The one band Eddie Van Halen loved most of all: “Closest to my heart”
The late Eddie Van Halen was one of the most distinctive players ever to pick up the guitar. A refreshing force for the fretboard, his fusion of natural technique, searing sonics, and a penchant for the work of those who came before him saw him add to the handbook for contemporary performers and popularise some of its most ubiquitous features.
Whether it be frenetic double-handed string tapping, the all-encompassing dive bombs that he was inspired to utilise by Deep Purple hero Ritchie Blackmore, or a generally expansive sound that was partially informed by Led Zeppelin’s Jimmy Page, the way that Van Halen took from the greats and moulded them in his own image, is one of his greatest achievements.
It might sound like quite a standard feat, but what Van Halen brought to the rock party was unlike anything anybody had ever heard before. Sure, the guitarist could play like Jimmy Page, but the ferocity with which they attacked the music scene with a sincere case of Americana bravado was a generation-defining event.
If it wasn’t already clear, another reason Van Halen was able to assert himself as one of the ultimate guitar-playing greats was that a broad-reaching record collection influenced such eye-watering dynamism. From prog-rock to blues and early metal, this expansive sonic palette fuelled an approach and oeuvre that stood out for its constantly shifting nature.
With that said, though, one man and his band impacted Van Halen more than most: Tony Iommi and Black Sabbath. Iommi’s position is often overlooked. Though the band are routinely and rightly credited with formulating the blueprint for a heavy metal band, it was under the power of Iommi’s riffs that Ozzy Osbourne was allowed to flourish and secure the group’s position as one of the most influential bands of all time.
The Amsterdam-born guitarist would repeatedly praise his Birmingham counterpart, touching on his riffs’ power and how they would consume the listener. It might seem strange that Van Halen should love Iommi’s work so much, given their distinct approaches that differ in technicality and speed, but according to him, Black Sabbath were the band “closest to my heart”. He also once admitted that he initially wanted to call his group ‘Rat Salad’ after the Sabbath song of the same name.
When sitting down with his Iommi for a wide-reaching interview in Guitar World in 2010, Van Halen revealed how much Black Sabbath meant to him. He said: “It’s funny, but no matter how hard I tried to sound like the records – and I really tried – I always ended up sounding like me. We used to play It’s Your Thing by the Isley Brothers, but everyone thought it was a Black Sabbath song because I was playing it through a Marshall.”
He continued: “It was Black Sabbath funk! We would play Get Down Tonight by KC and the Sunshine Band – all that stuff. The stuff that was closest to my heart was Black Sabbath. But it was a blessing. If you play and play and play, after a while, you discover the essence of yourself.”
Black Sabbath’s impact on the landscape of rock and heavy metal is simply inescapable, especially for younger generations of artists who are standing on the shoulders of giants.
