Michael Anthony Shares The Plans To Explore Van Halen Archive

Michael Anthony, the former bassist of Van Halen, has confirmed that there are plans to go through the band’s archives and prepare previously unreleased material for publication.

During an interview with Eddie Trunk on SiriusXM, Anthony disclosed that Donn Landee, the engineer from the classic era, is involved in the project, with the first release focusing on work from the Sammy Hagar years.

Anthony also mentioned that there had been some progress on the project, with Wolfgang Van Halen and Alex Van Halen set to sift through the material at Ed’s 5150 Studio to see what they can find, as there is a lot of material available.

He mentioned that they will be reissuing Hagar’s era albums, and the first one to be released is the live album from 1992, Right Here, Right Now. Although he cannot provide more details, he hinted that they might also do some reissues of David Lee Roth’s era albums.

Anthony also reminisced about how Van Halen used to record every show for the band’s personal review. This practice went on for years, with almost every show from the first few tours being recorded. He also mentioned that he has a collection of his recordings, some of which are almost album-like, from various sources.

When asked if he was involved in the project, Anthony responded by saying that he had just learned about it and would be vocal about it. He expressed a desire to contribute to the project, even if it was just in a sonic capacity to complement Landee’s work.

Although he owned some video footage, Anthony regretted that Van Halen didn’t use cameras more in the early ’80s to capture behind-the-scenes footage like many others were doing at the time. He confirmed that the footage he had was shot by the band’s staff exclusively for them and has never been released in the official or unofficial form.

Anthony expressed his sadness about the lack of archive releases for fans, especially during the Roth era.