Guitar World is reporting that Dweezil Zappa has revealed he once got to record his friend and mentor, Eddie Van Halen, at the latter’s renowned 5150 Studios – describing the moment as a true "role reversal" experience and noting he even had to remind the late great guitar icon how to play some of his parts.
The guitarist recently shared a clip from an interview with YouTube channel LaughingMonkeyMusic, in which he says the session took place in the early ’90s as part of his ‘audio movie’ concept, What the Hell Was I Thinking?.
The unreleased project saw him trying to recreate the experience of changing a radio dial, with an exclusively drums, bass and guitar setup – drafting in a variety of big-name guest guitarists in the process.
Asked if Van Halen was involved, Zappa responds, “Yeah, there's two solos. And the coolest thing was I got to work with him at 5150.
“It was like a total role-reversal because the first thing that he did with me, when I was 12, was he was teaching me how to do punch-ins in the studio – like, you gotta play along and then he'd press play and record, and record at the right time – so, all these years later, I'm saying, ‘Okay, on this solo, I need you to play…’"
Tantalizingly, Zappa describes the resulting, unreleased contributions from EVH as a “greatest hits” solo that combined elements of classic Van Halen tracks into something of a lead guitar medley.
“We made like a greatest hits guitar solo,” remembers Zappa. “[So] it was just a funny thing to say, ‘Okay, I want you to play this lick from Mean Streets, this one from Push Comes to Shove, this one from On Fire…’ and we put it all in one solo over this thing.”
Read more at Guitar World.
Last month, Zappa shared the video below, stating: "Watch me play 'Eruption' on the guitar Edward Van Halen gave to me when I was 12 years old!"
Producer / songwriter / educator Rick Beato recently shared an in-depth interview with Dweezil Zappa, where he talks about continuing the musical legacy of his father, and shreds some of his favorite Eddie Van Halen guitar licks.
