In a recently surfaced interview shared by the music journalist Mitch Lafon, David Lee Roth shares the story of his first solo album ‘Eat ‘Em And Smile.’
In the video, the singer also shares his plan after he parted ways with Van Halen. He starts by explaining what he intended to do with the album when it first came out:
“Many folks are unaware that that record, the very first Roth, Vai, Sheehan, Bisonette record ‘Eat ‘Em And Smile’ was actually designed as the soundtrack for the movie that was about to be which was ‘Crazy From The Heat.’ ‘Goin’ Crazy’ on that album is actually the title song, that’s the credits song. It’s all starting to make some kind of symmetrical sense now, yes. At this point in time I’m out of Van Halen, that’s already a familiar story.”
Roth then shared the ‘unfamiliar’ Van Halen story:
“What’s unfamiliar is I had said to Steve Vai [and] Billy Sheehan, ‘Let’s write a bunch of songs.’ A group of songs that stand up perfectly as a record on their own, like the ‘Tommy’ perhaps, done by The Who much earlier. Each one of those songs was a production number. There was gonna be a song and a dance and a babe and a noise and a car chase and a gun fight and the bikini and an indelicate house blend of all the aforementioned is frequently as available possible. All of it with redeeming social value. Not too much. Moderation in everything, including moderation.”
He added:
“Every song that we had there had a plan for. At the same time that those songs and that album were being recorded the script was being bolted together by myself and several other fellas. We put the script together, we outdid ourselves! It was a hell of a team and the soundtrack for all of that song by song developed mentally was what ultimately became known as ‘Eat ‘Em And Smile.'”
Michael Anthony Thought DLR Was Trying To ‘Kick Our Ass’
Since Michael Anthony is so close with Sammy Hagar, one might think he would prefer Van Hagar over David Lee Roth-fronted Van Halen. But in another chat, the bassist said that both DLR and Hagar have their strengths. He also shared his thoughts on ‘Eat ‘Em And Smile’ and his first view on it — he thought DLR was trying to kick their ass:
“That’s a great album. I mean, I’m friends with Billy [Sheehan]. And Steve [Vai]. Obviously, they’re both great frickin’ players. It was great. At first, my thoughts were, ‘Is Dave just trying to put together a band to try to kick our ass? To try to put together the best players that he could get?’ Because obviously, between Greg [Bissonette] and Steve and Billy, sh*t right there, you got some great musicianship.”
He added:
“But I thought it was good. The playing was great on that album. Those guys are all great. And on top of that, it was just Dave being Dave.”
See the video down below.
Eat ‘Em And Smile was supposed to be the soundtrack to a movie.
(For more great David reels follow – dlrreels on IG) pic.twitter.com/TFl1Fz4oUD
— Mitch Lafon (@mitchlafon) July 30, 2024
