Is Eddie Van Halen serious with this shit? Don’t get us wrong, we’re as happy as the next website that Van Halen has decided to reunite with David Lee Roth, one of rock’s all-time great frontmen. But the replacement of original bassist Michael Anthony with Eddie’s teenage son Wolfgang is just ridiculous. It’d be fine if Anthony had died or quit, but being fired for siding with Sammy in the divorce is just lame — though for Anthony it may have been the sanest choice possible (if not the most financially viable). And as if Eddie wasn’t douchey enough for “reuniting” without the band’s original bass player, not to mention the only other guy besides DLR in the band who sings, he had to go and do this:

Some seriously on-the-ball fans discovered that on the front page of Van Halen’s official website, were some revisionist versions of early VH album covers. The covers were tiny thumbnails that got colorized when you moused over them, but fans noticed that Mr. Anthony had been inexplicably Photoshopped off the cover of the band’s self-titled debut album, as well as removed from the front of “Women and Children First.”

Here’s the original image of the first Van Halen record next to the “new” version . Notice how in the bottom right-hand corner, Michael Anthony has been replaced by another shot of Eddie. Hot!

And in this version of “Women and Children First,” the normal cover, which shows a photo of all four band members, has been replaced by this all-text version. Talk about taking an album title literally!

The original covers have since been reinstated on the site, but a saavy blogger was able to snap up the evidence. Look carefully at the first and third covers down the sides of the page and you’ll see the offending images.

Altering an album cover to reflect a lineup change nearly thirty years after its original release isn’t all that different from believing the Holocaust didn’t exist. It’s revisionist history fueled by hubris. Perhaps the band should consider changing their name to Mel Halen.

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