George Harrison’s opinion on Eddie Van Halen

A fundamental part of The Beatles, George Harrison took part in the incredible revolution they ignited in the 1960s, which changed the course of music all over the world. While the band was still active, they witnessed up close the rapid transformation and evolution of Rock that they themselves helped accelerate, including the emergence of Jimi Hendrix. Although Hendrix’s career was short, he showed guitarists everywhere how much more could be done with the electric guitar. Harrison lived long enough to see many other extraordinary guitar players, including Eddie Van Halen, who was often described as the most important guitarist since Hendrix, as he demonstrated that there was still much more to be explored in guitar playing.

What was George Harrison’s opinion on Eddie Van Halen

George Harrison admired Eddie Van Halen and once listed him among his favorite guitarists, saying he was a “pretty hot” player. “Well, there are a lot of guitar players I like. I like a guy called Eddie Lang, a guy called Django Reinhardt. These days I think, out of the contemporary players, I think Eddie Van Halen is pretty hot. I like, of course, Eric Clapton. I like a lot of the old Blues players, many of them, like Robert Johnson,” George Harrison said in a TV interview in the 1980s.

The fact that Harrison mentioned him is curious, since he was not a big fan of Hard Rock or Heavy Metal. But because he praised Eddie, he clearly listened to Van Halen’s music and enjoyed it, believing that Eddie was a truly great guitar player who could be placed in the same category as the others he mentioned. In the following decade, in 1992, he had the chance to share the stage with Eddie. Both performed “With a Little Help From My Friends” in a supergroup formed to pay tribute to the late Toto and session drummer Jeff Porcaro, who had died that year. Eddie was a good friend of guitarist Steve Lukather, who had been Porcaro’s bandmate, so he was invited as a special guest.

A few days before the event, Lukather had the chance to meet The Beatles guitarist in a nightclub. Steve invited him, without expecting that he would actually attend the show. He surprisingly showed up and ended up performing that final Beatles song with them, but in the Joe Cocker arrangement. Before the encore, he watched Eddie playing with Toto a version of Jimi Hendrix’s “Fire”, Van Halen’s “Ain’t Talkin’ ‘Bout Love” and Toto’s “Hold the Line”.

The Beatles inspired Eddie Van Halen to learn how to play the guitar

It was also a very special moment for Eddie Van Halen, since he had the chance to share the stage with Harrison. The Beatles and The Dave Clark Five were two of the bands that inspired Eddie and his brother the most when they were young. “Who wants to sit at the piano! I want to go crazy. Everybody turned me on. I grew up on a lot of early Beatles, DC5, Cream, Clapton, Page, Beck and Hendrix,” Eddie Van Halen told Guitar World magazine in 1981. He mentioned those groups when talking about abandoning the piano to play the guitar as a kid.

According to Alex Van Halen, in his book “Brothers”, it was after watching the movie “A Hard Day’s Night” that he and Eddie decided to stop studying the piano and turn their attention to Rock and Roll music. “I never really doubted I’d be in a band, and I never doubted it would be with my brother. But we didn’t know what kind of music we’d play until the British Invasion made it clear. ‘We moved to America, we saw A Hard Day’s Night,’ said Ed, ‘and I stopped playing piano.'”

He continued:

“We wanted to rock ’n’ roll like our idols: the Beatles and the Dave Clark Five. (You may never have heard of that second band. But back then they were neck and neck with the Beatles, I’m telling you. Songs like ‘Glad All Over’—that stuff was amazing. We were hooked on that grungy saxophone. It was an instrument we already knew how to play, so we could imitate their sound.) We were excited by the wildness and the rebellion of rock,” Alex Van Halen said.

A few years before, George Harrison had the chance to perform with other Hard Rock musicians like Deep Purple. He joined them in Australia during one of their reunion concerts in the 1980s. That night they played the Little Richard song “Lucille”.

Paul McCartney also is a big fan of Eddie

George Harrison was not the only member of The Beatles who admired Eddie Van Halen’s guitar playing. Paul McCartney, who is an underrated guitar player, had also praised the late Dutch American musician. Their opinions are very significant not only because they were members of The Beatles, but also because both of them had the chance to see Jimi Hendrix perform live back in the day. “I like Eddie Van Halen as a player. He gets it right quite often. I like a lot of heavy metal guys because they wind it up. What I usually like in a heavy metal band is the guitar player. But when it’s just miles of scales, I lose interest. I like some of the hot sounds,” Paul McCartney told Guitar Player in the late 80s.

Although Paul thought Eddie was amazing, he didn’t think he was better than his late friend Jimi Hendrix. “I have very fond memories of Jimi. I mean, Van Halen’s great, I love Eddie Van Halen. But I still think Jimi was the best,” Paul McCartney said in an interview with Rolling Stone magazine in 1986.

Often listed as the greatest guitarists of all time, Hendrix and Van Halen changed the course of guitar playing. They were copied by countless musicians who were inspired by them. During their live shows, Van Halen covered The Beatles a couple of times. In one of those occasions they played “Norwegian Wood“, during the Sammy Hagar era.