A new approach to diplomacy.

From the BBC:

Donald Trump's election risks upsetting EU ties with the US "fundamentally and structurally", EU Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker has warned.

"We will need to teach the president-elect what Europe is and how it works," Mr Juncker told students in Luxembourg. The Commission chief predicted that two years would be wasted while Mr Trump "tours a world he doesn't know"…

Speaking on Friday, he said: "In general the Americans take no interest in Europe… During the campaign, Mr Trump said Belgium was a village somewhere on our continent… "

Trump and Juncker are both insufferably rude and conceited, but I'll give Juncker the points in this round for elegant sarcasm.

Juncker gets no points for originality though. I distinctly remember a Dave Lee Roth interview in the early 1980s where he claimed Sammy Hagar was dumb (it was not clear why he had a grudge against Hagar). Roth said that he had performed all over the world and learned something about each country he visited; Hagar had also performed all over the world but had learned nothing because he never had a clue where he actually was, or words to that effect. Ironically, a couple of years later, Lee Roth got kicked out of/left Van Halen and was replaced by… Sammy Hagar.

UPDATE: Mike W informs us in the comments that Dave Lee Roth was merely paraphrasing Frederick the Great:

"Thought, or, better to explain myself, the faculty of combining ideas, is what distinguishes man from beasts of burden. A mule, though he should have made ten campaigns under prince Eugene, would not have improved in his tactics.

And to the shame of humanity it must be confessed that, with respect to this kind of indolent stupidity, many old officers are not superior to such a mule."

Van Halen: A Different Kind Of Truth

Yippee!

Dave Lee Roth finally rejoined Van Halen a few years ago and they have got round to making a new album, which is the first one with the original line-up (glossing over the fact that Eddie Van Halen's son Wolfgang replaced Mike Anthony on bass, they sound exactly the same) for... er... twenty-eight years.

It's not a towering work of genius like their first six albums* (politely ignoring side one of the fifth), but it's still incredibly good and Eddie Van Halen's guitar playing is as astonishing as ever. For a fuller review, click on the cover:My new 'blog header is a line from the song "Bullethead".

* Update, having listened to it for a few days, actually it is just as good as the other albums, it's just really badly recorded/mixed.

Missing beats round (3)

Van Halen's "Outta love again" came up on my iPod on the way home yesterday, and I noticed that there's a beat missing just before the chorus starts. Scroll forward to 43 seconds in and start counting:

Said that you are leaving, I don't (4 beats)
wanna hear that talk (4 beats)
Stare at disbelief in me, as (4 beats)
I just up and walk (4 beats)
Outta love (without backing vocals, 3 beats)
[new riff] (without singing, 4 beats)
Outta love (with backing vocals, 4 beats, from here on it continues in 4/4)...

Van Halen joke

I met this bloke who told me he'd worked out how to play 'Eruption'.

"Wow!" say I "Go on, play it!"

"Sure thing" he replied, and sat himself down behind his drum kit.