"Diamond" Dave Lee Roth, the once (and "inevitably" future) lead singer of Van Halen, did not disappoint on Fox News Channel's "Your World with Neil Cavuto" yesterday. (Check out the video of the interview here.) He had a lot of cool and outrageous things to say--and oh yes, his new album, "Strummin' with the Devil," is released today, 6/6/06. Check out some of what Dave had to say about the last days of his CBS radio career as one of Howard Stern's replacements, Les Moonves' desire to stay in the past, Eddie Van Halen and the possibility of a Van Halen reunion, the enduring genius of Howard Stern, what it's like to sing "Dance the Night Away" at 6am, and what it was like to have a morning show that was the radio equivalent of Tony Soprano selling guns out of the backroom:
CAVUTO: ...the whole Stern thing, are you bitter?
ROTH: No, not at all. Come on. Whether I'm on for a day or whether I'm on for a year, at the end of the day, I sing for my dinner. And I kept my day job. And I think we brought something really unique to the radio. I think they expected a nice, quiet, kind of corner candy store in the morning. And I gave them one. But we had Tony Soprano selling guns out of the backroom, so to speak.
CAVUTO: Are you angry at CBS? Are you angry at Les Moonves?
ROTH: No. I think that they are probably a little bit towards trying to repeat the past. And I want to try and take something into the future. I think we had something really unique, really exciting.
CAVUTO: Did you ever hear from Les Moonves? Did he ever call you?
ROTH: No. And none of the top doggies did. We were kind of -- you could have named the show "Inherit Howard Stern's Old Problems."
CAVUTO: Now, I know you are good friends with Howard Stern. Do you think he made the right move -- obviously, it was the right financial move for him -- but going off in to the much more limited listenership of radio, paid radio?
ROTH: You are thinking like a beginning chess player, if you think that he made a mistake. You can't just move the piece and wait to see what happens to it. He is thinking seven moves ahead.
CAVUTO: Yes.
ROTH: He has already conquered, inarguably, just about every other department of popular in-the-home kind of entertainment there is...
CAVUTO: All right. Now, you and Eddie Van Halen, are you talking to each other?
ROTH: Mmm. Well, define talking...I think, paging Eddie Van Winkle. I think he is the only one of the camp who is still kind of resistant to the idea. Who knows what's going on with Eddie. He's still finding himself.
CAVUTO: That would be a very lucrative [Van Halen] reunion.
ROTH: Yes. And how hard is it to sing "Dance the Night Away"? I tell you, I have done it at 6:00 in the morning now. So, yes...
CAVUTO: So, the -- you are saying the only one holding it up is -- is Eddie?
ROTH: Yes, at this point in time. He has got issues. I don't know. What does Axl Rose have? Issues?
CAVUTO: Yes. All right. So -- so -- but you think you can clear those? Have you heard from his people talking to your people that a reunion is possible, and you guys are going to make gobs of money?
ROTH: I think it's inevitable. That -- that material is as familiar as my country 'tis of purple mountains, particularly in warm weather, when the summertime shows up here. And to avert that, I think, would be a sin.
