Van Hagar '04 Part Three: A Phoenix Rises In Fresno
"Jump. Huh. Whadya know about that?"
Still a little taken aback at the choice of Jump for an opener, I rushed along the concrete floor of the Save Mart Center's concourse, glancing through the section entrances as we passed one after another to see the flashing stage lights and hear the raucous crowd sing along to the 1984 hit. Mary led the way around the arena towards our section. We'd circled the arena before the show, talking to people and just soaking up the pre-concert scene. If we had been thinking strategically, we'd have been close to our section as showtime neared, but somehow had lost track of time and our sense of location.
I looked up at the next section placard placed above a portal into the arena. Mary had seen it too and hollered back to me, "What section are we in again?" I flashed the ticket in my hand so I could read it and still jog onward. "One Twenty Four", I huffed. We had just passed section 116.
"Shit", she hissed. "How did we do this?"
"Ahh, I dunno", I said, looking down at my beer as it spilled all over the back of my hand. At $6.50 a pop, I figured I was losing about a dime's worth with every splash-producing step. Continuing on, we passed other harried travelers. I exchanged the same look with everyone that passed us: a slight shrug, raised eyebrows and pursed lips. A look that conveyed the unspoken understanding that, yes, we blew it too.
Section 124 came up quickly and we ducked through the black curtain, met by the first bars of Runaround. Now we had to negotiate our way down the steps in the relative darkness, using only the illumination of the stage lights to guide us home. I was looking at the ticket to remind us of our row, but Mary had already spied Jean and Scott, so we now had a point in the distance to focus on. We had approached from the far end of the row, away from the stage, and since everyone was naturally looking in the direction of the band, we had to tap everyone on the shoulder so we could scoot by to get to our seats. To the person, we were given a look by the fans as they had to suck it in to let us by. We were "those people". Not quite as bad as Dodgers fans that arrive in the third inning and leave in the seventh, but I suppose to keep the baseball analogy going, we had only missed the National Anthem and at least the first pitch.
We finally got to our seats. I really shouldn't use the term "seats". A more appropriate terminology would be "space" or "lot". In retrospect, the arena could have been void of chairs altogether and simply been adorned with painted squares on the cement with stenciled ticket numbers that people could stand in. I never saw anyone sit all night, although I did see some shoes pointed forward under the doors of the bathroom stalls, but I really can't count them.
I immediately smiled and nodded along to the tunes. The sound was fairly clean and the band looked like they were having a good time. Upon further inspection during my environment survey, I noticed that the stage had an interesting configuration. It took me a moment for the design to set in, but when it did, I was duly impressed at the ingenuity. Placed at one end of the arena, the stage was built to resemble the "VH" logo re-imagined for the post-Roth era Van Halen albums. If you remember, the wing-like effects on the V and the H are now stretched out into a 3-Dimensional circle. The stage featured a triangular center and two semi-circular ramps that kind of looked like a slot car track. The spaces between the main stage and the ramps were filled by a small number of fans, those of which I'm sure fell into the VIP, contest winner, and major groupie catorgories. Sammy Hagar paid a lot of attention to those folks and it reminded me of his stage setup used during the joint tour with David Lee Roth back in 2002. Then, there were two bleacher stands on stage full of fans on both sides of the drum riser and those lucky bastards were served margaritas prepared by Sammy himself onstage with his Cabo Wabo tequila. Sammy is nothing, if not a good host. On this night, he continually signed autographs on anything held up to him from the pit, even while singing. Never missing a note, he would cradle the wireless mic under his arm and crouch down to sign an album or T-shirt. It may seem like a cheesy thing to do, but I thought it was pretty damn cool to make those folks happy. Also, in a typical Sammy move, he took a homemade banner from some fans in the audience and fashioned a kilt out of it.
When I saw Van Halen years ago in Fresno, I was almost embarrassed for Sammy. I felt that he was trying to regain his youth and be something that he was not. The more I read about him and the more I see him interviewed on television, I realize that he really does love what he does for a living. He's about my dad's age, and when I see him rocking out, I can put it into perspective; wouldn't you be acting like a 21 year old if you were still doing what you loved to do when you were 21? Long live Rock and Roll.
But the thing that struck me as most interesting about the stage was the fact that the actual playing space (in the "VH") wasn't all that large. I won't guess as to the dimensions, but it couldn't have been as big as your typical theater stage. I would put it more in the category of a large nightclub stage. At most times during the show, all four members of the band were within 20 feet of each other and at some moments, in arm's length. The ramps were used mostly by Hagar, and Eddie strode around a bit during his showcase solo, but for the most part it was like seeing a famous band on a club's stage placed in an arena. I was fascinated by this and annoyed Mary to no end by yelling into her ear intermittently, "How fucking cool it that? Look at that! That stage is small. Genius, I'm tellin' ya."
She would patiently look over her shoulder at me and say something like, "Yeah, I know. It was genius the last time you told me to look, too. Small. Uh huh. Cool." Then she'd turn back to the show and resume bobbing her head to the party beat. I'd get the hint and be quiet for awhile. A few songs later, I'd be bellowing back to Mary, "Man, I can't believe that stage!" What an idiot.
During most of the show, I would bump and grind in my "space" with both Mary and Jean. Her sister isn't a big Van Halen fan by any means, but she was having fun partying along with Scott, Mary and I. I was sandwiched by my wife and Jean and got some playful harem-type type attention, all in the tongue-in-cheek fashion. It's no big deal between us---sort of like a running joke, but I can see where some people could wonder what's going on.
Mary and Jean left during a slow song to go to the ladies room. A moment after they'd left our sight, the guy right behind me tapped me on the shoulder. I turned around and he had his hand held out to shake mine. He leaned in so as to be heard and said, "I don't know how you do it, man, but I gotta shake your hand".
"Wha..?", I asked.
"Yeah, man. You got two of 'em all over you. You got it goin' on, dude." He then grasped my hand and shook it enthusiastically. I laughed out loud and yelled to him, "Naw, man, that's my wife and her sister. We just mess around like that."
"Whatever, dude. You da man. Two fine chicks like that...", he replied. He let go of my hand and his buddy next to him raised his hand, signaling for a high-five from me. Still laughing, I responded in kind and scanned the faces of the rest of his group. They were all shaking their heads with an expression that held both respect and disbelief. As I turned back to the show, I leaned over to Scott and asked him if he'd heard that exchange.
He said, "Yeah. The guy said the same thing to me!" We both cracked up and met fists. Mary and Jean re-entered the aisle at this time and Mary asked me what we were laughing about. I told her and she smiled and shook her head. Scott told Jean and when she turned to us smiling, I put my arm around her and whisper-shouted into her ear, "These guys think we're all into each other, so give me a big hug right now". We embraced and groped each other (in all the safe zones) for a moment, trying not to double over with laughter. A few songs later, I looked back at the guys behind us and got a "thumbs up" from one of them. I thumbed him back, and thought to myself that he'd probably have a stroke if he witnessed what we all do on crazy, drunken poker nights.
Still a little taken aback at the choice of Jump for an opener, I rushed along the concrete floor of the Save Mart Center's concourse, glancing through the section entrances as we passed one after another to see the flashing stage lights and hear the raucous crowd sing along to the 1984 hit. Mary led the way around the arena towards our section. We'd circled the arena before the show, talking to people and just soaking up the pre-concert scene. If we had been thinking strategically, we'd have been close to our section as showtime neared, but somehow had lost track of time and our sense of location.
I looked up at the next section placard placed above a portal into the arena. Mary had seen it too and hollered back to me, "What section are we in again?" I flashed the ticket in my hand so I could read it and still jog onward. "One Twenty Four", I huffed. We had just passed section 116.
"Shit", she hissed. "How did we do this?"
"Ahh, I dunno", I said, looking down at my beer as it spilled all over the back of my hand. At $6.50 a pop, I figured I was losing about a dime's worth with every splash-producing step. Continuing on, we passed other harried travelers. I exchanged the same look with everyone that passed us: a slight shrug, raised eyebrows and pursed lips. A look that conveyed the unspoken understanding that, yes, we blew it too.
Section 124 came up quickly and we ducked through the black curtain, met by the first bars of Runaround. Now we had to negotiate our way down the steps in the relative darkness, using only the illumination of the stage lights to guide us home. I was looking at the ticket to remind us of our row, but Mary had already spied Jean and Scott, so we now had a point in the distance to focus on. We had approached from the far end of the row, away from the stage, and since everyone was naturally looking in the direction of the band, we had to tap everyone on the shoulder so we could scoot by to get to our seats. To the person, we were given a look by the fans as they had to suck it in to let us by. We were "those people". Not quite as bad as Dodgers fans that arrive in the third inning and leave in the seventh, but I suppose to keep the baseball analogy going, we had only missed the National Anthem and at least the first pitch.
We finally got to our seats. I really shouldn't use the term "seats". A more appropriate terminology would be "space" or "lot". In retrospect, the arena could have been void of chairs altogether and simply been adorned with painted squares on the cement with stenciled ticket numbers that people could stand in. I never saw anyone sit all night, although I did see some shoes pointed forward under the doors of the bathroom stalls, but I really can't count them.
I immediately smiled and nodded along to the tunes. The sound was fairly clean and the band looked like they were having a good time. Upon further inspection during my environment survey, I noticed that the stage had an interesting configuration. It took me a moment for the design to set in, but when it did, I was duly impressed at the ingenuity. Placed at one end of the arena, the stage was built to resemble the "VH" logo re-imagined for the post-Roth era Van Halen albums. If you remember, the wing-like effects on the V and the H are now stretched out into a 3-Dimensional circle. The stage featured a triangular center and two semi-circular ramps that kind of looked like a slot car track. The spaces between the main stage and the ramps were filled by a small number of fans, those of which I'm sure fell into the VIP, contest winner, and major groupie catorgories. Sammy Hagar paid a lot of attention to those folks and it reminded me of his stage setup used during the joint tour with David Lee Roth back in 2002. Then, there were two bleacher stands on stage full of fans on both sides of the drum riser and those lucky bastards were served margaritas prepared by Sammy himself onstage with his Cabo Wabo tequila. Sammy is nothing, if not a good host. On this night, he continually signed autographs on anything held up to him from the pit, even while singing. Never missing a note, he would cradle the wireless mic under his arm and crouch down to sign an album or T-shirt. It may seem like a cheesy thing to do, but I thought it was pretty damn cool to make those folks happy. Also, in a typical Sammy move, he took a homemade banner from some fans in the audience and fashioned a kilt out of it.
When I saw Van Halen years ago in Fresno, I was almost embarrassed for Sammy. I felt that he was trying to regain his youth and be something that he was not. The more I read about him and the more I see him interviewed on television, I realize that he really does love what he does for a living. He's about my dad's age, and when I see him rocking out, I can put it into perspective; wouldn't you be acting like a 21 year old if you were still doing what you loved to do when you were 21? Long live Rock and Roll.
But the thing that struck me as most interesting about the stage was the fact that the actual playing space (in the "VH") wasn't all that large. I won't guess as to the dimensions, but it couldn't have been as big as your typical theater stage. I would put it more in the category of a large nightclub stage. At most times during the show, all four members of the band were within 20 feet of each other and at some moments, in arm's length. The ramps were used mostly by Hagar, and Eddie strode around a bit during his showcase solo, but for the most part it was like seeing a famous band on a club's stage placed in an arena. I was fascinated by this and annoyed Mary to no end by yelling into her ear intermittently, "How fucking cool it that? Look at that! That stage is small. Genius, I'm tellin' ya."
She would patiently look over her shoulder at me and say something like, "Yeah, I know. It was genius the last time you told me to look, too. Small. Uh huh. Cool." Then she'd turn back to the show and resume bobbing her head to the party beat. I'd get the hint and be quiet for awhile. A few songs later, I'd be bellowing back to Mary, "Man, I can't believe that stage!" What an idiot.
During most of the show, I would bump and grind in my "space" with both Mary and Jean. Her sister isn't a big Van Halen fan by any means, but she was having fun partying along with Scott, Mary and I. I was sandwiched by my wife and Jean and got some playful harem-type type attention, all in the tongue-in-cheek fashion. It's no big deal between us---sort of like a running joke, but I can see where some people could wonder what's going on.
Mary and Jean left during a slow song to go to the ladies room. A moment after they'd left our sight, the guy right behind me tapped me on the shoulder. I turned around and he had his hand held out to shake mine. He leaned in so as to be heard and said, "I don't know how you do it, man, but I gotta shake your hand".
"Wha..?", I asked.
"Yeah, man. You got two of 'em all over you. You got it goin' on, dude." He then grasped my hand and shook it enthusiastically. I laughed out loud and yelled to him, "Naw, man, that's my wife and her sister. We just mess around like that."
"Whatever, dude. You da man. Two fine chicks like that...", he replied. He let go of my hand and his buddy next to him raised his hand, signaling for a high-five from me. Still laughing, I responded in kind and scanned the faces of the rest of his group. They were all shaking their heads with an expression that held both respect and disbelief. As I turned back to the show, I leaned over to Scott and asked him if he'd heard that exchange.
He said, "Yeah. The guy said the same thing to me!" We both cracked up and met fists. Mary and Jean re-entered the aisle at this time and Mary asked me what we were laughing about. I told her and she smiled and shook her head. Scott told Jean and when she turned to us smiling, I put my arm around her and whisper-shouted into her ear, "These guys think we're all into each other, so give me a big hug right now". We embraced and groped each other (in all the safe zones) for a moment, trying not to double over with laughter. A few songs later, I looked back at the guys behind us and got a "thumbs up" from one of them. I thumbed him back, and thought to myself that he'd probably have a stroke if he witnessed what we all do on crazy, drunken poker nights.
Tangent Alert!
This reminds me of one of many nights where I've gotten the harem treatment from my wife's sisters. About a year ago or so, Mary and I went to a local micro-brewery to see a cover band that featured a friend of Jean and Scott's as well as our friend Paul, whose blog is linked here on this site on the sidebar. The band played a nice mix of danceable classic rock stuff and Mary wanted to dance. I'm not one to be the first out on the floor. I need some brave soul to christen the dance floor and take the heat of the haunting gaze from the inhibited crowd so I can slip out there unnoticed. I'll get your back, but you gotta take point, man. But this night, I'd had the precise amount of the cool, amber ale that I call Liquid Courage and appeased Mary. We walked up to a space in front of the band (there was no real dance floor, just a place between them and the front door), and proceeded to do our thing. Seconds later, we were joined by Jean and her friend Diana. Somehow, probably because I was the only male dancing, I became the focal point for all three of the gals and was caressed, grinded upon, and had my shirt unbuttoned by any number of them at any time during the song. I don't know how well I danced, but we got many whoops and hollers when we left the dance floor at the end of the song.
I stepped back to the bar facing the band, took a drink of my waiting beer, and wiped my brow. I was standing next to Steve, a friend I've met through Chris Brown (another blogger linked to this site) and he smiled at me. "Man, you are the King", he said. "Dancing with all those chicks, these people worship you", he said, waving his hand at all folks watching the band play that night. I nodded and thought about that for a second. I leaned on my elbow and looked back at those faces and reconsidered the situation. I leaned back over to Steve and said, "Y'know, that's what I thought too, for a minute there. Here I am, thinking to myself, 'Yeah, man, these dudes are all sooo jealous right now. Check it out; three women, all over me. Me. A frog like me and these gals have everyone thinking that I've got them all wrapped around my finger as they compete for my attention.'" I stepped back and said, "Then, about half-way through the song, a realization came upon me and I told myself, 'No, Tony. They all think you're gay. The gay guy always dances with his girlfriends. You're the gay guy, Tony. Way to go.'"
End of Tangent
The Van Hagar show raged on and we ate it up along with the rest of the Fresno crowd. Eddie Van Halen played a solo that seemed to be a medley of past solos, mixing parts of Eruption with parts of other showcase solos from past tours and albums. I really didn't have a problem with this, but some folks I talked to in the following days were disappointed. Michael Anthony played a bass solo that provided me with a nice bathroom break that lasted into Alex Van Halen's drum solo. Aside from Neil Peart of Rush and Gov't Mule's Matt Abts, there hasn't been a drummer that can keep me in the room with their solo. As much as I love Led Zeppelin, I even skip over Bonham's 30 minute indulgences during Whole Lotta Love on the many bootlegs I have. Later, Mary and I ducked out again during Sammy's 1,000,000th rendition of Eagles Fly. Phewww! I could only think to myself, sack that shit and as long as you're playing old stuff, give me more tracks from Fair Warning!
The show moved on and was paced well. I even enjoyed the Pepsi commercial song and sang along in a raspy, where's-my-lighter voice to Panama. What I'd forgotten, was how mean the Van Halen-ized riff to The Kinks' You Really Got Me is. That is a guttural, sneering, dirty-ass riff and it furrowed it's way into our bellies that night like a heavy metal tapeworm. When It's Love seemed to be a strange closer and left me feeling like I'd been to The Spaghetti Factory and skipped the spumoni. Still full, but not fulfilled.
--------
The next day, Mary and I awoke at about the same time. I did the typical Sunday morning self-check; Headache? Check. Back? Not so bad. Stomach? Considering the amount of beer consumed, not so bad. But wait. What's this? The ears are ringing! What the hell? My ears had not rung after an arena show since high school. I conferred with Mary and her ears were ringing too. But that I could understand. She hadn't suffered the echoes bouncing off of the cinder block walls of Fresno's Selland Arena like I had. Let me state that when the solos from Dokken's George Lynch sound exactly like those of Mark Knopfler of Dire Straights, it's probably the building's fault. In recent years, most arena shows I've seen have had the volume turned down a bit in comparison to past decades and the benefit is a cleaner sound and buzz-less eardrums the next day(s). So I'd have to say that this Van Halen concert was deceptively loud. I didn't get it at the time, but my ears certainly did. Years from now, God willing, when I'm in the rest home and constantly saying, "Eh?", you can all chastise me for not wearing plugs on August 14th, 2004.
In the end, I would say that I enjoyed the experience very much. But I did hear and read some negative things in the days following the show. In the S.F. Chronicle dated 8/22/04, I read a letter to the Datebook section editor that contained claims of taped musical segments, including keyboard parts and even guitar riffs. I cannot support these accusations with personal eyewitness testimony, and have to say that I wasn't aware of anything of the kind. If they'd never reunited, my life wouldn't have changed that much. But I'm glad they did. The world's most prominent party band gave us all in Fresno a hell of a party. What else do you want? We can't all be Spicoli and hire them out to play a private party.
posted by Tony at 11:20 PM
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