Why did the chicken drink Rococo Coffee? They're sponsoring me, not some f*king chicken!

□ [Wolfgang Van Halen - “Distance" (official video)]

I totally forgot this was coming out.  He says his style is more 2000's "active rock" (whatever that means) than classic Van Halen.  That's certainly true.

I didn't even try to watch the video.  No interest whatsoever in seeing childhood footage.  The dialogue between the father and son at the beginning and end doesn't help.  I can certainly understand why it was done but I don't want to watch it.  I'm not remotely a big enough Van Halen fan to want to see any footage of Eddie and that goes double for Wolfie.

Musically there's nothing wrong with it other than the genre.  This is where pop music stopped even trying to have verses and choruses.  It just starts, keeps going and ends, nothing catchy or memorable.  The opening is decent but then the song just stays that way.  I'm actually planning to listen to it again to check if there was a real chorus or even a bridge, Nothing stands out, it all sounds the same going along.

The lyrics are pretty meaningless.  That's not a bad thing but there's nothing grabbing about them, in fact I have to work to pay any attention to them.  They're very repetitive which doesn't help.  The lyrics to "Jump" were meaningless but who cares, might as well listen to "Jump."  I guess there is a bridge but the guitar solo is just the same note over and over, eventually moving to another note, then another one.  Then the song just ends.

The whole thing just seems to be mechanical although that may just be because he's the sole instrumentalist so that's unfortunately a natural trend.  Compare the difference between Paul McCartney's solo "Maybe I'm Amazed" compared to the live version that became a well-deserved hit.  That's what a band does.  Prince is the only one I can think of off the top of my head who could be the sole musician on songs that was still catchy and popular.  [Obviously there are others.  Brian May's "Too Much Love Will Kill You" is one of my favorite songs ever, way better than the Queen version, But in both cases, they wrote actual songs and fortunately weren't doing the 2000s "active rock" style.

I honestly hoped it would be horrible.  At least that would be amusing.  It isn't horrible.  It'll probably be whatever qualifies as a hit these days but I assumed that would happen.  But it's not very good.  He could have played it on Van Halen's last tour and had a real guitarist and drummer, that might have been worth something.  Maybe he can do it for the reunion.