Michael Anthony touched on the rumored Van Halen tribute tour in a new interview.
Appearing on The Mitch Lafon and Jeremy White Show, Anthony said of the rumored tour, “The only thing that was kind of a surprise to me was the Jason Newsted thing when he came out and said that Alex [Van Halen] had talked to him last year or something like that, which is kind of interesting, because I actually had been talking on a conference call with [Van Halen manager] Irving Azoff, Alex and Dave [Lee Roth] last year, so I don’t know what the Jason thing was all about.”
Anthony would add, “I spoke to Joe about it, and it was more, you know, just something kicking around…I hope something happens in the future here. I think Joe was mentioning in some of the interviews that it’s more a celebration of the band and of the music than calling it ‘Van Halen.’ Obviously, Eddie being probably the most integral part of the whole band, you can’t really call it Van Halen after that.”
As previously reported, Newsted said in an interview with The Palm Beach Post published on April 14 he was contacted by Alex Van Halen for a “possible Van Halen tour.” Newsted also said Joe Satriani was selected by Alex to play guitar.
The Palm Beach Post wrote, “Newsted said he agreed to go to California to jam with the guys and see if it felt right, but, in his heart of hearts, thought it would be impossible to do justice to Van Halen’s legacy. The outlet then quoted Newsted saying, “How could you? There’s nobody that can top it, so how do you show it honor? I didn’t want it to be viewed as a money grab. And then it kind of just all fizzled.”
In an episode of Rock of Nations with Dave Kinchen published on April 18, Satriani said, “I’ve been talking with Alex and Dave for about a year about doing something — a tour, something like that — that was going to be a true tribute to Eddie and the Van Halen legacy…For me, it was a terrifying prospect of doing something like that, but I realized that it was something that would be a real labor of love for me. I was just so honored to take on the challenge.”
Satriani added regarding Newsted’s recent comments, “These things are always happening in the music industry, and you’re supposed to keep very quiet about it because sometimes they don’t work out. There’s usually about ten crazy ideas that float around, and musicians are always like, ‘Okay, I won’t say anything about this, because it may not work out. I don’t want to hurt this person’s feelings or disrupt any other business plans. So yeah, we were all pretty shocked that Jason wanted to go public with it because we were all sworn to silence.”
Following all of these quotes from Newsted and Satriani, David Lee Roth would issue a statement to Van Halen News desk saying, “In my mind ‘Van Halen 4K,’ in the age of covid is going to require two of us for every position. [Joe] Satriani and [Steve] Lukather, [Michael] Anthony and [Jason] Newsted, Al [ex Van Halen] or Tommy Lee. Probably the only one who could do my job today would be Pink.”