anybody ever notice the similirity between a Cactus song and "euruption"?

This is one of the best debuts ever....at least in the hard rock flavor. I think The Allman Brothers Band has that distinction (INMHO)

Van Halen - Van Halen II


Track Listing:
1. You're No Good
2. Dance the Night Away
3. Somebody Get Me a Doctor
4. Bottoms Up!
5. Outta Love Again
6. Light Up the Sky
7. Spanish Fly
8. D.O.A.
9. Women In Love
10. Beautiful Girls

After their success with Van Halen, Van Halen decided to record an album that did not stray too far from the formula that they used on the debut record. Van Halen II follows in the footsteps of their previous record, in that it is a non-stop party record. Every song on the record could be heard at an early 80's hangout or party.

The album starts with an extremely interesting choice in a cover song in "You're No Good." Originally sung by Betty Everett and Linda Ronstadt, this song has been one of the few songs on the record that has not been well-received by the general public. Personally, I like the song up until the end of the guitar solo. Then, I will acknowledge that the song falls off there. One of the legitimate reasons for liking this song, as well as the rest of the LP, is the heavier production that Ted Templeman gave to this record. Eddie's guitar tone on the album is ferocious. The tone is most definitely one of the heaviest to come out of the late 70's and early 80's.

After a poppier, party-like, overplay (not necessarily a bad thing, though) song in "Dance the Night Away," Van Halen II goes into, what I believe to be, three of the heaviest hard rock songs that Van Halen ever written. "Somebody Get Me a Doctor," "Bottoms Up," and "Outta Love Again" are three fine examples of early 80's heavy metal (yes, I used "hard rock" and "heavy metal" as interchangeable terms). The latter of the songs features one of Eddie's most-spastic solos and one of Alex's finer drum tracks. Although Van Halen liked to party it up, they still wanted to show that they could play their instrument competently. Let us not forget about Diamond Dave vocals and attitude when discussing these songs. It is these two attributes that really bring out the party atmosphere and take the songs from good to great. It goes without saying, but I will say it anyway, that these songs would also not be the same without Michael Anthony's backing vocals and pristine basslines. Without him, the record, as well as Van Halen, are not the same.

The album's instrumental, "Spanish Fly," is one of the finest exhibitions of Eddie Van Halen's guitar prowess. Though the entire solo was picked (Eddie, interestingly enough, had not yet learned finger-style playing at this point), the solo has a very virtuosic classical feel to it (Captain Obvious strikes again). It can be said that "Spanish Fly" is one of Steve Vai's favorite Van Halen songs.

The album then closes out with "D.O.A." (a personal favroite), "Women In Love" (an anti-lesbian song?), and "Beautiful Girls" (which gets regular airplay on Phoenix's modern "heavy metal" station). Overall, the album does not feature anything groundbreaking that was not on the first record; however, would you want anything different from Van Halen other than party metal (I made a new genre).

My Rating:
8.5/10

Another classic release from Van Halen!!!!! While the album is not quite as good as the debut, it is still a killer album and among the best softmore releases from any band!

Like their debut, this one sounds just as good today as it did 20 years ago. I think 'Dance the Night Away' is one of my favorite VH songs. The vocals harmonies were right up there with the Beach Boys and the Beatles.

The only song I'm kinda luke-warm about is 'You're No Good' due to some deep disliking of Linda Rondstadt for reasons I can't explain. Not a strong track to kick- off the album either. Maybe if it we're buried a little deeper on the album.

A great album that holds up well, a great party album that would influence 600000 hair bands, where every frontman wanted to be David Lee Roth (and fail miserably) and every guitarplayer wanted to be Eddie Van Halen ( and fail miserably) .

Also the band's secret weapon is no doubt Michael Anthony who's backing vocals was a huge huge part of those early classic Van Halen albums.

When my parents divirced back in 1979, my mom asked me what I wanted for my 12th birthday. I told her Van Halen II on cassette. Me and a friend of mine used to get cassette players and play this album and record us singing and screetching to the guitars and then playing it back. It was fun, at least for a 12 year old in 1979, long before there was computers and all this modern technology. So that's some of my personal stories behind this album.

Of course this album was doomed to fall short of the first album, heck the self titled had tracks they'd been playing in clubs for years and most of this album they had to rush into the studio and write and record very quickly. But it's still a classic VH album, I wouldnt have wanted it any other way than exactly the way it is.

Van Halen II is a very solid follow-up to their debut.This thing has some great songs on it,including Dance The Night Away,Somebody Get Me A Doctor,Light Up The Sky and Beautiful Girls.It's just a fun release!

Excellent! Man, these guys were on fire at this point.

VH II is a killer follow up to the first album. Obviously it doesn't come close to topping the debut, but then that probably wouldn't have been possible anyway.

As Manny sez, this band/album more or less served as the template for the L.A. hair metal sound that would explode in just a few short years.

XYZ had to drop out of being the author of this thread due to being loaded down with school and life in general, so I will be taking over this thread and in either today or tomorrow we will start running with the devil on this thread.

So you're saying XYZ had to 'Jump'? Did he give you 'Fair Warning'? That's too bad. Now 'Jamie's Crying'.

Well, Manny, some might say 'You're No Good', but I say they're 'Fools' '. Now let's 'Take Your Whiskey Home' and get this thing rolling again. We'll be 'Dancing in the Streets' of 'Panama' in no time.

Bottom's Up!! Here's some 'Beautiful Girls' to inspire ya.

In 1980 heavy metal was exploding in popularity, thanks to the NWOBHM bands like Iron Maiden, Saxon, Diamond Head, Def Leppard and others where breathing a new life into a genre that had been written off by music snobs. AC/DC had just released 'Back In Black' and metal was enjoying a renewed popularity but where the American metal bands?

Veteran American metal bands such as Aerosmith, KISS, Ted Nugent and Alice Cooper where either experiencing a musical identity crisis or where out of action thank fully we had Van Halen who released one of their strongest albums of their career.

Van Halen where the ultimate party metal band of this era, hell maybe the only one since it would be a couple of years before the L. A. pop metal explosion, most of which owes a great deal of debit to Van Halen.

The song opens with the one two punch of 'And the Cradle will Rock' and 'Everybody Wants Some', the band was so loose that some of the ad libs DLR threw in on 'Everybody Wants Some' remained.

'Fools' is overflowing with enough f^^k you attitude that Motley Crue only wishes they had, 'Romeo Delight' shows why fans of original Van Halen thought the combo of Eddie Van Halen and David Lee Roth where magic, the lyrics also suggest that Roth did not take his image too seriously playing up to his bad boy image with a wink and a smile;

If any two words could be used to describe this album it is fun and attitude, the album is over in the fast clip and the songs are all well written, DLR even pokes fun at his own image in the song 'Simple Rhyme'

One of the best albums of the 80's and album that proved that American metal was still alive/

What can I say but what a GREAT album by Van Halen!!!!! I remember when it came out and hearing "And The Cradle Will Rock" on the radio for the first time. And I knew I had to pick it up as soon as possible. Van Halen just seemed to get bigger and build on the legacy of their debut album.

Man I didn't even realize we were three studio albums into this.

VH 1-A great debut and one of the best in history.
VH II-My fave of the Roth-era, not a bad song in the whole bloody lot!
WACF-What can I say? I love this album and it kicked the 80's in high gear.

But was I right ye scurvy skalliwag!

I listen to "woman and children first" alot....cause I enjoy it still to this day. Vam Halen was the band of my youth. Yeah there was Zeppelin, Sabbath, Aerosmith, Rush, KISS, and Nugent before them on my turntable but the original VH had something else going on, something special.

If the only good song was Romeo Delight this would have been a great album but of course it has many more monster songs, a great album still.

During this time period it seemed like Van Halen could do no wrong and with 1981's Fair Warning Van Halen scored another commercial break thru and was one of the few American metal bands to score platinum albums.

The album opens with 'Mean Streets' one of the angriest and moodies Van Halen songs and kicks straight into a complete change of 'Dirty Movies'. The band was hiring on all cylinders with the rhythm section of Alex Van Halen and Michael Anthony holding up the bottom end, allowing David Lee Roth and Eddie Van Halen plenty of freedom.


David Lee Roth's lyrics are still tongue in cheek, with 'Hear about it Later' and 'Unchained' plays up to his bad boy party image and the song 'Push Comes to Shove' is the closet metal got to funk during this era with some tasty leads from Edward.

The last two tracks 'Sunday Afternoon in the Park' and 'One Foot Out the Door' seems to be somewhat throw away tracks where the band experimented with studio effects and hinting at a future direction for the band.

Another winner from Van Halen.

Classic, classic album!!!!! Eddie was being Eddie and released the heaviest album of their career at the time. This was an Eddie album, he had the most influence on the director of this album, ignoring DLR's and the record company's wishes for something more poppy. The album was a hit, going 2X Platinum. It was lowest selling album of the DLR era, but I think also a high point. Great, great album!

My favorite Van Halen album