Oh no . . . Van Halen alert!

Back in the late 1980s, I had a good friend who came by after school almost daily to play with the Nintendo Entertainment System. We spent hundreds of hours destroying ninjas, punching foreigners and generally beating the ever-loving crap out of each other. Good times!!!

So given that there were thousands of possible 8-bit audio music sources available to us, what do you think was ultimately our soundtrack of choice?

The same friend who owned the NES also had this second-hand copy of Van Halen's "1984" -- possibly the pinnacle of the band's accomplishments. It was an old tape published in that odd, beige plastic with black lettering that came off with excessive handling. You ended up remembering the track order without the benefit of the factory-provided guide.

I must have heard every lick of "1984" dozens of times during those carefree days of excessive video game intake. Portions of this albums remain in circulation with classic rock stations around the world, and every guitar hero wannabe at some time tries to copy the style.

Why was this such a landmark effort? Nobody else was making sounds like these. Nobody in mainstream music could match Eddie Van Halen's guitar play. And David Lee Roth could yell out a lyric with unparalleled ability.

But all good things must come to an end, and much of Van Halen's follow-up efforts failed to gain traction. And it didn't help that each member of the band was living a lifestyle destined to lessen the quality of their lives and their abilites to contiune to put up with each other.

Now it has come to light that the band is back and hitting the road . . . with Roth in the lead and minus Michael Anthony. I just don't see how these guys are going to get over all the bad feelings that caused them to break up, rejoin, break up, rejoin and break up again.

And face facts -- they are all old, tired and just as worn as that old cassette we popped in time and again. This just seems like the saddest thing these guys could possibly do to grab more cash and "keep it real" with the fans.

I think most who spent way too much time listening to "1984" over any other recording available at the time will agree -- if it ain't going to be right, just don't do it. We'll all thank you for using a little discretion.