POWDER IS WHAT HAPPENED

Day two of a typical hut trip consists of a lavish breakfast, skiing, lunch back at the hut, more skiing and a lavish dinner. I eat better on these hut trips than I do at home! Breakfast was my designated meal so I was busy this Thursday morning. Snow was coming down lightly all day long.

Powder skiing was available just outside our front door. Skin up the hill to the west of us, turn around and carve sweet turns in the foot plus deep powder. We also ascended the ridge south of us, on top of which the wind was howling and blowing snow in our faces. Carved turns as we descended, heading to the trees on the slope east of us where we found two feet plus deep powder. Look down and see your knees bulldozing a huge pile of snow before you! It was so deep that making turns would cause one to slow down and possibly come to a stop. One individual in another party said that he's been coming here over the years and this is the best he's every seen it! Perfect timing!

A delicious dinner of fresh salad, salmon chowder, bread and cheesecake! Feeling good again, I was prepared for a the traditional evening of music, tequila and a cigar. I bundled up and headed to the front deck where I had a view through the trees up to the ridge line. The sky had cleared somewhat, the moon and a few star trying to shine through high clouds. Clear skies brought frigid temperatures.

Coming down the trail

Young snow goddess on snowshoes

Freckles on her face

Billions of snowflakes

Fall from the cold mountain sky

Blanket the landscape

Trees that point skyward

Rise through a moonlit snow scape

Black against the night

Catches the last light
Mountains begin to grow dim
Clouds turn bright orange

Caressed by high clouds

Luminous pearl of the night
Feels the cold night air

Tonight's show had Gary Cherone as lead vocalist of Van Halen. It took place on October 24, 1998 at the Rainbow Hall before an enthusiastic crowd in Nagoya, Japan. Another excellent audience recording of a show near the very end of the Van Halen III tour. Here are a few things the Van Halen Bootleg Discography says about this show:

The show begins with with a fade-in of the Aerosmith tune "Train Kept-a Rollin'" before the announcer asks "Nagoya Japan! Good Evening, are you ready Nagoya? Will please you welcome from Los Angeles...the mighty... Van Halen!!!" They open with a very thunderous version of "Unchained". You can feel the energy emit from the speakers.

The title of this disc is odd, and the reason why is because of this: At exactly :53 seconds into Track 5, "When It's Love", the band runs into sound problems, and it quickly escalates into a more serious one. At 1:10 they stop altogether, as the audio problem gets to be too much to continue the song. Feedback of major proportions overpowers everything and forces the band to stop. You can hear Gary and someone else talking, presumably Ed, but it's unclear what they're saying. Gary then turns to the audience and says, "Tsk, Tsk...What do you think happened?", hence the title. The crowd gets a big laugh out of that. Ed then says, "That's *not* the special effect that was planned." Gary asks everyone if they would like for them to keep on playing, and is met with enthusiastic yells of "YES!!!" He turns and tells someone, not sure who, "Don't let it happen again!" in a playful manner. The crowd laughs once again. In between all this hoopla you hear the crown yelling "Eddie!! Eddie!!" "Okay, we'll try this one again", says Gary and off they go to launch into "When It's Love" once more.

Mike says the same thing he said the previous night in Osaka prior to starting "Somebody Get Me A Doctor", "Nagoya! Let's see if we fuckin' rock!" At the end of the tune, Ed yells out "MIKEY!!!" and Gary yells out "Somebody give that boy a shot of sake!"

"Once again Nagoya, you've been a very beautiful audience tonight", Gary says as they intro "Panama" with the Everybody Wants Some" teaser. Judging by the amount of shouting and hollering, "Panama" is the crowd favorite and enjoys the evening's biggest response.

There were some hardcore Van Halen fans in the audience that night, evidenced by the excitement at the beginning of each song and all the hollering throughout the entire show.

Dave shares his exploits

Sammy talks to his people

Gary just performs

Download it here:

http://rapidshare.com/files/173673562/Van_Halen_-_1998-10-24_-_Nagoya_Japan_cd_1.rar

http://rapidshare.com/files/173679941/Van_Halen_-_1998-10-24_-_Nagoya_Japan_cd_2.rar

CABIN FEVER

Got up early and drove to the Copper Mountain ski area for a cup of Starbuck's coffee and a couple supermarket burritos. I just about finished packing my food and gear when the others arrived at the designated parking area for hut travelers. Our destination was Janet's Cabin at 11,610' up a drainage beside Jacque Peak. What was nice about this particular hut ascent was that we cut off some distance and elevation by taking a ski chair lift up part of the drainage.

The ski in was relatively easy, with the exception of the very end where the slope angle increased just before the hut. I took my time because the trail was well established and the hut was visible in the distance. It was blue skies the whole way, the sun softening the snow and causing my skins to stick. Deep powder blanketed the whole landscape. We all knew it was going to be fabulous powder skiing!

Got to the hut, unpacked and relaxed in an effort to regain my strength. We were sharing the cabin with a couple other groups. After dinner I was feeling well enough to have a little tequila. That meant it was show time!

I picked one of the relatively short concerts of the few I had brought along, a soundboard recording of Van Halen's May 22, 1978 appearance at the Manchester Apollo, in Manchester, England. They were the opening act for Black Sabbath. As is always the case with these 1978 shows, the sound of the recording and the quality of their performance is excellent! This was their breakout tour following the release of their first album, and they were putting their heart and soul into the performance.

I have a copy of Van Halen's September 22, 1978 show in Fresno, CA that comes along with a bootleg of Black Sabbath's performance following their act. What a difference. Van Halen's fresh sounding and energetic, while Black Sabbath sounds tired, an unmemorable performance. It was a mistake pairing up the two, contributing to the the breakup of Black Sabbath shortly after this tour.

Lives come to an end
Sorrow afflicts the living
World keeps on turning

Loud heavy breathing
A sign of the slow ascent
Every painful step

Clouds fly overhead
Eclipse the night sky's full moon
Shadows on the snow

Download it here:

http://rapidshare.com/files/27216016/Manchester_Apollo__England_5-22-78.zip.html

SOME NIGHT IN THE VALLEY

I begin my ski trip on Wednesday night, but not before getting the terrible news at work that a friend and one of my most valued employees passed away earlier that day. Diagnosed in mid-May with skin cancer after suffering a stroke, learning that it had already lodged itself in the brain and elsewhere in her body. Little could be done at this late stage. A young, very smart, hard working mother of two young children. All gone in an instant. I've reached that point in life where my friends are beginning to leave the party early.

Watch no longer wound
Hands slowly come to a stop
Journey at an end

Grows oh so tired
Frail arms raised in acceptance
Embraces the night

Time on his side
Grip that's ever tightening
Reaper holds our hand

Fighting for so long
Peace found at the very end
Exhales the last breath

I drove into the mountains last night, intending to meet others the following morning for our trip up to Janet's Cabin near Vail Pass. A firm grip on the steering wheel was necessary because of strong winds from a passing storm front. I parked the car on a side road along the highway leading over Fremont Pass. A broad glacial valley alongside the Tenmile Range. The wind calmed down and a nearly full moon was in the sky overhead. Time for a concert.

Considering my location, this night's concert is entitled "Someday In The Valley", Van Halen playing at the Alpine Valley Music Theater in East Troy WI on July 29, 1995. An excellent audience recording. After messing up the lyrics to "Eagles Fly" the previous night in Chicago, and admitting it to the audience, Sammy Hagar performs "Someday" for the first time in concert. Sammy was especially chatty with the very enthusiastic audience.

While Eddie was performing his solo piece late in the show, around midnight my time, a pair of security guards belonging to the nearby Climax mine pulled up, spotlighting me in their headlights. Who knows what they thought of this guy standing outside his truck so late at night. I was informed I was on private property and would need to move. The guy was cool about it. I got in the truck and drove farther up the valley towards the pass, finding a turnout on Forest Service property. The concert was resumed with minimal interruption!

This concert took place almost a month after a six-week run of European festival dates, Van Halen assuming an unfamiliar role on their second jaunt in two years opening for Bon Jovi who was very popular on the continent. Van Halen would be playing before more people every night than they could ever possibly draw on their own. But there was a downside to this arrangement, as noted by Sammy in an unpublished memoir of his:

The cool reception Van Halen received from the capacity crowds of 60 to 70,000 people on a nightly basis jolted them. It nearly mimicked their headlining romp in 1993 when the dumbfounded band realized they weren't the rock gods in this part of the world they thought they were. "In most of the festivals we played," sighed Hagar, "while I was singing, I'd see makeshift signs that read "Jon," or "We Love Bon Jovi." It was actually kind of cute to see these young girls holding signs up, but Eddie couldn't handle it. He was freaking, because he wasn't a guitar hero to any of these kids. Not once during the entire time we toured over there, did the crowd ever chant, "Eddie, Eddie, Eddie." After some songs, I tried to get the crowd fired up by yelling Eddie's name over the loud speakers. Every time it was met with dead silence. By the end of the tour, he was so bummed out, he even cut his guitar solo down to one minute. Whoever heard of Eddie Van Halen playing a one minute guitar solo? They did in Europe. It got so bad for him over there, sometimes he didn't even solo during a show. Man, I'm telling you, there were no drum or bass solos, or acoustic versions of 'Give to Live' and 'Eagles Fly.' This tour had to be one of the most depressing times on the road I ever witnessed with Van Halen. In probably half the shows we played, we got no encores. Sometimes we even went back on stage for an encore when the crowd didn't want one. We just said, "To hell with it. Let's go back and do another one." Van Halen wasn't getting called back for any encores until we finally wised up and made 'Jump' the last song of the set. That would get people going, and we'd come back for another song. Even then, it didn't always work.

This band was absolutely nothing over there. There would be occasions where we had our little contingent of 10,000 fans jumping up and down yelling "Yeah, Van Halen!" But you know what when this scene is happening in a stadium with 70,000 people, it's embarrassing. I'd be standing on the stage looking at this ocean of people not responding to our music thinking, "Sorry, I thought maybe you would like this." Bon Jovi sold out Wembley Stadium three consecutive nights toward the end of the tour. We ended each performance with 'Jump,' and nobody cared. Each night over 70,000 people had paid money to see Bon Jovi, and Bon Jovi only. I was amazed that nobody gave a damn about Van Halen.

According to Sammy, this humbling experience caused him to think about the problems the group was facing, convincing him it was time to take the band's music in a new direction. It was never to happen, the building friction between the Van Halen brothers and Sammy eventually causing them to separate shortly after the Balance Tour.

A golden pry bar
Cracks open the wall of time
His chance to escape

Blows down the valley
Winters cold wind in his face
Moon so far above

Moon lit mountain peaks
Stands amidst eternity
Just for a moment

BACK TO BASICS

Although it was snowing both down here and in the mountains, I decided to relax and stay home this weekend. Primarily because I would get in four days of skiing next weekend and there was stuff I've been neglecting to do around the house. My main objective was to get a block print fully carved so that when the next available weekend arrives I can begin printing. I'm already looking beyond to the next subject for a quick carve and print.

There in the darkness
New sight along the roadside
Dead blue eyes glinting

Lying there in bed
Stares across the empty room
Memory's solace

It was late in the evening and I was not interested in a long music set so I defaulted to Van Halen's third #1 studio album F. U. C. K. Alot of good Sammy era songs that I enjoyed hearing in crystal clarity. A light snow was coming down, three inches already on the ground, my dancing stamped out a patch that became slick as ice. I went through the album once and then got a double dose of my favorites before it was time to go back inside at midnight.

According to the Van Halen Encyclopedia:

This album came after a yearlong break for the band. Eddie claims that he barely picked up the guitar in that time. When the band decided to start the new album, they decided to first pick a producer. They knew of Andy Johns from his work with Led Zeppelin, and he came to work so quickly that the band was taken by surprise and had nothing written for the album. The entire process from recording to mastering took 361 days. The album was done one song at a time in that each song was completed before moving on to the next.

SOMEWHERE OVER THE RAINBOW

This holiday season presents me with too many opportunities to party with Van Halen, so much so that its beginning to wear me out. But once the music starts playing, there's no turning back and I rock out to the very end!

It's snowing in the mountains so skiing is also on my mind. There's a lot of stuff that needs to get done here at the house so I've got to make some decisions today. Plus I have a two night hut trip planned for later in the week. Ski season is in full swing!

My concert of choice this Friday night was Van Halen's June 29, 1979 appearance at the Rainbow Theater in London, England, the last night of their European leg of their "World Vacation" tour. Another hot performance on this very good audience recording. Dave was in prime form, yakking it up between songs. His talk before their performance of "On Fire" offered a tease of what was yet to come on their next album, with references to "Everybody wants some, and I want some too". Shortly after the mid point of the show, some bad feedback interrupts their performance and their struggle to fix it, but never quite can. Dave apologizes for this technical difficulty but they go on with the show, their loud sound drowning the low buzz coming from the speakers. Great performance!

At the same time Van Halen was playing in London, I was alone wandering through the forest in the western Cascade Mountains, looking for any rock outcrops that might shed light on the local geology. Mapping old volcanoes and their deposits that had long disappeared, predating the young cones in the High Cascades to the east by 15 million years. My notes for June 29, 1979 show it was cloudy, foggy and cold. Outcrops exposing ash flows, mudflows and lava flows, all shot through with hard dikes that cooled slowly far below the ancient ground surface. Neatly penned field notes record my observations: "Outcrop of a brown mudflow volcaniclastic breccia. The clasts, which range in size from 40 cm to sand grains, are generally angular, dark in color and there are quite a few pumice fragments." So while Van Halen partied in London, I was rocking out in the Cascades! Unfortunately, no stereo in the vehicle I was driving!

Sounds of destruction

Like Godzilla, walks the streets
Michael's bass solo

From idle banter
Seeds of creativity
A teenage anthem

Download it here:

http://www.megaupload.com/?d=J0YTB0A4