The Mighty VH Podcast
This ain’t yer mom's podcast.
This is a high-voltage, back-alley, nitro-burning, chrome-plated oral history of the loudest, proudest, most uncontainable rock band ever to plug in and blow the doors clean off the building.
Every episode, your hosts Tommy London & Tor kick open the vault, flash a fake backstage pass and stroll past the velvet rope like they own the place. Albums get peeled apart track by track. Tours get relived night by night, bruise by bruise. Legends get mythologized, demystified, and then mythologized again.
The Mighty VH Podcast is where the riffs sweat, the stories stretch, and the truth comes flying in sideways wearing ass-less chaps.
You want news and rumors? We tell you what’s real, what’s noise, and what’s pure beautiful nonsense, with a wink and a raised eyebrow.
This is the place where genius gets examined, ego gets celebrated, and excess gets its rightful crown. Where guitars talk, drums thunder, and the spirit of rock and roll doesn’t politely knock, it jumps the fence, cannonballs the pool, and steals your girlfriend’s attention span.
The Mighty VH Podcast
Ep: 012 Doing a Deep Dive with Dweezil
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In this somewhat extended episode, Tommy and Tor welcome acclaimed guitarist, composer, producer, and life long Van Halen fan and friend, Dweezil Zappa, for a wide-ranging conversation that goes far beyond the surface.
From growing up with and befriending some of the greatest musicians in rock history to forging his own path as one of today's most respected guitarists, Dweezil shares stories, perspectives, and insights only he can tell.
Together, Tommy, Tor, and Dweezil spend the episode exploring his relationship with Edward Van Halen, Eddie's revolutionary impact on guitar playing and unforgettable personal memories. Along the way, they also discuss Dweezil's own career, his approach to music, and the passion that continues to drive him as both a guitarist and performer.
It's an honest, thoughtful discussion about musicianship, creativity, friendship, and the lifelong pursuit of mastering the instrument. Whether you're a Van Halen fan, a Zappa fan, or simply love hearing great stories about one of rock's greatest bands, this is an episode you won't want to miss.
Welcome once again to the Mighty Van Halen Podcast. I'm your host, Tommy London. With Tor, we talk about our favorite band in the world. And every so often we have a special guest. Who do we have today, Tor?
SPEAKER_02Today is a very special episode of the Mighty VH podcast. Our guest today grew up in a household where he got to meet and befriend some of the greatest musicians of the 20th century. He then went on to record his first uh single, his first record at 12 years old that Edward Van Halen produced and Don Landy engineered. He would then go on to uh release full-length albums and videos and appear in movies, and he was a regular on MTV and living every teenage long-haired rocker teenage dream that there was out there in the 80s, and then went on to uh, you know, basically carry the torch for his father's work and some of the most complex and interesting music ever created. Uh, ladies and gentlemen, without further ado, Mr. Dweezel Zappa. What's happening, guys? Hey, brother, welcome to the show. Thanks for having me. Yeah, sure. Thanks, thanks for being here. Uh, Tommy, what do you got for Dweezel today?
SPEAKER_00Well, hey, take us to the beginning. Let's start there. Always a great place to start. Do you remember the first time Van Halen came onto your radar? And what was it about then that uh grabbed your attention?
SPEAKER_01Well, I only really heard my dad's music when I was growing up. Whatever he was working on or listening to is all I heard at the house. You know, he had a record collection that he would listen to in an area that was called the alcove. It was sort of just like an area with um a carpeted floor and pillows and lots of records and a record player. And he had very eclectic taste in music. And I grew up hearing so many different styles of music. So it wasn't until I was 12 that I started to hear the radio and what other people were listening to. So most of what I heard on the radio, I was thinking to myself, where's the rest of it? There weren't all these other instruments and textures and timbers, and the overall soundscape was very plain compared to what I was used to hearing that my dad either wrote, recorded, or was working on. So uh it was interesting when I started to hear other things that were very guitar-centric. You know, my dad was also very much a guitar player and had guitar-centric music. So I was familiar with the sound of guitar and love the sound of guitar, but my dad's music seemed very complicated. So as a kid, I thought to myself, I don't know if I'll ever be able to do what that is. Maybe one day, you know, I could learn to do what that is because it just seemed so complex. But on the flip side, I was starting to hear bands like Van Halen or Randy Rhodes playing with Ozzie Osborne. And it was so guitar-centric and so guitar-focused that I could, in my own way, pick it out and just focus on that. And I could sort of exclude everything else from the picture. And it was the kind of thing that captivated my ear immediately. It wasn't that I heard it and thought, oh, I could do this very easily. It was like I want to be able to learn to do what they're doing because I love the sound of it so much, you know. So uh for a long time it was neck and neck, Randy Rhodes, Edward Van Halen. But we had this uh interesting experience where um one night, around, I would say around eight o'clock, we got a phone call to our house, and it was someone purporting to be Edward Van Halen. Now, this is the kind of era when you have a house phone that's on the wall and it had multiple lines, and you could pick up the phone from different rooms, and you could basically have people more than one person could be in on a conversation, and no one would be any the wiser because somebody could you know silently just pick up a phone.
SPEAKER_03Right.
SPEAKER_01Um, but this was a case where this person could be saying that they're Edward Van Halen, but might not be Edward Van Halen, we don't know. Uh and so as it turns out, you know, my dad ends up getting on the phone with him, and it was him because he showed up at our house about 10 minutes later. He lived nearby, showed up in a Lamborghini truck, and he was uh wearing the women and children first jumpsuit, uh, and he had the Van Halen necklace with the Van Halen logo, so it was like he was ripped up. Yeah, so you know, he's ripped off the cover of the album and he's walking up the steps with a guitar, not in a case, it's the a purple two humbucker guitar, which later would be well known as the one of the very first um Kramer guitars that he played. He had just played it only a few nights before coming to our house, uh playing at the Roxy with Alan Holdsworth. Right anyway. Uh, you know, he he ended up coming over. Steve Vai was in my dad's band, so my dad invited him to come over, and we just ended up playing guitar, the four of us my dad, Steve Vai, Edward Van Halen, and me at 12 years old, only having played guitar for six, seven months, something like that. So the experience of him walking into the studio and plugging the guitar in and me being able to ask him to play certain things, like the intro to Mean Street or play Eruption or anything that I wanted, it was the equivalent of having a toy Edward Van Halen that you could have play whatever you want by request, you know. So it was like, I'll make my Eddie Van Halen play this, you know. But it was it was the the pivotal moment where I could see how he played, where his fingers went, the general area of the guitar neck, and it was burned into my mind all the things that he would do and the way that he did them. So I could see the way he held the pick, I could see that he didn't hit real hard. I could see that he just really uh did a lot of things functionally that were uh, you know, to simplify certain things. He was very much a pattern-oriented player and he would use open strings for cool effects. Um, and you know, I saw him do all the harmonic stuff where he'd flutter something and then move his fingers around or the palm of his hand. And uh this is not the kind of stuff that you would see back then. You would have had to have seen a very special television show where they were featuring somebody doing that up close. Musicians weren't seen that way. We didn't have access like you do on YouTube or Instagram that we do these days, right? So it was very much uh a um you know an amazing experience to to go ahead and see that stuff up close like that, and then have that translate to what would become my own uh ability to translate what I had seen into my own plane.
SPEAKER_02Sure. I mean, while while the rest of the world is putting that record on and trying to slow it down and and trying to figure out all these amazing things that Edward's doing, um, man, you are up close and personal and just getting a such an incredible view as to, I mean, the first hand, even better than a TV show, could ever possibly show you this. Right. Um, I wonder if, you know, I mean, knowing what I've known, I've read your father's biography, et cetera, like knowing what I know of of the house that you grew up in and how many musicians and this one and that one always stopping by, etc., was it was that amazing to you that Edward was stopping by, or was it just another like drop by?
SPEAKER_01Well, there weren't really a lot of people that were uh stopping over. My dad had people that he was working with. We had a studio at the house, uh, so um it wasn't that he was very social and would just constantly have okay celebrity guests over. That really wasn't a thing. This episode celebrity, yeah. Yeah, it was just really like a handful of people that uh that ever really came in in that way, but um Edward just sort of uh appeared, you know, so that was uh unique and still to this day was um one of the coolest things ever because when you're just getting into music and the thing that you're listening to over and over 12 hours a day, the person responsible for that calls your house and says, Hey, I want to come over. How is that not gonna be the coolest thing that will ever happen? You know, so I mean that's exactly how I felt about it.
SPEAKER_00So well, you know, one of the most famous stories in Van Halen lore is uh Eddie teaching you how to play running with the devil for your school talent show and bringing you a guitar that would stay in tune to play. Uh, but what was the aftermath? Was everybody's jaw like on the floor uh after you know he had left? And and how did the talent show actually go? Well, it was just a weird one. Did you win the talent show?
SPEAKER_03I mean yeah, did you win?
SPEAKER_01Uh I I don't really remember all the details of that because one of the weirdest parts about it is my parents weren't even there for this sound check of this talent show. You know, this was during the day, and I don't even know uh really how he ended up coming to that on his own. Yeah, I don't know if he wanted to do that and asked about this thing because we had talked about, hey, I'm gonna be playing this song you know next week at this talent show. Um I really don't know how it all came about, but the interesting thing is that the guitar that he brought, I I after doing the show, I said, Hey, thanks so much for bringing that. You know, it's it's ready for you to come pick up. He says, Oh no, you can have it. And that was, of course, one of the most amazing things that ever could have taken place. But I do remember that um it was kind of unsettling for the school because the the word got around that Edward Van Halen was there. Now, arguably the most famous musician at the time. So, girls, boys, anybody would have been super excited to know that this guy is somewhere on the campus, you know. And uh but the fact that he was there and then realized that my guitar wasn't working very well, and then he drove home and then came back, that's another thing that was weird, where it's like they they the school made the effort to allow for the extra time to to have this take place. So, you know, they could have easily been like, no, no, you know, we're we're not gonna devote extra time to this, but even they could realize that there's something unique about this uh situation, and it was definitely uh something that was uh super memorable. I mean, obviously the part where when I'm on the stage playing the part and playing it incorrectly, and then he stands up behind me with uh the guitar player perspective, and he showed me how to play the right chord and where the pick slide happens and how he does that pick slide, you know, going this way, then that way. You know, that that stuff was all, of course, like I said, burned into my DNA at that point.
SPEAKER_02Oh, I bet. I bet what an amazing uh experience to have, you know. No doubt. The rest of us just dream of something like that happening, you know. Um, so right, so he gifted you that guitar. I understand you still have it, yeah. Yes, I do, yeah. Yeah, oh amazing. And I would think that over the years there were probably a few other things like that when he did his Ernie Ball, you probably received one of those, or yeah, I did gifts raining from the skies for you from not really, uh, but uh, I mean, over the years I got to develop a uh a unique friendship with him.
SPEAKER_01Um, you know, I've told before that he was the first person that called me when my dad passed away. When the news broke, um, he must have been up and watching CNN or something, um, because it was around five in the morning, and he called me. And uh he was like, Hey, you know, I'm I'm sorry to hear this news. If you want to do anything, uh you know, I'm free all week. Let's just go do stuff. And so I had never heard of anything like this, like somebody offering to do something like this at such a terrible time, you never know what you're gonna experience in a grief uh time period, you know, you don't know what life is, uh it changes moment to moment. But to have a positive influence and distraction at that time, you know, that just shows the generosity of him as a as a person. And he just was always that way. You know, I think there's uh there's times where uh, you know, he had struggles in his own life where um, you know, he might not have been exactly the person that I first met. Um but he would make his way through it, and you know, we had many different times that we would get together over and talking about different things. But the the biggest change was at the point where I was starting to do my dad's music and playing these very complicated things. Um, he came to one of my shows where I was opening for Jeff Beck at the Nokia Center in Los Angeles, and he saw this one thing that we were playing, which was St. Alfonso's Pancake Breakfast. It has a very difficult thing that was on Marimba, but I learned to play it on guitar. And he heard it and saw me playing it. And, you know, backstage, he was like, Show me that thing, you know, and I showed it to him, and it was the total role reversal of the first time I met him because here he is coming up to me and saying, Hey, show me how you do that. And then as I was showing it to him, he said, I could never play that. Uh, and it is a very complicated thing, and it does require certain kinds of techniques. And I would imagine he could do it if he wanted to spend the time to do it, but I don't think he wanted to spend the time to learn that complicated part. Now, the the point of it though is that it was such a role reversal that it was uh uh another unique way that this relationship developed. It was not something I ever expected to have, um, where he would be talking to me, like, hey, show me that thing, and how do you do that? You know, it was it was very surreal.
SPEAKER_00Yeah. Well, you know, not long after the talent show, uh, Edward produced your first single, uh, My Mother is a Space Cadet.
SPEAKER_01Uh what studio was Crunchy Water, which of course, you know, when you're a 12-year-old songwriter, that is the extent of your creative abilities. Those titles are great, the songs are great.
SPEAKER_00Uh, but what studio uh did you record it in?
SPEAKER_01Uh my dad had uh just finished building the utility muffin research kitchen, which was the studio at the bottom of the house, you know, the basement in the house. And Edward was just getting ready to make plans to build 5150. So part of the reason that he had called my dad was that he wanted to see the studio because my dad had a full-fledged studio with different tracking rooms and an echo chamber and all this stuff. So uh he wanted to see the studio, and Don Landy came with him um at some point. And I when it came to producing the song, again, it wasn't like I asked him to do it. I don't even know how it happened. It was just one day my dad said, Hey, do you want to record a song? I was like, Yeah, that'd be super cool. Uh and he said, Okay, well, Edward and Don are gonna come help you with it. And it was like, what? You know, so this was like uh just one of those things where it was wild that me and my friends that that had been listening to Van Halen so much were gonna be in a room with Edward trying to wrangle us as you know, very, very amateur kids trying to play some music in the studio. But I got to learn how to do things like how you punch in, or what's the process of recording, and and all these little elements that um that would later become the way that I would learn to understand things in the studio. And again, I had another full circle moment when I recorded at 5150, where Edward was playing on a piece of music called What the Hell Was I Thinking, where I actually was uh punching in when he was recording because we did a certain thing where he played a solo. I said it would be hilarious if you do a greatest hit solo, like all your best licks in one solo. And he's like, Okay, but what do you want me to play? And so I'd be like, You got to play this one lick from push comes to shove, and this one from this. And he said, Why don't you just play? You sound like me anyway. So uh it was like the but it was really funny because only I would know exactly where to punch in to save the part of just what I wanted of the lick and not ruin the next part, you know. So that was the thing. When you were punching in, you had the uh the possibility that you could destroy part of a performance that you otherwise would have wanted to keep, and technology has changed now, so you never have destructive audio editing. Uh, but back then you had to know what you were doing, or you could ruin what was happening. So um people have yet to hear that solo, but it is one of the greatest things that they will hear when they eventually hear it because he plays uh like a bunch of stream of consciousness versions of his best guitar licks that we decided should go together. And most of it he just plays and strings them together himself. But where we felt like we wanted to add something special, we would pick moments to punch in and say, Okay, put this one in right here, you know. But he would create the gaps and make it all feel like it all should be there, uh, just naturally, because he was such a great musician.
SPEAKER_02Incredible. You know, just for those who may not know, this track that Dweezel's referring to, and Dweezel, please jump in. Um, is this legendary track that we've been hearing about for for decades or have known about for decades, that basically has name a guitarist and they're on it doing a solo. Like, and and I would imagine the reason we haven't heard it yet is the logistics and legalities, etc., in terms of trying to do that.
SPEAKER_01It's way less uh exciting than that. It's uh more that um the it started on analog tape and it was on these uh at the time you could have normal size reels and then bigger size reels, which would give you a little bit more uh uh record space. And so the the concept of this piece of music it started off as a random idea of I'm gonna make a 22-minute long piece of music that goes through a bunch of different styles as if you're turning the radio knob and the music just keeps changing as you're listening to it. But after doing like the first 22 minutes, I thought, you know, this there's so many other things to explore here. And at the time, the maximum amount of time you could put on a CD was 75 minutes. So I thought, okay, let's make this thing 75 minutes, and I'll just see if I can get a bunch of different people to play on it. From moment to moment, you might hear different guitar players falling out of the speakers. And you know, think about it in terms of if you were watching a movie and you saw a scene that had all the most famous actors in small roles just in one scene. So, like Stallone and Schwarzenegger and Bruce Willis all like sitting together at a table, and each of them has just a couple of lines, but they're not necessarily the main character. And then you have other people that are over here that you recognize, but they're just kind of you know crossing paths, and that's what is happening with this piece of music. The music itself is changing, but you start to see characters show up, and and the idea really was what would it be like if you put certain players in situations where you hear them out of context, hear them in a way that you would never normally hear them. And that was kind of what happened with uh Edward. He plays on two parts, so there's two solos from him. Um, but you know, you got guys like Brian May, Angus, and Malcolm Young, who never played on anything other than ACDC, both play on this. Um, there's all Kinds of stuff that uh is super surprising. But the technical issue that uh happened early on was that we were using these big reels of tape, and what happened was we were playing a lot of this music and all the changes as a live performance, and so as it's happening, we're capturing the performance, and you can't really hear that there's anything wrong until you decide, oh wait, I need to add a part or change something, and it wouldn't stay in tune. We're like, what's going on? There was some drift because the actual by the time it got to the end of the reels, it was pulling the tape faster than it should, and it changed the pitch gradually. So there were things that were happening where you couldn't easily fix stuff, and it was just the the machine itself would make it worse as you were trying to go ahead and keep fixing stuff. You know, the the the timing change, the speed change just was making it worse. So it was kind of like at a standstill for a long time, and then it went to a new format. We put it on digital tape, and it was like, all right, at least if we can get this to be stable, I can now start to fix parts, and so we got it to that point, and then one day we were listening in the studio, and you could see on the board all the channels and the audio was showing up, and then suddenly everything went blank, and we're like, Well, what just happened? Where where is uh did did everything just get muted? The machine like erased everything, so it went from uh one format uh that was having problems to another, so we had safeties from the original analog, but now we had to put all that stuff, anything that was recorded and fixed got ruined because it just got wiped out by the the new tape machine. Wow. So fortunately, it never erased any guest performances, but then it went to another digital format, which was these uh small video tapes called D888 tapes. Uh, and this is way before Pro Tools and all that stuff existed, so then that had its own set of issues, and I finally ended up getting it into a modern DAW, uh, only fairly recently. Uh, so I'm trying to compile all this stuff and and make it all work, but now there's a lot of it that uh previously I had put in several sections where I was quoting parts of my dad's music throughout, but I don't really feel the need to do that at this point because I've been playing his music now for 20 years on stage. So now I have to invent some new sections to put in and have it uh morph into these other new sections, but I also have the ability to have um newer players. There's a lot of great modern players that would be nice to uh uh invite to be a part of this thing. So at the end of the day, this thing will take 30 plus years to make and have uh, I don't know, 40, 50, maybe 60 different guitar players on it. Uh so it's not something that anybody else would ever uh attempt to do.
SPEAKER_02I mean, the title itself is just so perfect. What were you thinking, Jason?
SPEAKER_00First time you saw Van Halen in concert, what was that experience like?
SPEAKER_01So the very first tour that I saw was the Diver Down tour, and I saw them at the forum, and I saw two shows, and it was the loudest thing I had ever experienced in my life at that point. Uh, but you know how they used to talk about it like it was Barnum and Bailey, like you know, they're bringing the circus to town. You just couldn't believe what you were seeing because this is before you have those mega screens where you can see you know everything on a big screen. And and half the time now, when people go to a big concert like that, they're not looking at the performers. The performers are this big, they're looking at the big screen. But back then, you were focused on the performers, people would big bring binoculars and stuff, you know, to see what was going on. And the the fact that David Lee Roth would take these long pauses, you know, and just like stand there and like just look at all the people here tonight, doing nothing, and it feels like an eternity, but the place is just screaming, and the fact that he's doing nothing and they're screaming, you're just like, What is happening here? You know, they just were in awe of of whatever that band did, and then you know, Edward tossing picks into the audience, always smiling, running, jumping, doing stuff. Playing the songs is hard enough, but running around and doing it and skidding across on knee pads, uh, it was just athleticism and uh everything about the music was was so powerful. Them, just as musicians, they were at the apex of the skill level, you know. So I just feel like nothing could ever match what that was. They brought this giant energy to the stage and they made it work for every corner of the stage, and as many people in that building got their feel and the fill of what that energy was wherever they went. And you know, they they really were. I think there's nothing that could touch what they were doing. Their presentation in at that time, uh, it was just the greatest rock and roll experience that you could have. You know, of course, you had things like Hendrix or the Beatles or those kinds of things before that, and there was audience enthusiasm for those kind of performers, but nobody had brought that kind of energy and athleticism to the thing, and playing difficult, tricky stuff, you know, that was like of course, you have Edward and Alex, who are both in their own right, virtuosos, and you put them together and they create this uh this musicianship and energy that it's it's way beyond just a display of skill because the songwriting is so good and memorable that that's what makes Van Halen last the test of time. It's not just like, oh, these guys could do these complicated math equations and make it all work, you know, on stage. But uh they they just really were so kick-ass the way they did it that you just can't. I mean, there's just no better thing that you could have seen at that time.
SPEAKER_02Right. I mean, you know, people talk about we we always talk about the virtuosity in this band, right? Edward and and all that he brought to the guitar community, but he did it while doing split kicks. Yeah, the showmanship was there too. It wasn't it wasn't just about one or the other, he it was the full package. And and you don't really we don't really talk about Edward in terms of the the full package that he presented and what he did for the guitar community. It's either it's either this or that or the other that we talk about with him. But when you get into the real minutiae and talk about how he changed the guitar industry itself, I mean that's a whole other conversation, that's a whole other show, you know. Uh it's very, you know, we that's maybe we maybe we do a whole other episode on that. We'll call you some other time with that one. But um, I'm interested to know um two things. One, did you did you get to go to the us festival?
SPEAKER_01I didn't go to the us festival. It was funny because um I was interested to go, uh, and I talked to Edward at that time. He said, You're not gonna want to go to this, there's gonna be a million people there, literally, and it's just gonna be a nightmare. And uh you just come see a show at the forum again, right? Right, you know, and that made sense because uh if you're 12 years old, you you don't want to be in that mass of humanity uh over there, it's like uh it's a scary thing. Oh so it was it was a I think the right choice not to go, and if you also watched the the the footage, it wasn't even really their full show, and it wasn't their greatest night, you know.
SPEAKER_02It still was cool, but right you know, for for those of us, I didn't see them until the 1984 tour, but um when you know, back then I'll take whatever I could get. That was a great show, as far as I'm concerned, you know, like it was it was magic because again, we didn't get to see them move around, you know. It it was static photos in Cream Magazine or Circus or what have you, or the back of Diver Town, etc. But to actually see Dave do a jump, to actually see Edward do his thing, like it was really uh like seeing, you know, Tommy and I have talked about the the bootlegs from from the Us Festival, we're just so uh awestruck. We were just so awestruck by it. Still, I'm still yeah, you know, so incredible. Okay, so just a follow-up question to that, which is kind of off topic in a way, but okay, so 5150 is is born, the studio is open, you have this relationship with Edward. When was your first visit to 5150?
SPEAKER_01Um, I didn't go up there and really see what he was doing or like play guitars and and see what the process was when they were recording until the um OU812 era, uh, and he was showing me the telly that he used for Cabo Wabbo. Um, and they had these very big soffited speakers, and Ed like to play in the control room at massive, massive volume, and so I think if you listen to that record, the bass frequencies on that record are very low compared to some of the other records, and I think it really just was because they listened so loud, you got a sense that there was enough bass at that massive volume, but uh it just it didn't necessarily translate for the uh the end user because the the balances were a little bit um skewed at that point. Uh, but I was around when he did um stuff for the the four unlawful cardinal knowledge record. And uh the time when we did his solos on uh what the hell was I thinking was around the balance era. So and he did use his um original Marshall amp for that. So the sound that you hear is you know classic, classic and pure, yeah.
SPEAKER_00You know, uh as the years went on, how often would you find yourself crossing paths with uh with Eddie, you know, after that whole era and stuff, and and what kind of friendship uh did you guys have as as things went uh went on?
SPEAKER_01Well, we would talk on the phone uh every so often. We would play golf every so often, and we would talk about guitars and get together. It was probably like uh once a year or or a couple times a year sometimes. Um, but you know, at the point where he did the record, the first record with Wolfgang, right before they were going into the studio, he called me up and he said, Hey, do you have any bootlegs of of early Van Halen? I'm like, Do I? You know, uh so I, me and a friend, Craig Adams, um, between us, we had probably every bootleg that you could possibly imagine. And we put together a care package for Edward. And he he came over and he got this box of all this stuff, and we made suggestions on you gotta listen to this one, or you should think about like, are you gonna do some of these older Van Halen songs that were previously on demos, or are they gonna make it to the album? So we were giving them some ideas of things that they should uh think about, and um, he ended up bringing that box of stuff over to um the producer of the record, the the first producer of uh of that record. Um and they went over all that stuff. Uh, so it was uh it was interesting to see the evolution. There was one thing that was around that time where he was saying, um, you know, he was not feeling super inspired. Uh he he was still writing really cool guitar riffs, but like lead playing, he wasn't pushing the boundaries like he used to, and he was saying to himself, you know, I can't get into the zone. He was sober at this time, and he was sort of lamenting the fact that it was an adjustment period for him to get his creative mind space uh together. Um, so that was uh I think something that might have stuck around for a little while with him, where he was trying to feel like he could get ideas through the ether naturally, uh, as opposed to feeling like he had to be somehow uninhibited in some other way for those ideas to to flow in.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, I would imagine that um, you know, being Edward Van Halen and being someone who is touted constantly for pushing the envelope, basically on every album. Every album had the moment where you're like, oh my god, Spanish Fly, oh my god, Cathedral, oh my god, you know, like we every album had a moment like that. The the pressure, I think, that that winds up building up album after album. The more albums you put out, the I would imagine the stress, etc. So by the time now we're at a different kind of truth, well, now what do I do? You know, and and you're in a different place in your life, and you're, you know, I would imagine that that stress really uh takes its toll. But at the same time, man, what an amazing vault to fall back on, right? So, I mean, we really got some great stuff thanks to you and and and I'm sure others, but like uh to hear those songs. I thought that was the brilliance of that album, too, was the the idea of, you know, what does a a reunion album sound like? They're not they're usually not so great, they're not as great as you remember the the originals being, but man, that album to me really delivered, and part of that, that part of that equation was hearkening back to some of these demos that we've all kind of heard these incomplete songs or these half-assed songs, uh, you know, over the years on on various bootlegs. But man, um, I really thought that that album was fantastic. What were your when when you were finally able to hear that's that album, did you get any like did you get to hear it before the rest of us, or were you kind of listening the day it came out too?
SPEAKER_01Well, there were times where when he finished a record, he would call me and say, Hey, do you want to hear this? And I would either go up to the studio or he would come over. He liked to listen to the records in the car, so he did that with balance. You know, he brought that over and listened at ear-piercing volume.
SPEAKER_02Uh, but everyone always says that about him. Whenever someone has listened to something with Ed, it's always at ear piercing volume.
SPEAKER_01Incredible. Yeah, yeah. So, I mean, there is a thing that was an era where the power of what you felt, uh, if the music was actually moving through you, that was part of the way these riffs were intended to be experienced. You know, the thunderous sound of this stuff is that's I think another thing that people, unless you've ever really experienced it at that volume, the way Unchained would hit you, or some of these other riffs, you know, it's like they're amazing at a regular volume, but when you feel it being played, especially like right when that song was really just created, there was nothing that could match what that energy was. I mean, you might as well have been standing in front of a jet airplane, you know. I mean, it's uh it's just uh it's it's wild. Uh and Alex would have two uh 4x12 cabinets practically this close to his head as his monitoring system for live shows, plus the symbols and all that, you know, I like it's just punishing level, but did it create great effect? Of course. Did it have some side effects? Most likely. But you know, the thing about it is that was an era that will never be repeated because the the adrenaline that comes with that volume, the music was written to create that adrenaline, you know, it wasn't just like, oh yeah, here's a you know crafty little tune. You know, later on, you might have heard some of his music be more maybe songwriter crafted, but in the earliest days, it was about how does this guitar riff make you feel? You know, so he had a lot of tricks up his sleeve uh as far as uh being able to be a songwriter musician. Um, and I think even past like the first six albums, there's still tons of really creative, great rhythm playing and songwriting, um, you know, arrangement things that were put into uh Van Halen music that uh probably Alex had uh a significant role in as well, because the way that he plays against what Edward did, it makes it have a totally different feel. So, like Edward sounded most like Van Halen when he played with Alex. When he played with other people, yeah, he still sounded like Edward, but did it really feel like Van Halen? Not really, you know. So it's the combination of those guys that make the Van Halen sound exactly what we know it to be.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, that's an interesting point that you bring up because the probably the one of the most uh viewed or watched uh clips of Ed playing without Alex is from the Les Paul anniversary special. And and the thing that I took away from that was that Ed was being Ed, but it sounded out of place. It just didn't sound like there was something about, I mean, his tone was there, he was obviously there doing his thing, and um, but there was something that was just you know, like he had a little bit of an off thing to his writing that just didn't wasn't standard, so to speak, right? And yeah, and uh I feel like watching that clip, you really it's magnified watching him play with another drummer and another band.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, I think one of the elements that can come into play is if you got a drummer that's not uh like balls to the wall, gets it rock, authentic drummer, there's no way that's ever gonna work great with Edwards playing. You know, it's gonna feel too safe, and Ed's you know, gotta be teetering on the edge with Alex, you know. Uh, and so I think that's that's one of the ingredients that brings the excitement, but that's also because Alex, in his way, is uh is interpreting what needs to happen, and he's matching the energy and the creativity, and you hear that in uh every song they ever played together. It's you know, even Alex is playing. If you really analyze the stuff, they're moving together. The tempo never stays super straight. So you got a guy that's like a machine-style drummer, you know. Ed's like now restrained, he can't go where he needs to go, right?
SPEAKER_00Yeah, hey, uh we're talking about the reunion, you know, with David Roth with Van Halen and a different kind of truth, and it had me thinking, I always felt that the real reunion with an album should have happened when they did Me Wise Magic and can't get this stuff no more. I just love those songs, and I'm I'm curious. Two two questions here for you. When you heard Dave was coming back to the fold, I'm I'm a fan of all errors of Van Halen, and I'm sure you are as well. But when when hearing Dave was coming back to the fold, uh, what was your initial reaction? And are are you aware if maybe they recorded more songs than just those two for The Greatest Hits?
SPEAKER_01Because those are well, I don't really know. I I assume that there are lots of different takes and different things, but I know when they would deliver stuff to the label, they only they carefully only wanted to give just the album take that was there. So there weren't lots of you know alternative takes of things. That's not really part of their delivery system. I remember talking to Don Landy about that because um I asked him about some things, you know. Edward had given me this tape from the Fair Warning era, a cassette that was an alternate version of Hear About It Later, that had a totally different guitar solo on it that was much more um Alan Holdsworth inspired. And um and Don said, Oh yeah, we we would just cut out all the other things off the reel so that the label didn't have extra stuff. And I said, Well, then what did you do with that stuff? He says, probably threw it away. You know, uh, so in some cases, there there may not be um extra things, but you know, they he had the studio at his beck and call. So uh by the time 5150 was a thing, there's probably dozens and dozens of reels of things that are that no one's heard before. Uh so it's there there probably is quite a bit of stuff, but you know, as as you say, you know, there's different eras and lots of good things that uh you could be discovered from from all these these eras, but people tend to like the original the best. Uh and you know, hearing that Dave was coming back, of course, that was exciting. Uh but you know, if you if you're a Van Halen fan, you're still always going to have your favorites and things that made you get into the band from the beginning. So, like most Van Halen fans, I can still get into any one of the first six albums at any point and listen all the way through and enjoy every moment of it. Um, and that might not always be the case as the the the years progressed with with the other stuff. You know, I can certainly appreciate a lot of the other stuff, but um, you know, I I I tend to go back to the first six albums.
SPEAKER_02I I wonder if um, you know, over the years there were there were always, I would imagine, opportunities where you two would play together, right? And maybe like NAM or you know, charity events or what have you. Um how often would that happen? Did it ever happen with where you and Ed would play?
SPEAKER_01Well, we played uh on stage a couple times together. Um I played at a Van Halen concert in uh, I think it was Indiana, uh, at some point in uh on the for unlawful carnal knowledge tour. Um what was interesting about that was they said, do not go in these areas because there's pyro here and you will catch on fire, you know. So, like uh that's not something that you normally experience in life is like uh walking too close to a place where you could catch on fire. Uh so you know that was uh interesting. But um what did you play that night?
SPEAKER_02What were you playing?
SPEAKER_01Um Led Zeppelin's rock and roll, you know. But um the thing is, uh when we would sit down and play guitar either at the studio, like you know, the time when we were doing what the hell was I thinking, or backstage when I was showing him the St. Alfonso's Pancake Breakfast, that was never lost on me that, like, hey, I'm I'm sitting here with like Edward Van Halen, you know, we're you know, like we're talking about guitar, this is cool, you know. So it was uh it was definitely always um like being a 12-year-old.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, well, you know, people often talk about Eddie as uh an innovator, uh, and uh well, not necessarily as a teacher. I also don't think he gets the credit as a songwriter that he deserves, by the way. Um but uh how much did he teach you? Like uh what was the most valuable lesson that you got from Eddie Van Halen?
SPEAKER_01Well, he wasn't um sitting there trying to tell me, okay, you gotta hold a pick like this, and you gotta play your scales and do, you know, he would just show me how he did something, and I would just absorb that um through osmosis. Uh if I had questions, you know, I would ask him to play it again, and then I could just see it. But it he didn't really say, This is the way to do it. He wanted whoever was gonna be picking up a guitar to try to find their own voice. So even if you found his music inspiring and you wanted to play like him, that wasn't necessarily his favorite thing to hear when you know other people played like him. They want he just wanted somebody to do his own, you know, their own thing. But you know, everybody starts with something that inspires them, and it usually is uh apparent throughout all of their musical career. There's going to be quotes, or there's going to be something that that is a callback to that inspiration. Uh, so you'll find that from uh all kinds of players in every style of music from every era. They will be quoting things or they will be good at demonstrating that they have a a lot of knowledge in one area about one type of music. So it happens uh in rock, it happens in jazz, it happens in a lot of things. If you have an interest in something, there's no way that's not gonna rub off in in some way. Uh and but I feel like if you really listen to Edward's playing, when he talked about really being inspired by Eric Clapton, I hear less Eric Clapton in his playing than I do Jeff Beck and Richie Blackmore.
SPEAKER_03Right.
SPEAKER_01But I know that he could listen to a song like Highway Star and then just go ahead and start playing the whole thing. And he could sound like Richie Blackmore playing the parts. Uh, so he was very good at being able to hear phrasing and uh, but then he would translate his personality into that. So that's why when you hear Van Halen do cover songs, like um when they did that one Who song with Sammy Hagar, you know, the who are you? Um or no, don't get fooled again.
SPEAKER_00Don't get fooled again.
SPEAKER_01Don't get fooled. Um I mean, that's one of the best versions of that song, it's great, but but also when you uh hear them in the early days doing something like, You really got me, it's he's taken that song to a different level, and and this is a funny element because so many times this will happen with different generations. Uh, a generation will hear a version of a song and think that that was the original writer of that song. So when I heard You Really Got Me at 12 years old, I heard the Van Halen version, and then when I heard the Kinks version on the radio, I was like, this guy can't play that song, right? You know, uh, and so it was just like the reverse, and and you have these examples of that all the time, where like when uh P. Diddy did that terrible version of Cashmere, you know, you have that generation thinking that that's what that song is, you know, and then they hear the original, like, Oh, I don't like that one. I like the T one. Like, oh my god, right, just have gone so wrong.
SPEAKER_02I actually have a fun a funny little side story on that. When I was about nine years old, the Sgt. Pepper's movie came out with Peter Frampton and the Bee Gees. Yeah, and my dad had a record store and gave me the soundtrack, and I listened to it over and over again. And one day we were driving, and the real Beatles Sergeant Pepper came on, and I was like, What is that? My father pulled the car over and said, Listen to me, that is the real deal. What you're listening to is trash, you need to listen to this. And we went home and I had a real education for about a week on all things Beatles. Yeah, and he kind of sent me straight on that one.
SPEAKER_01So sometimes it doesn't work that way, but yes, in this case, it happens far more than people realize. And especially, you know, it's fine to make the mistake, but the problem is when somebody doesn't want to do the research and then appreciate the original to begin, you know, that's where like there's a loss of music appreciation in general from these younger generations. Sure, they they don't seem to have that much of an interest to see where everything came from, and they want to take whatever's happening right now and say, Oh, that's unique and original, but it's like, no, this is the the watered-down version of like seven generations of what came before it.
SPEAKER_03Sure.
SPEAKER_01So there's always going to be that element, there's always gonna be people that are gonna be disappointed by some version of of that um scenario.
SPEAKER_02For sure. You know, it's interesting. We live in a uh society right now where we are constantly moving forward. And you know, I think when we were when we were all growing up. So yeah, yeah, okay. Good point. Um, but you know, when we were growing up, I mean, how many times did you watch that movie on cable that month? You know, and you knew all the lines. I mean, now, even myself included, I see a movie once that I really like, and I'll only watch it once because there's just so much more stuff to then watch next week or next day or what have you. So you don't really have the time because there's just so you're just inundated constantly with new that you don't have the time to turn around and and see something again or watch something over and over again.
SPEAKER_01But also the things that are being created that uh in the temple that you're talking about, everything is so formulated to be disposable in the way that you're talking about that it doesn't resonate the same way because it's not a new idea that's connecting with you and giving you a new perspective. You know, a lot of movies that did that stand the test of time, but you know, you might have a well-made movie now that is it's got all the ingredients that they want you to see, you know, like the biracial couple and the this and the that, and you're like, okay, you know, but it's not representative of anything other than a formula that they're saying, right this out, and uh, you know, so I think to some level, uh, you know, on a on a human level, we we all get um uh inspired by certain things that feel authentic to us and the things that don't, you could watch it, but it doesn't stick with you, you don't really care about it.
SPEAKER_02Your subconscious knows, yeah, yeah, for sure. Well, listen, what I've got a question for you, sort of kind of in a different direction. Uh back uh in the early 90s, um, you know, Roth was looking for a new guitar player a couple of times. Were you ever approached about that? Was it ever anything that you were interested in doing?
SPEAKER_01Uh it never came up. You know, I know uh that uh my good friend Blue Saracino had a moment where that was like uh you know being talked about, and uh there's you know some other guys that obviously uh went down that path. Um, but yeah, that wasn't uh uh a thing. I don't think I was ever really um like a uh you know, I'm not so much a showman when it when it comes to playing, because I find it very difficult to be like running around and playing hard things. You know, it's not it's not uh I I probably if I practiced it a lot, I probably could do it, but it just never was my my thing.
SPEAKER_02I I asked the question because you what you do exude is that fun, right? You you always had a great sense of humor about you know what you were doing. There was there were those serious moments, but obviously any of your output, especially from back then, had a sense of fun to it.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, well, I definitely have fun when it comes to music because I just really enjoy the fact that it can inspire you, it can make you feel things. And you know, my dad famously asked the question does humor belong in music? He had an album with that that title, and and you know, that's not to say that you have to have music that has a ton of jokes that are written into it in terms of like the lyrics are all jokes. Sometimes the music itself can be funny, just like cartoon music can be funny, or elements that can just set you up to feel this strange uh imbalance or awkward feeling, and then it has a resolution. It's all of these things make music fascinating, and it it kind of just brings your your uh emotional life together. Music is in films because it's the only thing that can bolster that emotional sense. There's no other part of filmmaking that can bring those feelings together. If you take the music out of a lot of movies, it's not even worth watching.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, it's very true. Very, very true. Hey, so you know, the one thing being a Van Halen fan that I've been disappointed with is that we never got an actual tribute concert to Eddie Van Halen. Um, I I mean, I just can't figure out why uh the band, the former band members uh couldn't come together um uh to pay tribute to, well, in my opinion, if if Eddie Van Halen didn't exist, I don't know if any of these guys would have had a music career. I mean, Eddie was the pulse of it all. And uh were you ever approached about uh anything like that or or participating?
SPEAKER_01Uh there I think there were some sort of talks about doing something like that, but um yeah, I was never directly involved in any of it. Uh but I think you know it's a it's a weird situation because on one hand there's one camp that could say don't change the perception of who he was. If you saw him, remember what you saw of him. Don't don't let this new narrative become how you remember him, you know. So I think as a fan, people want different opportunities to to uh listen to different things or be exposed to whatever they can because they they just enjoy the music and they'll take whatever they can get. But the people that are closest to the ones who created the music might see it differently uh and say, you know, uh the music that was put out there was curated to be just this. We don't need a different version of it, you know, even if it's all because it's uh uh about uh a celebration. I don't know, you know, there's there's arguments on both sides that you wouldn't want to dilute what it is, and no one's gonna replace him. So, you know, but I think as a fan, you know, people do like to see people paying their uh respects in different ways. And so I could definitely see both sides. Um, but it's uh, you know, who knows? Maybe one of these days there there will be an event like that.
SPEAKER_02I'm just throwing it out there, which I have in the past, uh, not publicly, but I can remember when there were those rumors milling about that there was going to be a tribute concert or a tribute tour or what have you, and they were talking to, you know, the uh Van Halen Camp was talking to Satriani about about doing it. And I texted Tommy right away and I was like, they need to get Weezel's apple. Like if there's if there's anyone on the planet Earth other than Wolfgang who would know all the intricacies and between the tone and the way to play these songs, etc., that would know how to do this right, it's gonna be Dweezel. Like he was the one who was literally sitting next to him and showing him these things since he was 12 years old. I always thought that it was a no-brainer that if there was gonna be a guitarist on stage besides Wolfgang, like you're you're right there. You're you're you're next to Dweezel.
SPEAKER_00Dweezel, he's not lying. I remember when he texted me that, and I was like, Holy shit, you're right, dude. He's the man for the job.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, no, I I appreciate it. I do like the nuances and and all that stuff, and uh, I do like to uh in my own way uh pay homage uh whenever I can, however I can. Yeah, uh, you know, some people look at it sideways though, and and they're like, oh, well, you know, all you do is play other people's music and and you uh, you know, just show that you can copy somebody, your dad or Edward Van Halen. It's like you know, you can be disappointed all you want. I enjoy it. I I like playing the music and having the challenge of like trying to play it as well as I can, whether it's Edward Edward Van Halen's music or my dad's music. Um, but you know, I've made my own music as well. It's not like I can't do that. Uh it's uh it's just one of those things where um at any point there's there's uh there's gonna be some possible musical challenge that you'll face as a as a guitarist or songwriter, whatever. And you know uh I like doing the things, the kind of things that I have consistently done over the years, and when people appreciate that I will put the effort into the details of like I said, Van Halen or or my dad, like you try doing it, you try doing it to that level, you know, it's like uh it it takes you know some skill to be able to to reverse engineer sounds and and play the play the stuff. So you know people want to hate on it, go ahead, you know. Yeah, it doesn't bother me. But um, you know, I I think there is uh another kid that's great at playing the songs, and you probably already know Jacob DeRops. Sure. But um, you know, he's he's very good and very dedicated to learning the stuff as note for note as possible, and uh I think he's got a very good natural uh feel for it as well.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, for sure. And you know, there are there are a number of and there's there's so many people out there that that do this that maybe aren't quite as great, but they're doing it, they're trying to do it, they're they're aspiring to do it, you know, because it's inspiring. The music makes you wanna. You know, uh, we've had a conversation on here before about um, you know, building replica guitars of Eddie's striped, you know, the variations on Eddie's strap guitars. If you're a guitarist and you're into Van Halen, at some point you probably attempted your version of grabbing a strap body and a spray spray a can of spray paint and doing your own version. It's just inspiring. You just you can't help but try, you know, to be a little closer to Ed.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, I think uh I think that's definitely true for the people that were of his uh original audience, original generation. It's probably fewer uh from the newer generation, uh, but it's it's interesting that there are people that will still want to make the distinction that oh, you know, he he ruined guitar because he did all these things. But anybody that ever says that kind of stuff pretends that whatever they're doing is the most unique and amazing thing, and they they play at a much lower level of skill because who needs all this other stuff, you know? That that want to um say that he ruined guitar playing and they went the other way because of it, but usually it's because they can't do it, and and it's just not like uh you know, I I think that kind of stuff uh is um it really reflects more on their limited ability to comprehend the the level of skill and talent. And really, again, like what we've been saying, as a songwriter, as a band, Van Halen wrote songs that stand the test of time. You want to hear them, they make you feel something, you get excited, you are happy when you hear this stuff, and you can't really say that about a lot of alternative music, you know, it's not necessarily supposed to make you happy, it's supposed to make you uh, I don't know, depressed. But it's like um uh, you know, if you're if you're gonna be hating on somebody that put a smile on your face, I don't know, it's not my not my cup of tea.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, for sure. You know, I think that uh a big part of what Eddie brought to the table, amongst all the other things, was the fact that he could be a virtuoso on one hand, but also, and this is not the proper phrase, but dumb it down for the masses, right? Like, like he wasn't he wasn't a Jeff Beck where like Jeff Beck is Jeff Beck and amazing and an amazing guitarist, but he wasn't writing number one hits, you know, he wasn't writing these songs, but he also knew what to play and what was appropriate for the song, so he didn't overdo it.
SPEAKER_01You know, there's very rare situations where he is playing an extended solo, right? You know, if you really look at the first six albums, most of the songs are three minutes or under. Sure. And to be able to say that much in that little amount of time, you have to be a great editor in terms of arranging and just say, here's only what's necessary. And that's also kind of the reason he never made a solo album. You know, I asked him why he didn't. He goes, Who wants to hear that? I'm like, Everyone, everyone wants to hear that. But he just thought, like, I get a I get to play enough within the band, you know, I don't need to write extra just instrumental stuff.
SPEAKER_02One one last thing before we we let you go. Um, you know, it to that point. Um, the other day I was waiting for something to happen. I was online somewhere, and it dawned on me, I didn't have headphones on or anything, but it dawned on me that, hey, little guitarist doesn't have a guitar solo. How can how can that be? And so then I start going through the parts of my head and I'm going and I'm like, well, there's this part and there's that part, and that part never repeats. And then wait a second, wait a second. So then I do grab headphones and I do start looking. And I start to break the song down. And I never realized. I mean, the song is so good that it it doesn't take you to a place where you're like, all right, can we get to the chorus already? You know, like but there's there's quite a bit of time and a few musical passages that get you know that get that happen before you get to the crooks of the song, right? And and you never realize it. How I've been listening to that album for 40 plus years and never, I'm just gonna he does have a slide guitar melody solo, right? Yes, yes. But I was thinking of that more of as a as a part than a solo part, you know. But you know, then you get into songs like uh Girl Gone Bad or House of Pain, where I then give the credit to Dave for knowing when not to sing, right? Just letting musical interludes just sort of happen, and you know, I mean hot for teacher for crying out loud, like who would have ever thought of how you know how to put that song together as a lyricist? Yeah, you know, when when to not sing.
SPEAKER_01I mean, truly, if you listen to those songs and the way that he brings them together so that they tell a story that isn't just like songwriting 101, you know, they bring these images that match the muscularity of the music and the the humor and the the the quirkiness, you know, and and Edward himself he would just use noises sometimes as part of a riff or part of a song, you know, and uh so these found sound kind of things are very um very different than somebody that's only about writing chords and and you know structured arrangements. He he was happy to to throw a wrench in it anywhere, you know, and that's what was cool is like you didn't know what you were gonna get.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, yeah, for sure. Dweezel, I can't say uh thank you enough. We can't say thank you enough for for us spending so much time with us today to talk about uh Van Halen. Uh what's what's new in your world? What what uh what's going on next for you?
SPEAKER_01Yeah, I have a tour I'm doing in the fall that is celebrating 20 years of me playing my dad's music, and I'm doing something a little different on this one. I'm gonna play some of my own music, but I'm gonna play some of the music that my dad liked of my music that he saw us play live. And you know, there's a few different songs where he would say, You should open with that one, or I like this one because of this. So I have some stories that uh relate to some of these songs, and um, and so it just sort of ties it all together. And the tour is called Like Father, like son.
SPEAKER_02Oh, that's awesome! Fantastic. I saw the last tour, and it was just fantastic. It was so good, it was so great to to rehear those those songs again. And you always do such a great job. All right. Well, how about one last shout-out from you? Where can people reach you? How do you want them to find you? All that stuff.
SPEAKER_01Well, I'm doing a lot of stuff on YouTube these days, which you can find me on my YouTube channel. Um, pretty sure that's the real Dweezel Zappa on YouTube. Uh, and then uh, you know, uh on my website, dweezelzappa.com. You can check out music or uh some of our live concerts that are available for streaming and stuff like that.
SPEAKER_02So um, yeah, those are I enjoyed your um your Instagram uh campaign that was going to be the tour was just fantastic. That actually that got me there. I really like you know I can go to a lot of shows, but man, I was like, Oh, I gotta go. This this been to this end.
SPEAKER_01Well, yeah, we gotta figure out some some stuff to to uh you know make people uh aware that we're going back out. So uh we'll I don't know if I'm gonna do the same exact kind of thing, but uh we'll we'll try to get uh some interesting content out there.
SPEAKER_02All right. So uh before we say goodbye, everyone check out uh at dweezelzappa.com, check out running with the dweezel. Dweezel put out a uh a series of episodes of a podcast just focused on Van Halen, really doing deep dives into every single album. Uh, and I believe they're for purchase uh on dweezelzappa.com. I suggest the 5150 package if you're if you're a diehard.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, there's there's a lot going on there. There is one more episode that I'm finishing up uh that will complete the whole series. Um so yeah, it's uh uh it's an it's been an ongoing thing, and it's uh a labor of love to to do all that stuff, uh, just like it is when I'm playing my dad stuff. Right on. That's so cool.
SPEAKER_02All right, everybody. Until next time. Happy trails.
SPEAKER_00Yes, thanks, guys.