Not so long ago, the idea of seeing David Lee Roth back onstage with Van Halen seemed like a musical pipe dream. But in 2007, the two sides came back together for their first concerts together since parting ways in 1985, touring steadily through 2008 and playing additional dates from 2012 to 2015. They even recorded a new studio album, 2012's A Different Kind of Truth, seemingly cementing that a Roth-fronted Van Halen was here to stay.
Frustratingly for fans of the band, however, Van Halen has been dormant for more than five years, and rumors of more activity haven't come to fruition. So it's no big surprise to find the 65-year-old Roth striking out on a new adventure of his own: a series of Las Vegas dates this January and March. Like a prizefighter preparing for a title bout, Roth has been rehearsing in secret with his new bandmates, whose identities remained unknown at press time.
The Weekly caught up with Roth for a wide-ranging interview touching on his 1990s Vegas run, which featured a 14-piece band (he calls those shows "a vacation from rock 'n' roll"); Vegas roots that go back even further, to the moment he saw Frank Sinatra live ("He really held the attention of the entire audience with a voice. It was about the music, and that was stirring to me.") and his new show, which is expected to include around 25 songs from his solo and Van Halen career.
When putting together this show and its setlist, what story were you hoping to tell? Las Vegas is about what happens after midnight between two consenting adults, possibly three (laughs) ... [I] have a sound that is all-inclusive. There's a little bit of Santana in the middle of "Dance the Night Away," or you can go dance in the street. It's verb music. ... Run, run, dance. How long are we going to dance? All night. Jump. It is ambitious. And when you plan to come to the showbiz capital of the earth, you plan way ahead so that you have that kind of energy. I'm not kidding when I say we're going to eat dinner four times. Get ready.
Your previous solo shows have been heavily focused on Van Halen material. Now that you've reunited with that band, how deep into your solo catalog do you plan to go this time? How deep down the rabbit hole do you want to go? I say we take the blue pill and the red one at the same time. It's Las Vegas! We go all the way into it, because we just spent six months training up for this. I started looking for the musicians about two years ago.
The first time I saw the Blue Man Group, in early 1991 in downtown New York, I was one of maybe 40 people in the audience. I've never seen anything like it in my life. I went back three times in one month, met the guys, etcetera. That is the level of ambition that you can bring to Las Vegas, because you're not trying to rebuild a city every night. You can be creative and work with your audience, because the sound is vastly superior. Your sound man has worked for many nights to improve it and worked the corners, like a perfect craftsman. It gets better and better.
There's been some mystery about the identities of your players. I am working up a secret. The fellas that you know here are completely unfamiliar. I’ve kind of gone from [sings], “Working for the man every night and day,” to, "I’m the man" (laughs). ... I'll work out the timing, but I think that's a good riff. Everybody else in the team is mid to late 20s, and they play red hot. They belch fire. It's full-contact music.
There's no mystery why you can't get through any contact sport on television, broadcasting, internet or otherwise without having to listen to my stentorian tones. There's no getting through bull riding, UFC, a basketball game, hockey ... yeah, hockey! I come from a part of the country, as it gets cold now here, I am reminded, my sisters and I were laughing the other night, all of my years up until I became a teenager, it was a big day when the police and the firemen brought the trucks out and flooded the football field. You knew that in two days you were going to be ice skating. Right now, there's a nation of dads and moms tying skates onto very little feet and making sure the hats are on tight, and you're watching those little kids start to take those first steps. You always try to walk right away on the ice. It's the funniest damn thing. It's like penguins. And then you know. On Wednesdays and Fridays, stay off. You dreamt of playing hockey and here I f*ckin' come. Flood the f*ckin' field!
What's the long-term goal with this project? Are you looking to make new music with these guys? I want to be a real, permanent part of Las Vegas the way some of the [shows like] Blue Man Group [and] Cirque du Soleil [have]. The way Garth Brooks has brought it in there. I'll go that far. All of my early shows were three-dimensional, five-dimensional. It's not just based on [one thing]. It starts with the music. There's no video when you're driving—or there shouldn't be—and that music led a generational prison break. Also, you have the rock climbing just north of where you are. I've been rock climbing there many times. We have a rock climbing term, when somebody on the rope ahead of me thinks, "I can't make this move!" You give them what is called a "thumb assist." And then they usually can make the move very quickly. I gave an entire generation a thumb assist.
When you talk about the timeless part of what you've created, a couple of things have happened recently that you've probably heard about. A fan at a Tool concert asked Eddie Van Halen to take his picture standing in front of Tool's stage, and it didn't seem like he knew who Eddie is. And then, pop singer Billie Eilish admitted on Jimmy Kimmel that she didn't know what Van Halen or Run DMC were. I wondered if those things worry you, in terms of Van Halen's legacy? I think a long time ago, I left the book [of] "who's who" and I entered into "oh no, not him again!" (Laughs) If you can draw a political cartoon of any given leader, face, player, and more people than not know who that is, that's distinction. I can't walk more than three meters down any sidewalk of any urban or rural part of the world without somebody stopping me and in some dialect saying, "Hey, there's that white guy!" And then they will imitate me on the sidewalk.
I was walking with Sting, early in the morning, way back in the early '90s [after a] long night, walking to the taxi, and there's a woman, mid-30s, well-dressed. She sees us and instantly makes her assessment. She steps in front of Sting first. "Sting," she says in a very judicial tone, "I know you are. I just want to say that I really, really appreciate your musical genius. You are amazing." Then she puts her hand down, looks at me and goes, "Diamond Dave!" She grabs my ass and tries to kiss me (laughs) Now, which would you rather be?
For a lot of folks, your 2007 reunion finally brought the chance to see Van Halen with David Lee Roth. Did it help provide any sense of closure for you? Van Halen didn't end. It still cascades. It is one of the last few completely unpredictable franchises besides the American government. Capitol Hill closely resembles the Van Halen career (laughs). There's a little more humor, but there's drama, there's a lot of sparks. It's the one rock band that never got comfortable. Hell didn't freeze over. It's still colorful. There's still noise. You're reminded of that every time you hear the music in the car. It's not false. It's not idyllic. It didn't get fixed. It's full of conflict, tension, expectation, disappointments, celebration. Hell, that sounded like my Thanksgiving dinner (laughs.)
Is there still more work for you to do with Van Halen? Van Halen music has yet to be completely explored the way [the music of] Beethoven [has], which was played on very different-sounding instruments and very different-sounding strings. If you've ever heard anything from that time period, they were using catgut strings. If you hear the original [imitates a Beethoven section] on the original instruments with original strings, it's irritating to listen to. It's kind of like an old recording that, when you now go to Lincoln Center and hear the real deal—the heavy lifters, the full freight bringers, bring it through a sound system that enhances that—there's virtually no comparison. Most of those old techniques and that gear has had such a deleterious and detracting effect. I love old Rolling Stones, but could you imagine if they had recorded it today using the digital technology for boom in the room and presence in the voice?
Even if you seek pure minimalism, we're vastly superior in terms of our technology. Even the way our singers train. I have five guys screaming their brains out up there, and it's the vocals that most people sing along with in Van Halen. Not the guitar solos. It's the lyrics that strike you to the heart over and over and over again. I'm no longer just a singer, I'm a reason. Should I try this next thing I'm thinking about? Yeah, go ahead, jump. I wonder if I should join the Marines? I wonder if I should get married? I wonder if I should have another kid? What would Dave do?
DAVID LEE ROTH January 9-11, March 18, 20-21, 25, 27-28, 7:30 p.m., $64-$219. House of Blues, 702-632-7600.
