All Your Little Guitars Sing to Me
In Memory of Eddie van Halen; or, The Case for Little Guitars
Unpopular opinion, but my fave Van Halen song is “Little Guitars” from the original lineup’s fifth and poorest regarded album, 1982’s Diver Down. It is a perfect cut of bubbly party pop from America’s greatest hard-rock dance band, which sees Eddie van Halen switching effortlessly between a grab bag of rhythmic flavors.
After a flashy flamenco prelude, brother Alex van Halen leaps in with his signature stomping beat, setting the stage for Ed to start laying the guitar riffs down—from the swaggering, half-time intro groove to the bright, syncopated stabs that follow, into majestic, cinematic sweeps before finally launching into the staccato pulses that drive the track. More than just a jaw-dropping guitar virtuoso, Edward Lodewijk van Halen was an astonishing songwriter and canny composer, especially working in the often clunky hard rock milieu. A classically-trained pianist with a jazz clarinetist father, those non-rock roots surface as Eddie places so many lovely textures and moods into “Little Guitars” that when the song finally hits the spot a rippin’ solo would usually occupy, he smartly switches it up and opts to just lay back with some drifting atmospherics, spacing out for a bit before galloping back in to wrap the whole thing up.
By wedding this effervescent musical track to Diamond David Lee Roth’s sweetest-ever lyric (a hopeful love letter to an indifferent señorita), and splashing it with the gloss of Michael Anthony and Ed’s echoing and ahhing backing vocals, that unique sense of unbridled joy that permeates so many VH tunes finds full flower here — you can hear the boys’ shit-eating grins as they dance and strut their way through the bouncing ditty.
Edward’s use of a miniature Les Paul on the track adds to the bell-like shimmer of the song and inspires it’s title; but it also lends legitimacy to those of us with small hands who find themselves most comfortable on short scale, or even children’s, guitars. While hard rock frequently trades in over-sized expressions of alpha male aggression, Eddie showed you could be effortlessly cool with a smile on your face and a little guitar in your hands.
Rest in pinch harmonics, EVH.
