10 Surprising Instrumental Tracks You NEED To Hear
4. Eruption - Van Halen
This song truly needs no introduction. Van Halen were relative unknowns on the hard rock scene before their earth-shaking debut, but this single track gave the rock world their next guitar hero.
Eddie Van Halen spends this track's 1:42 unleashing his fretboard acrobatics with lightning speed. While shredding solos had been around for years prior to Van Halen, Eddie blew away the competition by being one of the few guitarists to implement tapping into his playing.
EVH was so secretive about this new trick that he often played his leads with his back to the audience, so other guitarists couldn't see how he was hitting every note so quickly. Just before the 1:00 mark, Eddie begins to use this tapping technique to euphoric effect, incorporating many different melodic themes into his solo, but never letting it devolve into mindless shred pyrotechnics.
The song is a monumental feat of musicianship, but that wasn't the plan. At first, Eruption wasn't going to be on the record, with Van Halen thinking that he made too many mistakes on the final version.
Regardless, the song is a true masterpiece for hard rock fans and an inspirational moment for anyone thinking about picking up the guitar.