Van Halen 1982-09-05 Fresno, CA

Here we have a totally unheard, uncirculated open-mic recording, capturing the Van Halen concert in Fresno during their Diver Down tour (Hide Your Sheep tour) in 1982. This is what could be considered an “official audience recording”, having been recorded with an open-mic right next to the soundboard / mixing desk. It’s worth noting that an old audience recording of this show does also exist in circulation.

Unfortunately, only the second half of this recording survives. It seems that when the band were stopping in Worcester for the three-night stand in late October, Roy used the entire first side of this tape to record a Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young radio special from “The Source” that was aired on WAAF.

With the first 45 minutes having been taped over, the second side of the 90 minute master tape starts partway into Dave’s storytime interlude during Everybody Wants Some. Then as he often did to save space, Roy temporarily paused the recording during Dave’s acoustic solo and Ice Cream Man, so essentially only captures 43 seconds of the acoustic bit, then 17 seconds of the ending of Ice Cream Man. Later, Roy did not start recording again after stopping the tape for the first encore break, so this also does not capture Bottoms Up, You Really Got Me or Happy Trails.

Luckily, the audience recording that circulates captures the entire show, and is roughly the same quality as Roy’s tape, so I highly recommend seeking that one out online if you want to hear more of this show.

Track Listing:

01 Dave Talks (cut) [0:00]
02 Everybody Wants Some!! (Reprise) [4:41]
03 Dance The Night Away [6:27]
04 Somebody Get Me A Doctor / I’m So Glad [9:41]
05 Dave Acoustic Solo (cut) [16:17]
06 Intruder [17:27]
07 Pretty Woman [19:20]
08 Guitar Solo [22:34]
09 D.O.A. [31:43]
10 Ain’t Talkin’ ‘Bout Love [35:32]

Lineage: Maxell UDXL-I C-90 cassette / Nakamichi DR-1 (azimuth adjustment) / Creative Sound Blaster X-Fi HD / Audacity (24 bit – 96 khz) / FLAC 6

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