Watch: WOLFGANG VAN HALEN Plays 'Eruption' During FOO FIGHTERS Concert At WELCOME TO ROCKVILLE

May 12, 2024

Wolfgang Van Halen played his father's classic instrumental "Eruption" during Saturday night's (May 11) FOO FIGHTERS concert at Welcome To Rockville festival in Daytona Beach, Florida.

The moment came as FOO FIGHTERS frontman Dave Grohl jokingly complained to the crowd that, unlike his bandmates, he never gets to "fucking solo". Dave then said he would take the opportunity to show off his own guitar skills and launched into the VAN HALEN classic with his back to the audience. Several seconds later, however, the camera revealed that Eddie Van Halen's iconic solo was actually being played by Eddie's son, who was off to the side of the stage after performing Welcome To Rockville earlier in the night with his band MAMMOTH WVH.

"Dude, I told you to keep that cool. Wolfie, what the fuck you doing right now?" Grohl joked. "Everybody, give it up for Wolfgang Van Halen," Dave told the crowd before Wolfgang proceeded to play the opening notes of another VAN HALEN classic, "Hot For Teacher".

Before playing the next song of FOO FIGHTERS' set, "My Hero", Grohl told the audience: "Since Wolfie took all that fucking time to pull off that joke with us, I'm gonna dedicate this one to him. Let's sing this one for him, and let’s sing this one for his fucking dad too."

Wolfgang, who shared the stage with his father together from 2006 until 2015, five years before Eddie's death, played three VAN HALEN songs over the course of two Taylor Hawkins tribute concerts in September 2022 alongside FOO FIGHTERS members Grohl on bass, Josh Freese on drums and THE DARKNESS's Justin Hawkins on vocals.

That same month, Wolfgang took to Instagram to celebrate the 45th anniversary of "Eruption"'s recording with the release of a 2015 video of him playing the incendiary solo on his father's original Frankenstein guitar.

"Eruption" is considered to be one of the most groundbreaking electric guitar instrumentals of all time.

Voted by Guitar World readers as the second greatest guitar solo of all time in a 2021 poll, "Eruption" wasn't even originally supposed to be on VAN HALEN's self-titled 1978 debut album.

"My guitar solo, 'Eruption', wasn't planned for the record," Eddie told Guitar Player in a 1978 interview. "Al [Alex Van Halen, VAN HALEN drummer and Eddie's brother] and I were picking around rehearsing for a show, and I was warming up with this solo. Ted [Templeman, VAN HALEN's producer] came in and said, "It's great, put it on the record."

Eddie died in October 2020 at the age of 65. The legendary VAN HALEN guitarist passed away at St. John's Hospital in Santa Monica, California.

Find more on Van halen
  • facebook
  • twitter
  • reddit
  • email

Comments Disclaimer And Information

BLABBERMOUTH.NET uses the Facebook Comments plugin to let people comment on content on the site using their Facebook account. The comments reside on Facebook servers and are not stored on BLABBERMOUTH.NET. To comment on a BLABBERMOUTH.NET story or review, you must be logged in to an active personal account on Facebook. Once you're logged in, you will be able to comment. User comments or postings do not reflect the viewpoint of BLABBERMOUTH.NET and BLABBERMOUTH.NET does not endorse, or guarantee the accuracy of, any user comment. To report spam or any abusive, obscene, defamatory, racist, homophobic or threatening comments, or anything that may violate any applicable laws, use the "Report to Facebook" and "Mark as spam" links that appear next to the comments themselves. To do so, click the downward arrow on the top-right corner of the Facebook comment (the arrow is invisible until you roll over it) and select the appropriate action. You can also send an e-mail to blabbermouthinbox(@)gmail.com with pertinent details. BLABBERMOUTH.NET reserves the right to "hide" comments that may be considered offensive, illegal or inappropriate and to "ban" users that violate the site's Terms Of Service. Hidden comments will still appear to the user and to the user's Facebook friends. If a new comment is published from a "banned" user or contains a blacklisted word, this comment will automatically have limited visibility (the "banned" user's comments will only be visible to the user and the user's Facebook friends).