2007

The summer hasn’t been kind to Van Halen’s original bass player. First Michael Anthony found out that he was being replaced in the legendary group by a 16-year-old, then he watched as the band tried to re-write history by airbrushing his face out of old album covers on their website. MTV News recently interviewed Anthony, and you would think this would be the perfect opportunity for him to exact some revenge on the Van Halen family.

Instead, Anthony took the less-traveled high road:

“It’s not like it was totally unexpected,” he told MTV News during a recent interview, “only because of the strain from the 2004 tour and how everything’s been since then.” Anthony is referring to the band’s 2004 reunion jaunt with Roth replacement Sammy Hagar, which grossed almost $55 million before ending on a sour note (at the conclusion of the run’s final gig, guitarist Eddie Van Halen smashed one of his guitars and quickly walked offstage).

“That’s the one thing that’s really kind of sad,” Anthony continued. “It would have been cool to get onstage with Dave again, but I’m not going to whine about it, because that’s the way it is. Why waste my time trying to make a stink about it?”

The news isn’t all glum for Anthony, as he will be heading out with Sammy Hagar for the Other Half on October 19th. Read on for more from Anthony…

Sunday is fast-approaching, and many of us are sporting Larry Craig Bathroom Boners in anticipation of what our favorite football teams will look like on the field this season. For

Tomorrow we’ll present our regular Wednesday Intermezzo links, but there were a few stories from the long weekend we just couldn’t wait to share:

Photo of Eddie Vedder and Neil Finn of Crowded House by Aprilcott

• The word from the Bumbershoot Festival in Seattle is that Eddie Vedder sat in with Crowded House for kickass versions of World Where You Live and Something So Strong, while The Shins delivered an unbelievable version of Pink Floyd’s Breathe on Saturday. Sunday’s highlights included terrific sets from Kings of Leon and Black Rebel Motorcycle Club. The Wu-Tang Clan closed the festivities last night with a set peppered with their greatest hits.
• Live Nation has bought, and hopefully won’t ruin, New Jersey’s Bamboozle Festival. The concert behemoth already has plans for a Bamboozle West, as well as international Bamboozle festivals. You’d think Live Nation has their hands full trying to bring down Ticketmaster, but in order to completely dominate the concert industry I guess you have to multi-task.
• Our buddy BGentzel will be excited to hear that there will be more Rush shows in his future. The band will be continuing the Snakes and Arrows tour through the Spring, including another run of shows in North America.
• We’ve heard nothing from good reports about the weather, music and scene from moe.down 8. The self-proclaimed “indie jam rockers” debuted The Band’s Don’t Do It on Friday night, completed a band switch with the Meat Puppets then had Perry Farrell sit-in on Saturday, and even switched spots with their crew, who did a nice job with Everybody Knows This Is Nowhere on Sunday. It wasn’t all sunshine and lollipops in Turin, as the local police busted a dude who brought 30 rice crispy treats and over 80 small bags of pot to the festie. That’s for personal consumption, no?

Read on for some more stuff from moe.down, including some setlists…