Touring vs New Material and timelines...

[Samoa Joe's Ego]

...

I hope this is considered a decent enough topic for a new thread. As an infrequent reader/poster I apologize in advance if this is considered a pointless rehash.

When you look back at the ability of young bands in the late seventies and early eighties to go into a studio and hammer out an album in a few weeks time, I just cannot understand the inability of Van Halen (and other bands for that matter) to get in the studio and hammer out a record.

Looking at the Sammy statements regarding how they would never get a whole album done and stay together for the tour......how is a tour any better pschologically? If the idea is that DLR and EVH can co-exist on tour easier than making a CD...I give you the implosion of VH 2004 tour and the implosion of the Sammy and Dave tour. Not to mention Gun and Roses et al.

As a fan, I much prefer an album to a tour. I look at the decade of nothing other than 3 or 4 songs and think about the potential for 5 albums of material. Why are bands not concerned with a legacy of lasting music vs a tour few will remember in years to come.

Ideally it would be nice for new music AND a tour, but given a choice of imploding doing one or the other, the album seems a no brainer to me. Yet not only does that seem NOT to be the view of EVH, its almost as if they are actively NOT producing new music and using any excuse to relieve themselves of that goal.

Also, the music industry in general, only country music artists seem to still issue the equivalent of an album a year or so. Perhaps a few rappers use that model. That probably has to do with the country music stars having song writers. But look at the end of Johnny Cash's life, they were recording like crazy to get as much of a legend on record as possible. And had some interesting work to boot.

I would rather see 8 experiments like VH3 with some panning out, some not, leading to the eqivalent of an entire boxed set than 2 half assed tours and a couple of songs. EVH and DLR/Sammy could have reunited and imploded a few times A PIECE and a 4rth singer to boot in the amount of time that has been wasted.

Its just completely out of the realm of my understanding logic wise.

To stop being so long winded I will leave with this, can someone explain to me why the days of going in the studio and just hammering it out over a few weeks period are dead? My recollection is that it started when bands got HUGE, the Poison/Bon Jovi, Def Leppard thing...albums that produced singles for 2 years....same with U2....huge ridiculously sized tours that went on for years. That caused a huge gap between albums, and bands fell apart personality wise.


But this is a different era imo. With the digital sales, the lack of huge stadium tours, it seems to me the model of country music makes more sense. Have a deep catalogue of music, sell 1mill copies of an album with a new one every 18 months or even a year. Small tours packaged with a CD/ticket and a live instant cd. A quick Tour DVD.

Also some would say that a few weeks gives you a blah album, but on the other hand, one thing I have missed about EVH is the wild abandon of his jams from before. Even one take songs...something with raw energy. If it takes 3 years to do a CD and its a masterpiece, fine, but how often does THAT happen in reality?

To me that is the road to making a living in music.

I am not an expert, so please tell me where that is wrong.

Perhaps I am missing something obvious, but its a shame that 15 years has lead to so little work for posterity.

I wish these and others would realize that a tour doesn't really leave much of a legacy. And I wish they cared about their legacy.

Sorry for the rant, hope its an interesting enough topic. Though I suppose, pointless. Maybe they will actually get along and WANT to do music...but does anyone expect that the tour will even finish? I don't. But I hope I'm wrong.

[It's Mike]

"Looking at the Sammy statements regarding how they would never get a whole album done and stay together for the tour......how is a tour any better pschologically? If the idea is that DLR and EVH can co-exist on tour easier than making a CD...I give you the implosion of VH 2004 tour and the implosion of the Sammy and Dave tour."

i guess the main difference is that when they're on tour they have a financial reason to continue therefore they are more likely to get along. If the shows stop the cash stops.

When recording an album they're not getting a cheque every day they show at the studio. They have to create with each other everyday with no guaranteed money in it. Live, Dave and Ed can meet 2 minutes before the show and play. And leave in seperate limos. Not a real band in it's truest sense but something they could tolerate if the price was right.