Rock and Roll
An Album You Should Re-Discover
Van Halen — Diver Down (1982)
Recently, I went to an '80s themed murder mystery party dressed as David Lee Roth (or Davey Lee Broth). And yes, it's tough to pull the Roth look off with a dark beard that's got a gray tint to it.
But I'm like the Daniel Day-Lewis of costumes, so naturally, I did it (Page Six should have all the details and pics.)
Borrowing from the DDL playbook, I was listening to some vintage Van Halen and re-discovered 1982's Diver Down to get into character.
During their peak period, the David Lee Roth-era of Van Halen only released six albums. Diver Down is the fifth of those.
Three records (Van Halen I, Van Halen II, and Diver Down) contain covers.*
Of those three records, only the 12-track Diver Down merits the honor of 42% of the album being cover songs. If you exclude the three instrumental tracks, that's nine songs, and excluding those instrumentals, the cover song percentage inches up to 55%.
The net result of Diver Down is that there are only four new original songs on the record. And those four songs are some of Van Halen's best.
[Fun Fact: Even at 12 songs, Diver Down still clocks in at 31 minutes.]
