Watch GEORGE LYNCH Pay Musical Tribute To EDDIE VAN HALEN At DALLAS INTERNATIONAL GUITAR FESTIVAL

May 5, 2021

George Lynch paid musical tribute to Eddie Van Halen during the former DOKKEN guitarist's May 1 performance at the Dallas International Guitar Festival at Dallas Market Hall in Dallas, Texas. At the end of the impromptu jam, George told the crowd: "In remembrance of our fallen brother, who is one of the greatest inspirations of my personal guitar journey."

Fan-filmed video footage of the performance can be seen below (courtesy of YouTube user "arcme262").

In a recent interview with Metal Godz Radio, Lynch was asked if ever got a chance to bond and hang out with Eddie Van Halen. He responded: "Absolutely. I mean, we kind of came up through the ranks together. We were both [in] SoCal bands and played the same bills and same clubs and hung out a little bit and have common connections and friends and different things and acquaintances. But the time that we spent the most together was on the 'Monsters Of Rock' tour [in 1988, where DOKKEN and VAN HALEN shared the bill with SCORPIONS, METALLICA and KINGDOM COME]. Eddie and I would spend a lot of time in the hotel rooms just jamming and staying up all night drinking beers and smoking and playing guitar. So that was a really cool hang."

Lynch previously talked about Eddie's influence in a 2009 interview with Guitar Player magazine. Asked if he was jealous of VAN HALEN's success in the late 1970s and early 1980s, George said: "We were jealous and we were all trying to play catch up. We thought, 'Oh boy, we better get on board. This guy's going to change the world.' I remember my reaction when I first heard Eddie. I had been hearing about this guy with the weird European name. He's got a torpedo onstage, the bass player wears clogs, they have bombs onstage, and the guy's unbelievable. I saw him and it blew my mind. They were still doing covers at the time — RAINBOW, MONTROSE — and their original stuff was as good or better than their cover stuff, which was pretty exceptional. After their show, I went back to our band room and played my guitar until the sun came up. I thought, 'Man, how can I get that tone?'"

Asked if he tried to copy Eddie, George said: "What I really did was sort of bounce off his stuff rather than emulate it. I've done that with a lot of players. Instead of copying them, I react to them. I'll think, 'Well, Di Meola does this thing. I can do some alternate picking, so I won't copy it but I'll embed that a little bit into my toolbox and do it my own way.' I've tried to do that with any player who has influenced me: Clapton, Hendrix, Schenker, Eddie, Holdsworth. I couldn't play any of their stuff note for note to save my life, but I can capture the gist of what they're doing by being exposed to it. I can get the essence."

Eddie died in October at the age of 65 after a long battle with cancer.

Rolling Stone magazine ranked Van Halen No. 8 in its list of the 100 greatest guitarists.

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