Women and Children First Songs Ranked
Women and Children First is the third studio album by American rock band Van Halen, released on March 26, 1980, on Warner Bros. Records. Produced by Ted Templeman and engineered by Donn Landee, it was the first Van Halen album to not feature any cover songs, and is described by critic Stephen Thomas Erlewine as “[the] record where the group started to get heavier, both sonically and, to a lesser extent, thematically.” Like the two preceding albums, Women and Children First was recorded in Hollywood at Sunset Studios, in about two weeks’ time. The album is a progression, though, in that it features more studio overdubs and less emphasis on backing vocals, partly because two of the songs, “In a Simple Rhyme” and “Take Your Whiskey Home”, had already been written and recorded in a 1974 Cherokee Studios demo, before Michael Anthony had joined them, albeit both with some differences lyrically and musically. “Could This Be Magic?” contains the only female backing vocal ever recorded for a Van Halen song; Nicolette Larson sings during some of the choruses. The rain sound in the background is not an effect; it was raining outside, and the band decided to record the sound in stereo using two Neumann KM84 microphones, and added it to the track. Here are all of the Women and Children’s First songs ranked.
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9. Tora! Tora!
“To all you jerks who are like “Tony Iommi never influenced anybody” listen to this. This is definite Sabbath imitation right here by Eddie Van Halen. I am surprised at how authentic these riffs sound.”
8. Could This Be Magic?
“”Could This Be Magic?” is filler & has Eddie reveling in some blues with Diamond Dave throwing in his diverse background. laid back acoustic cajun inspired track. A real departure from the usual hardpop formula or this is just their way of letting us recover from “Loss of Control”!”
7. Take Your Whiskey Home
“Take Your Whiskey Home” is the best song on the album. It starts off with Eddie playing a mean acoustic guitar & Dave singing. At about 0:45 they kick into the full band & rock out.”
See more: Van Halen Albums Ranked
6. Loss of Control
“Van Halen gone speed metal! This is one of the speediest songs I ever heard, in fact even Daves words are going by way too fast, they obviously didn’t make this song for thought, so you enlightment people might want to avoid this.”
5. In a Simple Rhyme
“Amazing sound throughout: it is like soothing and hard at the same time. I love Micheal’s clearly audible bass work that sounds like it is following Eddie’s guitar riffs.”
See more: Van Halen Songs Ranked
4. Romeo Delight
“Nice repeat riff goes on through this song with the smashmouth lyric talk of DLR. This is one of his best lyrical works ever. “Romeo Delight” speeds things up alot after that and Eddie really shows his pro style on this one.”
3. Fools
“The longest song of the Dave era of Van Halen. Begins with a blues-metal influenced guitar solo by Eddie. “Fools” which is the other song that surpasses five minutes. Some of the problem with this song & the previous one is the somewhat extended openings. In “Fools”, once they get to about 1:30 into the song, then the song improves.”
2. And the Cradle Will Rock…
“Song has a ton of band comments during it (“ya could’ve at least faked it boy,” backup: “faked it boy”; “have you seen junior’s grades”). And according to Van Halen this is the first song that Eddie used a keyboard on to create a heavy guitar effect (wha?). The definition of heavy.”
1. Everybody Wants Some!!
“Heavy environment sound: Monkeys, distant guitar sound coming closer than the “ahha!” classic VH. Some more comments (“hey man, where did you get that ?” “I alway liked those kind of high heels”) with a few almost inaudible curse words thrown in just to see if you can hear them. Eddie’s sound has definitely changed, it sounds more developed and it resonates like an action or thought; weird.”
