Thursday, June 12, 2003
Copyright © Las Vegas Mercury

Music: Shine on, crazy Diamond Dave

David Lee Roth on spandex, drugs and redemption

By Newt Briggs

In his prime, David Lee Roth was the undisputed king of hard rock--a veritable spandex demagogue who reigned supreme over the mullet-headed masses with an arsenal of high kicks and hair spray. Yet for all the attention garnered by his skintight jumpsuits and wild stage antics, Roth also managed to piss off almost everyone he ever worked with, including Van Halen founder and band namesake Eddie Van Halen. With the release of 1984--arguably Van Halen's finest work--the two were already on the outs (a situation exacerbated by the release of Roth's solo EP Crazy from the Heat), and Roth soon found himself without a band to front.

Rather than fade into the annals of rock 'n' roll obscurity, though, Roth swathed himself in the chrysalis of reinvention and emerged as Diamond Dave--a dim-witted, libido-driven surfer dude bent on recapturing his lost glory. Just as Van Halen was installing Sammy Hagar in his stead, Diamond Dave was scoring hits with gaudy, overblown covers of the Beach Boys' "California Girls" and Vegas lounge crooner Louis Prima's "Just a Gigolo/I Ain't Got Nobody" medley. But the novelty of this new persona proved fleeting, and his career fell into decline as '90s audiences opted increasingly for substance over style. And despite repeated rumors of a Van Halen reunion--a possibility virtually squashed when Roth and Eddie Van Halen tussled backstage at the 1996 MTV Music Awards--Roth gradually plunged down the path to "Behind the Music" infamy, bottoming out with a 1996 bust for buying a nickel bag at a public park in New York (adding insult to injury, he was reportedly in his pajamas at the time).

But 2002 saw Roth joined with an unlikely partner, Hagar himself, as the oft-feuding pair toured the country co-headlining the "Sans Halen" tour. Notwithstanding a near-constant war of words between the stars, the experience put a new shine on Diamond Dave, and he's now released his first album in five years, a self-titled effort that features covers of the Doors' "Soul Kitchen," Jimi Hendrix's "If 6 Was 9" and Steve Miller's "Shoo Bop." He's also put the "Diamond Dave Happy Hour Show" back on the road, and despite a frantic touring schedule, the 47-year-old recently found 15 minutes for the Mercury to bask in his radiance.

Mercury: Was it a huge shock to you when spandex plummeted out of fashion in the late '80s?

David Lee Roth: Nothing's plummeted out of fashion, man. It just takes an extremely masculine man to look sexy in a pair of pink bicycle shorts.

M: Indeed it does. So would you say that your persona with Van Halen was a spontaneous expression of heavy metal hedonism or a shameless manipulation of the ignorant hordes?

DLR: I'm an action figure. It goes well beyond just being a singer. Do you know how many singers like me it takes to put in a light bulb? Just one. We hold up the bulb and wait for the world to revolve around us.

M: Were you at any time bigger than Jesus?

DLR: I think I had some bigger hit songs than Jesus. In terms of actual T-shirt sales and name recognition, it might have been a toss-up. Still, "Running with the Devil" has probably been memorized more effectively than...

M: The Lord's Prayer?

DLR: There's so many damn syllables in that one, man.

M: Is what happened in Rhode Island with Great White proof that God is punishing heavy metal and its fans?

DLR: That's a tough one. I think he's probably punishing Great White. The rest of those poor people were just collateral damage. To be honest, sometimes when I see these bands I feel like I'm driving past a car wreck, but I'm simply relieved that no one was killed.

M: Did you know that when you got busted buying dope in Washington Square Park, it was named the 35th greatest rock 'n' roll meltdown of all time by Rolling Stone?

DLR: I wouldn't even qualify it as dope. This was cheap, bunk, Jamaican gage that wouldn't even have filled a folded-up postage stamp. They had this little Puerto Rican cop holding it up on CNN, and it was like a Monty Python skit. My only screw-up was somebody told me to cover my head from the press, so I covered up. It was like something out of Bonfire of the Vanities--McCoy getting steamrollered by the system.

M: You were actually ranked two spots ahead of Jerry Lee Lewis' marriage to his 13-year-old cousin.

DLR: A vastly superior scandal, if you ask me.

M: Why were you so bad at buying drugs, anyway? And didn't you have a more reliable pipeline than the shady Jamaican slinging nickel bags at the park?

M: Hey, I'm a man of the people. I'm just trying to keep it real, y'all.

M: Besides, don't you think Van Halen III, featuring Extreme lead singer Gary Cherone, was a much more shameful rock debacle than any unsuccessful drug deal--no matter how bungled?

DLR: I think so. How were they ever going to replace Diamond Dave? Think about it like this: The L.A. Philharmonic is a Tchaikovsky tribute band. There's not an original member left in the rhythm section. But really skilled and disciplined professionals can not only duplicate the music, they can take it past where he wrote it. What you'll never duplicate is the voice and the personality that drives it. They say that the blues guitar just don't sound right until it's been in the pawn shop at least once. Somebody would have to put some serious stamps in their spiritual passport to sound like me, son.

M: When was the last time you played Vegas?

DLR: It might have been about three years ago or so. It's going to be a spectacular show. We play all the songs--solo as well as the Van Halen stuff. And it's not just a simple recitation. It's truly mind-roasting.

M: Cool. Let me ask you, is it better to be a has-been or a never-will-be?

DLR: Well, I can only reflect on what I've read in regards to either. [Laughter]