I have a 1/2-baked theory about a Van Halen song.

When It’s Love opens with Eddie on synth and Alex tapping drumsticks w/ nearly every note. The combination adds a mechanical sound to the synth, like the tapping is part of the synth keys themselves. (1/) https://youtu.be/OZGXRCI-JzQ ">https://youtu.be/OZGXRCI-J...

My theory: Eddie was using Alex to mimic the key clicks that accompanied older keyboards. For ex., early Hammond organs clicked this way, and though it was a defect, some musicians liked the sound and later organs included a feature to replicate it. (/2) http://www.dairiki.org/HammondWiki/KeyClickinstrument">https://www.dairiki.org/HammondWi...

Less likely, but more interesting: Eddie—a classically trained musician who named his son Wolfgang—was trying to create an exaggerated version of the click that harpsichords made, due to the wood jacks that moved inside of them.

If either of those theories is right,... (3/)

...I love that Eddie (with Alex’s help) went so far out of his way to reproduce an outdated sound to give his very modern, very slick synth-based power ballad some extra texture.

Thank you for coming to my Ed talk.