15 Greatest Hard Rock Albums You Need To Hear Before You Die
3. Fair Warning - Van Halen
As hard rock grew into a legitimate subsection of rock, Van Halen came to prominence in the late 70's as true masters of the craft. From their debut onward, the band had an unmistakable charisma and sonic bite that pleased both the pop-centric rock and rollers and the hard rocking metalheads.
Though any of the David-Lee-Roth-era albums could have made this list, Fair Warning earns the distinction as the heaviest Van Halen record ever made. With the other band members pulling back creatively, this album is where you get a good look at just how great a musical mind Eddie Van Halen has. The percussive slap on "Mean Street" along with the slinky yearning of "Hear About It Later" show the band both expanding their musical horizons while still being tied to their hard rock roots.
Even if this album was a bold new step forward for the band, it has fallen a bit by the wayside, with "Unchained" being one of the only tracks the band ever plays live from this era in recent memory. This album might not receive all the well-deserved praise that other Van Halen records do, but each song on here provides a road map to just how influential this band has been across multiple generations of rock musicians.