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The on-again, off-again Van Halen reunion tour with singer David Lee Roth is
once again a go. The quartet announced a 25-date North American tour Monday.
Roth, the Southern California quartet’s original vocalist, has not toured with
the band in 22 years. A few attempted reunions went bust, most recently last
January. An expected tour announcement was derailed when guitarist Eddie Van
Halen entered a rehab clinic for undisclosed reasons in March.
Despite racking up more No. 1 hits on Billboard’s mainstream-rock chart
than any band, and releasing two 10-million-selling albums (“Van Halen” in 1978
and “1984” in 1984), the quartet has had a fractious history. After Roth was
fired in the mid-‘80s, he was replaced by Sammy Hagar, who parted ways with the
band a decade later. Van Halen regrouped to record new music with Roth, only to
have that brief reunion dissolve in acrimony. Gary Cherone took over as
vocalist, and lasted for one album before being ousted in 1999. Hagar came back
aboard for a reunion tour in 2004, and then split again. The lastest twist is
that founding bassist Michael Anthony has been given the boot, and Van Halen’s
teenage son, Wolfgang, has replaced him.
More internal politics could be read into the four-page press release
announcing the tour from the tour promoter and two public-relations firms. The
release mentioned neither Hagar nor Anthony, and focused exclusively on the six
albums the band recorded with Roth from 1978 to 1984, even though the band
subsequently scored nine Top-40 hits with Hagar.
Though the band has not recorded an album of new material since 1998, the
renewed ties with Roth are expected to command instant sell-outs along the lines
of the current Police reunion. The arena tour with Hagar three years ago brought
in more than $54 million.
http://leisureblogs.chicagotribune.com/turn_it_up/2007/08/van-halen-david.html
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