Classic Rock
Michael Anthony explains why he thinks David Lee Roth is bipolar
The bassist Michael Anthony, who was a member of Van Halen from 1974 to 2006, talked in an interview with “That Rocks!” (Transcribed by Blabbermouth) about the band’s vocalist David Lee Roth and how he came to the conclusion that he was “bipolar”.
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Michael Anthony explains why he thinks David Lee Roth is bipolar
“I do a little bit of Instagramming and whatever, but… [otherwise] no… I don’t like to get involved in the drama. And that was really hard in certain times in Van Halen. Because, believe me. It’s kind of funny, because I look at TV and I’m watching things like ‘Behind The Music’ [specials] with other bands, and I go, ‘Oh my God. Look at all the shit they went through.’ And then I sit back and I go, ‘Oh my God. We’ve got probably the most drama out of anybody.'”
“There was always drama on the Roth tours… There were times… God, I forget which tour it was. I’ll just give you a real quick story — not so much drama, but just how it was with Dave on tour. We were staying somewhere in the Midwest, and Dave… After this, we all kind of came to the conclusion that he was bipolar. ‘Cause he would be great, and then all of a sudden he would just kind of freak out or whatever.”
Anthony continued:
“And one night… We had a night off, and everybody was… whatever we were doing. It was, like, around midnight, one in the morning, and everyone was pretty much back at the hotel. And I hear all this commotion out in the hall and pounding and screaming, and I’m going, ‘What the hell is going on?’ So I put my shorts on and I go walking down the hall. And our security guys have got Roth in a strait jacket. Our security guys carried a strait jacket on tour; I won’t get into that part of it. But they used to carry a strait jacket on tour, and Roth was just, like, screaming naked, sitting in one of our security guys’ rooms, wearing this strait jacket,” Michael Anthony said.
Michael Anthony has been playing with the ex-Van Halen vocalist Sammy Hagar for almost 20 years, being part of his solo records and of the supergroup Chickenfoot.
