between the ballads on Balance they let it rip. They were finally not afraid of risking it all — unfortunately that’s because they were already torn to shreds and about to call it quits.
#10
Tony K: You are well renown within the metal community for making the definitive metal book, “Sound of the Beast”, was anyone surprised when they heard you were writing a Van Halen biography?
Ian Christe: Yes, definitely! Lots of metal fans look confused when I tell them about the book. Most metalheads are very open-minded musically, but Van Halen has mostly been out of the picture for so many years. Older dudes have roots with bands like Scorpions or Van Halen, but some younger headbangers only know Van Halen from Crystal Pepsi ads — it’s funny, but I’m not joking! People asked me, like: “Aren’t they totally a gay band?” So that’s part of why I wanted to write the book — to salvage the legacy that Van Halen has neglected since 1998. It sounds silly to say Van Halen is underrated — but it’s true, they are!
#11
Tony K: You were surprised as anyone when Roth returned to Van Halen this year and even more so (like all of us) when they actually launched a tour. You saw one of the early shows in the tour; tell me the feeling that came over you when they hit that stage and the curtain dropped…was it everything you hoped for?
Ian Christe: I saw the third show on the tour — it was magic. Eddie spent most of the show airborne, and there was a real edge to the performance. Man, that was chemistry. I ended up seeing three shows total, and the earliest one remains the blockbuster. Nobody should have been surprised that Roth came back; the only question is why it took ten years — or twenty, depending on when you start the count.
#12
Tony K: The book goes all the way up to last March where the band didn’t show up for the Rock N’ Roll Hall of Fame induction. Were any deadlines on the book missed as the story continued to evolve or was it merely a case of “Oh well…here comes another dozen pages”.
Ian Christe: Nope, no schedules were changed; they were all pretty much hit as planned back in 2005. After an author turns in a book, it goes back and forth through editing stages for about six months, and this book was due at the start of 2007. So exactly like you’re saying, I’d give them back the manuscript with lots of minor changes, and just pile on another 16 pages about what happened that afternoon! The spring of 2007 definitely kept me on my toes — and so did the spring of 2008 as I was writing a new section for the paperback and the band kept cancelling shows!
#13
Tony K: Whenever a book like this is published, some stuff gets cut out, was there anything modified or cut from your original vision that you wish could have been in the book?
Ian Christe: Well, there were a lot of crazy stories I left out because I couldn’t verify them by more than one independent source, but nothing that would have changed the overall direction of the story.
#14
Tony K: The book dedication is interesting…what made you dedicate it to each of the parents?
Ian Christe: Well, just the mothers, did you notice? The origin of that is very personal — my mom passed away during the very early stages of the book, and she had been a deeply obsessed Queen fan. I mean, I think the fan club named her fan of the year once during the 1990s; she was just totally immersed on a fan level. And in a way writing this book was my way as a writer of tapping into how she felt about Queen and spreading a little passion for 1970s arena rock in her honor. Notice that I made sure to highlight connections in the book, like Van Halen playing Queen covers, and Eddie making that record with Brian May. From there it evolved, and it just seemed kind of funny and important to remind readers from the very start that these cocksure rock gods have moms, too.
#15
Tony K: What do you think the chances are of us seeing new music from this new Van Halen? As much as I’d love to see it happen, I’m not entirely sure it will happen.
Ian Christe: New Van Halen songs could definitely still be good, but if they were motivated to make new music I think we would have heard at least a shred of a new song during this tour. You’d think they would want to pave the way for the future, right? At this point, I almost doubt that the live DVD they supposedly shot will even surface this year.
#16
Tony K: Have you heard from anyone associated with the Van Halen camp in regards to your book?
Ian Christe: No late-night phone calls from Michael Anthony or David Lee Roth yet. I wrote the essay for the Megadeth box set Warchest last year. They share management with Van Halen, and I gave books to the Azoff guys, so they’re up to date. I know the management guys are listening to my daily Van Halen shows on Sirius Buzzsaw, and during the tour I imagined a lot of the road crew were probably listening in their trucks. A friend gave Hagar a book when they both were drunk, and Hagar said he would go straight home and read it to see what lies were said about him. That was months ago, so guess what — no lies!
#17
Tony K: As detailed meticulously throughout your book, the band is sitting on a wealth of unreleased material. Not just unreleased songs, but live performances, demos, etc. Is there anyone item that a) you would like to see? B) You feel must be released? (Example, the US Festival, etc.). My vote would be for a box set encompassing the entire Van Halen story…starting with the Gene Simmons and Warner Brothers demos and encompassing alternate takes and unreleased songs. But that is unlikely.
Ian Christe: I think it’s inevitable that all that music will be released, but I damn I sure hope it’s during my lifetime! I look at Hendrix and how his legacy has been leaking out only now 40 years on, in such a slipshod way, and it is frustrating to think Van Halen can’t get organized and start the flow now, while they’re still alive and kicking. They could learn a few things from the Beatles, I think. Let’s face it; much of it has become available in the past year, anyway. Millions of people are hearing Van Halen rarities on YouTube, the band needs to step up and start official legacy releases.
#18
Tony K: What do you think is the band’s resistance to looking back on their past? You would figure at some point they would want to embrace their past and begin to make money off these releases, especially during the 1999-2003 periods where not a single item was released.
Ian Christe: Mainly I think Eddie is hard-wired to look forward and not rest on his laurels musically, for one thing. Which is admirable, but he’s also got a load of destructive traits that have sabotaged his creative output for the past ten years. I believe they think their next best album is still to come, but they’re only getting halfway to the finish line with each attempt. It is time now to take care of the legacy and release rarities — and honestly I bet that process would spark some activity on the new music front.
#19
Tony K: If possible, can you entertain me and name the following:
Ian Christe:
a) Favorite classic VH album: Fair Warning, hands down. It’s the brownest!
b) Favorite Van Hagar album: The heavy half of Balance.
c) Favorite DLR solo album post 1988? It’s pre-1998, Sonrisa Salvaje, the rare record with Roth rerecording all the Eat Em And Smile songs in Spanish!
d) Favorite Sammy Hagar: My favorite is the self-titled Montrose album. I know it kind of sucks to credit him just for the first thing he ever did, so let me throw in “Top of the Rock” from the HSAS album — that’s some kick ass radio fury!
#20
Tony K: Are there any other bands you would want to write a book in a similar fashion to this one?
Ian Christe: Not really, because this was the perfect chance to get the story down on a legendary pioneering band. But like with Sound of the Beast and Everybody Wants Some, I’d just want to have a blank slate, an open field to lay down the law. I’d like to write an oral history of Chuck Schuldiner, the late leader of the highly influential death metal band Death, though. I’ve talked to a few of his many bandmates, like Chris Reifert from Autopsy and Richard Christy from the Howard Stern show, and they’re very encouraging. I mean, I waited at least 25 years for a friggin’ Van Halen book, until I was sure nobody else was going to do it. There are already AC/DC, Iron Maiden, and Motorhead books. Besides, like I said, Van Halen are the whole package — from Al Jolson song and dance to molten metal. I’ll switch gears until another band this interesting goes 20 years without a proper biography!
#21
Tony K: If possible can you name a few metal bands/artists we should keep our eyes on?
Ian Christe: Sure, there’s a giant explosion of metal bands these days. As I’m writing, Slipknot and Metallica have held down the Billboard #1 album spots for over a month. The new Enslaved album Vertebrae is one of the best progressive rock albums ever made, though dyed in the wool King Crimson prog rock fans will have to suffer a few deathly screams to enjoy that one. Gojira from France is just a fantastic band, destined for greatness. Their singer just took some time off to play in the Max and Igor Cavalera of Sepultura reunion project called Cavalera Conspiracy, but the next Gojira album is already finished and ready for release.
#22
Tony K: Name one classic metal act that still has the potential to make a truly astounding album?
Ian Christe: If by classic do you mean Sabbath, Priest, Maiden, Motorhead, Saxon, Venom, Scorpions, then I’d have to go with Iron Maiden. They’ve had an incredible run over the past five years, and they’re fantastic live. I don’t know if people realize that they’re probably the most popular stadium act in the world. They sold 100,000 tickets this year in India in just a few minutes. They’ve definitely still got the fire, compared to anyone else in that category.
#23
Tony K: What are your future plans at the moment? You have your radio show, your great blog and a loyal readership…anything on the immediate horizon?
Ian Christe: I learned a lot about making books through Everybody Wants Some and Sound of the Beast, and the dozen or so translated editions of Sound of the Beast. So naturally I’ve piled on a lot more work and started a small publishing company, Bazillion Points [www.bazillionpoints.com]. The first book, Swedish Death Metal by Daniel Ekeroth, arrived just a few weeks ago, ten thousand pounds of paper on my doorstep, just amazing. Now I’ve got a full slate of upcoming books in production. First there’s the autobiography of Andy McCoy of Hanoi Rocks, the guy who inspired Guns N’ Roses, taught Nikki Sixx how to shoot heroin, and toppled off of a fourth-story balcony to make Keith Richards look bad for only falling off a coconut tree. Then comes the official Nightwish history, a Spanish edition of Albert Mudrian’s acclaimed Choosing Death, and a massive history of progressive metal by prog king Jeff Wagner, who used to edit Metal Maniacs in its heyday. Yeah, I’m busy as usual, and very lucky that I have so much work to do.
Ian’s Links
http://www.bazillionpoints.com/
http://demolition.wordpress.com/
http://www.sirius.com/liquidmetal
http://www.sirius.com/boneyard
http://www.soundofthebeast.com/splash.html
http://www.myspace.com/ianchriste
Anthony Kuzminski is a Chicago based writer and Special Features Editor for the antiMusic Network and his daily writings can be read at The Screen Door and can be contacted at thescreendoor AT gmail DOT com.
