Van Halen was formed in Pasadena, California back in 1972 by the brothers Alex and Eddie Van Halen and two years later they were joined by the vocalist David Lee Roth and the bassist Michael Anthony. That line-up played constantly in the area where they lived and built a big fan base.
One night the Kiss bassist and singer Gene Simmons was in a club they were playing and was really impressed by the group. He then took them to New York to record a demo at the Electric Lady Studios but that still wasn’t enough to get them a record deal. In an interview with Steven Rosen back in 1979, Eddie Van Halen how they finally got their record deal with Warner Brothers.
The story of how Van Halen finally got their record deal
During the interview, Eddie explained that the demo made with the help of Gene Simmons was never used because they didn’t know where they should take it. “(…) Bands take it to a record company, and there will be some clown sittin’ on a couch, smokin’ a joint, listens to your tape, and nothing will ever happen that way.” What we basically did is we just kept playing the LA area everywhere.”
“We used to put on our own shows at the Pasadena Civic, our home town, and draw like three thousand people on a four-dollar ticket. This was way before [the deal with] Warner Brothers. So we just developed such a following that a sister of a friend at the record company heard about us and the word got around about the band.”
“Finally, Ted Templeman and [Warner Bros president] Mo Ostin came down to the Starwood in Hollywood, which was really always just kind of a bad place for us because we weren’t a Hollywood band. Pasadena is really where we’re from, and that’s like San Bernardino – that’s like Bumfuck, Iowa. That’s what people are like out in Hollywood.”
He continued:
“It really tripped me out, because when we were playin’ and Mo Ostin and Ted Templeman walked in we really didn’t know. Somebody just said: “There’s somebody really important out there so play good.” There were no people there; it was some rainy Monday night without any people at all. And still they came backstage and they loved it. They said: “If you don’t negotiate with anyone else, you’ve got what you want right here.”
“We were happy, we tripped out. Warner Brothers, man. That was always the company I wanted to be with. On top of that, we got Ted Templeman to produce the record. I talked to a lot of people and they said: “Wow, man, we’re trying to get Ted Templeman to produce our record.” He’s in demand, and here we are – we get picked up by him,” Eddie Van Halen said.
Van Halen finally released their self-titled groundbreaking debut album in 1978 and it was the start of a very successful career. They released 12 studio albums and 2 live albums, selling an estimated amount of more than 80 million records worldwide.