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Tracklisting & More Information
Van Halen vocalist David Lee Roth says it all on the second song of the band's third album — and third consecutive smash in less than three years time. "Everybody wants some!," he declares before immediately querying, "Baby, how 'bout, you?" Roth and the rest of Van Halen already knew the answer. The quartet further confirmed its status as America's leading rock band and principal party starters on Women and Children First while heading in harder, heavier directions with thrilling songs that Rolling Stone scribe David Fricke rightly deemed "works of high-volume art."
Sourced from the original analog tapes, pressed on MoFi SuperVinyl at Fidelity Record Pressing, and limited to 7,500 copies, Mobile Fidelity's UltraDisc One-Step 180g 45RPM 2LP set of Women and Children First explodes with dynamic energy, saturated colors, multi-dimensional textures, and vivid detail. This 2LP edition practically whisks you to Sunset Sound Recorders and lets you sit in with Eddie Van Halen, Alex Van Halen, Michael Anthony, and David Lee Roth as they complete the record in just eight days time. Made with few overdubs and featuring a live-on-the-floor feel, Women and Children First can now be experienced with unparalleled transparency, clarity, balance, and, if you so choose with your volume settings, concert-like solidity, scope, and decibel levels. Credit MoFi's unique SuperVinyl compound, which allows you to crank this set as high as you want without risking noise-floor interference.
The premium packaging and gorgeous presentation of the UD1S Women and Children First pressing befit its select status. Housed in a deluxe slipcase, it features special foil-stamped jackets and faithful-to-the-original graphics that illuminate the splendor of the recording. Aurally and visually, this UD1S reissue is made for discerning listeners who desire to fully immerse themselves in everything involved with the album, from the cover art — and really, is there a better shot of Van Halen than the cover image? — to the interior photos.
Though the intense schedule Van Halen faced when it entered the studio to record Women and Children First —made for what Eddie Van Halen estimated cost under $40,000, a rather paltry sum that coupled with the group's hit-and-run recording methods to wave a giant middle finger at most of their overblown contemporaries — would have crushed most artists, the quartet thrived on it. The closeness and chemistry that resulted from nearly non-stop touring — to say nothing of going from a Southern California group beloved by the locals to a global phenomenon in a few months time — echo throughout the nine songs here. However distinct from Van Halen and Van Halen II, Women and Children First contains many similarities.
From the opening strains of the lead-off "And the Cradle Will Rock…," Van Halen's familiar embrace of adventurousness, flair, humor, and ecstasy hits you between the eyes. What's often lost amid discussions of the band's celebratory reputation is just how much it pushed the limits of rock 'n' roll and invented new vocabularies. Played by Eddie Van Halen on a Wurlitzer electric piano fed through an MXR Flanger and Marshall amplifier, the song features the first appearance of a keyboard on a Van Halen LP. Naturally, it doesn't sound traditional. Nothing about the strange passage of opening notes is usual, either. That effect comes by way of Eddie Van Halen hitting his guitar strings above the nut, producer Ted Templeman playing it backwards, and, in conjunction, EVH scraping the springs on the back of his homemade instrument. (Don't try that at home, kids.)
The inventive vibes continue on "Everybody Wants Some!!," a track that more than earns the two exclamation points in its title. Girded by Alex Van Halen's thumping tribal beats, Roth's Tarzan-inspired yodels, and Eddie Van Halen's inventive feedback and hand-rubbing the guitar strings, the spring-loaded track inhales and exhales akin to an animated skyline-destroying monster — and what's doubtlessly one of the most bizarre albeit memorable opening lyrics in history ("You can't get romantic on a subway line"). Van Halen's innovative spirit also fuels the now-famous drum-vocal interlude, which Roth and company ad-libbed on the spot. The band's warts-and-all approach that favored feeling over perfection — Roth's spoken-word segment initially gets cut off by one of Eddie Van Halen's knifing chords — again proves brilliant.
As does the remainder of a record that endures as one of the group's most varied efforts.
Side One:
1. And the Cradle Will Rock...
2. Everybody Wants Some!!
Side Two:
1. Fools
2. Romeo’s Delight
Side Three:
1. Tora! Tora!
2. Loss of Control
3. Take Your Whiskey Home
Side Four:
1. Could This Be Magic?
2. In a Simple Rhyme
DOUBLE LP
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