Pandemonium wrote:Van Halen, the end of January '77 on a cold, foggy weeknight at the Golden Bear Club on PCH in Huntington Beach. A friend of mine knew the guy who used to occasionally worked the soundboard at the club and he bugged my for months to come with him to see bands at this club (he later talked me into seeing Quiet Riot w/Randy Rhoads around '79 in Hollywood). I was still 17 and a senior in High School with a fake ID recently bought at the local swap meet and had never been in a bar before so the whole night was a big life altering experience for me.
Soundboard guy got us in without even paying a cover. I was such a greenhorn regarding alcohol and especially beer, I ordered a Dos Equis by asking for a "Double X Beer please..." It's a miracle I didn't get thrown out that night, I was so obviously underage.
He let us check out the soundbooth before the place filled up. The soundbooth was this tiny wooden box built into the back wall and ceiling of the club that you had to climb a short ladder to get into like a kid's treehouse. It was big enough to fit the mixing board and a couple short stools but was still so small you couldn't stand up in it and had a small rectangular slot cut out the front to see and hear the stage. It was like being in a space capsule and I've never to this day seen any other club with a similar setup.
I had no idea who Van Halen was and by the time they came on, the club probably had about 75 people max that night. This was well over a year before they were signed to Warner Bros and released their first album and they were still playing about 50/50 covers vs originals. One cover they played that I really liked was "Walk Away" by the James Gang - problem was, I didn't know it wasn't a VH song and it took a few years before I clued in it wasn't their tune. Dave was into wearing disco bell bottoms at the time, Eddie had his rig built into a beat up big ol' upright WWII Bomb Shell they must have picked up at a junk yard sale. The biggest impression I left that show with was how incredibly loud they were in that place.
Still, it was almost over a year later before I saw another live band. To this day I regret passing on that friend's offer to see Led Zeppelin at the LA Forum late Summer '77 (their last shows they'd wind up playing in SoCal). I couldn't come up with the fuckin' $20 for his spare floor ticket. Thus my next show was a big outdoor gig at Anaheim Stadium headlined by The Electric Light Orchestra in April '78.
You always know Pandemoniums post in a topic like this will be the longest, most detailed, and histroically interesting.
Whoever said you should write a book about these experiences was spot on.
He was in all the girlie magazines at that time. And he was in "Disco" a famous music show here.
