Am I the only one who thinks Van Halen's Diver Down record is killer?

[Techdeth]

This is one of my ‘time machine’ albums. I had just finished my freshman year of HS. Had my first ‘job’ and used the proceeds to by a no-name knockoff of the SONY Walkman (remember that???) and Diver Down on cassette. I wore that tape OUT that summer and every track immediately brings me back to that summer when I was 15.

The covers were a blast and the originals were SO F’n good. Killer - almost ‘naked’ guitar tone and uncluttered mix. You can just smell the hot tubes in that guitar sound.

This makes me think something: albums were better because there were the right length . Thee when cd came they got too long

 

[hammered]

85 was the year...big hair, big music and big parties....that summer after graduation I played my first bar gig. Ah the memories...

Summer of ‘85 at the Oakland Stadium

 

[Rick Lee]

IIRC, DD contained so many covers because they had to rush it to press. Dave and Al had this obsession with doing a video for Pretty Woman just to wave the flag while they took a year off. But it started becoming a hit on radio and WB told the band to shelve their vacation plans and get an album done in a hurry. And so they rushed it out. And Ted was always solidly in Dave's camp with regard to covers.

 

[itsme]

YES!!! God where did the time go. I wouldn’t trade with any other generation for any reason. Cool cars, cool music, no internet, and all the girls dressed hot when we went out on the weekends!!!

Fellow ‘85er here. Agreed…

 

[Philhouse]

This makes me think something: albums were better because there were the right length . Thee when cd came they got too long

I absolutely agree.
There is something so much more powerful about the brevity and focus of all those older and shorter albums in general. As the formats extended and allowed more content it seemed like for many was just used to add filler and fat.
It used to be about getting bands into the studio every year or two and smashing out their absolute best 8-10 tracks onto an album and then getting back on the road. The media format time restriction forced a restraint, editing and focus into the writing and song/riff selection.

 

[Techdeth]

I absolutely agree.
There is something so much more powerful about the brevity and focus of all those older and shorter albums in general. As the formats extended and allowed more content it seemed like for many was just used to add filler and fat.
It used to be about getting bands into the studio every year or two and smashing out their absolute best 8-10 tracks onto an album and then getting back on the road. The media format time restriction forced a restraint, editing and focus into the writing and song/riff selection.

Some albums were a chore to get through in the 90s

 

[JackBootedThug]

Early Van Halen is the shit…. I enjoy the later stuff but it’s not the same.

 

[JohnnyGtar]

Early Van Halen is the shit…. I enjoy the later stuff but it’s not the same.

Yeah. I'm definitely on "Team Dave". I liked some of the Hagar era tunes. Sad thing is though, every time I bought a Sammy era VH record I was hoping they'd release a firecracker of an album, but nope. Each time I was disappointed overall. In the Dave era, I liked every tune on those albums.

 

[paulyc]

Love DD, great tunes, playing and tones.

 

[311splawndude]

Glad to see so much love for Diver Down. It often gets poo poo'd when compared to the other Roth era albums but it was damn good. Really really hard for me to rank as I like Fair Warning and 1984 better but DD was just this happy go lucky kind of sound and songs

I literally played all the VH albums last Friday starting in the basement up to AKOT. Good memories when I got to Diver Down.

YES!!! God where did the time go. I wouldn’t trade with any other generation for any reason. Cool cars, cool music, no internet, and all the girls dressed hot when we went out on the weekends!!!

'86 here and man what a great time to be in High School. When we took the bus to games and such I was the one in charge of music. Van Halen, Ratt, Motley Crue, etc.

 

[Briman24]

Little guitars is my fave to play on guitar

 

[skoora]

I LOVE Diver Down. I know Ed wasn't happy about doing so many covers, but damn, every track is pure fire, the band sounds raw AF, and Ed's guitar sounds are amazing. The VH original tunes on that album are fantastic.

I think it's one of their best albums.

Yes, you’re the only one. It’s complete shit. There is no other human in history who has enjoyed this sub par release from this excuse for a mariachi band.

 

[JohnnyGtar]

Yes, you’re the only one. It’s complete shit. There is no other human in history who has enjoyed this sub par release from this excuse for a mariachi band.

Thanks for clearing that up! Now I can sleep at night. LOL

 

[jchrisf]

Diver Down was one of the first albums I bought. A friend at school was telling me how great it was and I had never heard of them ( I was 10 when this came out). I got my mom to take me to the record store and thought the Diver Flag looked so cool ( I later became a professional diver). I bought this and Aldo Nova's Subject albums in LP. I had only ever bought a couple of tapes before.

Man, I was disappointed in this album. I thought it was goofy and I liked to rock even at that age. I loved Aldo Nova's album much more(Aldo put out some great music that never got played). I ended up selling the Diver Down album to another friend for a $2 loss lol.

The only songs I liked on it was Dancing in the Streets and Pretty Woman. Ed always had good tone back then though... even on the songs I didn't like. It was cool to hear his dad play on the album.

I discovered later that DLR really ruined a lot of Ed's great playing.. it seemed hidden behind his vocals. Though I never liked Van Halen after they got rid of Diamond Dave and am not familiar with anything they did after 1984. I do remember the first couple of Van Hagar albums but I didn't really care for them. My favorite album was 1984 which came out at a significant time in my life.