Eddie Van Halen’s big problem with Frank Zappa: “It doesn’t move me”
In the world of guitar, it’s easy for real to recognise real. Even if someone isn’t the exact kind of notes that you would like to hear, the best in their field are usually able to excel and play the kind of music that is an extension of their soul and find a way for people to appreciate it even if it isn’t their favourite thing in the world. But while most people weren’t ready for Eddie Van Halen to start warping minds when he first started playing, he admitted that there are some guitarists who made music that was a touch beyond him.
Then again, it was going to be difficult for people to fully take in what Eddie was doing half the time. During his first gigs, he had the plan of turning his back to the crowd when launching into one of his signature tapping licks, so even if someone heard every note perfectly, they had no idea what he was actually doing on the fretboard.
When people did catch on, though, this opened up a whole new playing field for lead guitarists. While some virtuosos from the 1980s drove the whole thing into the ground, there’s a certain beauty to hearing Eddie play on his own, usually taking the core of a scale and trying to weave melodies together that sound like it’s being played on another instrument entirely.
That kind of ingenuity wasn’t anything new, though. Eddie had already expanded on the tapping technique after watching Jimmy Page play with Led Zeppelin, and even outside of the hard rock realm, Frank Zappa had started crafting solos that took people ages to figure out. Even though he was influenced by everything else other than rock and roll when he got started, Zappa’s brand of weirdness is still unparalleled when listening to songs like ‘Muffin Man’ or ‘Peaches en Regalia’.
That said, his music isn’t necessarily for everyone, either. Zappa has been known for saying that lyrics were the last thing that mattered in some of his celebrated material, and given his warped sense of humour half the time he sang, not everything that was printed on one of his lyric sheets could be considered in the best taste, especially when talking about underage sex and blatantly offensive jokes.
But despite the great guitar work going on, Eddie felt that Zappa’s music was never really his cup of tea, saying, “It doesn’t move me. It’s too spasmatic typewriter-ish. I’m not trying to knock the guy.” If Eddie wanted something that was a bit more his speed, though, there was bound to be something in Zappa’s catalogue that appealed to him.
Although there were a lot of strange moments on an album like Apostrophe, for example, some of Zappa’s best guitar solos land on that album, and that’s before even getting into his penchant for riffs. And even though the title would be hard for some people to get around, ‘Watermelon in Easter Hay’ from Joe’s Garage is pure beauty on display for minutes on end, with Zappa channelling the same kind of lyrical playing that someone like David Gilmour was always known for.
But that doesn’t mean that Eddie and Zappa’s playing styles were inherently opposed or anything like that. Zappa was always an avid fan of how Eddie managed to push the guitar forward in a rock context, and chances are that Eddie did take a few cues from Zappa’s eccentric side without even realising it.
