The Hidden Truth Of David Lee Roth

There's probably never been and never again will be a frontman quite like David Lee Roth. An avatar of the rebellious, exciting spirit of rock 'n' roll itself, Roth made hard rock fun in the 1970s and 1980s as the lead singer of Van Halen, wailing and yelping and snarling his way through all-time classics like "Runnin' with the Devil," "Dance the Night Away," "Jamie's Cryin,'" "Panama," and "Jump." Through it all, Roth brought impressive vocal chops as well as lasciviousness, humor, danger, and a wink. And, if he was on stage or in front of a camera, he was jumping, kicking, and mugging. Roth was always there for the party, and so were Van Halen's legion of fans.

One of Van Halen's messiest breakups went down in 1985 when Roth left the band for a solo career. While successful, it never quite reached the same heights the singer scaled with his group. Nevertheless, he ultimately proved that the zany, goofy, life-loving persona he embodied on stage and in music videos was the real deal — Roth has lived a colorful, hard to believe life of adventure and accomplishment. Here's a look into the unique and singular world of David Lee Roth.

Usually, when rock bands name themselves after the last name of a member, they pick that of the lead singer or frontman. Van Halen is the rare band of this subset that takes its moniker from that of the respective guitarist and drummer Eddie and Alex Van Halen. But the main vocalist in Van Halen, at least for the first decade or so of its existence, was David Lee Roth.

The trio met at Pasadena City College in 1974. Roth's band, the Red Ball Jets, loaned out a PA system to the Van Halens' group, Mammoth. Eventually, Roth convinced the brothers to let him join their band, which became untitled when the musicians found out another band had registered the rights to Mammoth. Roth realized the perfect name was right in front of everyone: Van Halen. "Let's make something that's going to have some longevity to it, that has a little bit of shadow, and a little mystery," Roth recalled thinking at the time in an appearance on "The Howard Stern Show" (via American Songwriter). "You're not sure what a Van Halen is. It's like Santana. That could be the name of a place, it could be the name of a person." He didn't think "Roth" would be a good name for one reason: "Single syllables never swing."

In 1985, Van Halen dealt with the departure of singer David Lee Roth with the addition of new frontman Sammy Hagar. He brought a much different sensibility and sound to the band, but all parties involved had a lot in common. In the 1970s, Hagar was the lead singer for the hard rock band Montrose. Roth and guitarist Eddie Van Halen enjoyed Montrose so much that they covered some of the band's songs in early Van Halen shows.

Van Halen recorded its self-titled first album in 1977, and the process frustrated producer Ted Templeman. "Some of his vocal performances, to be frank, just weren't acceptable," Templeman wrote of Roth in "Ted Templeman: A Platinum Producer's Life in Music" (via Van Halen News Desk). "Every time I heard him get pitchy or completely miss a note, I worried that the public was going to be turned off by this band because of his limitations." Templeman and engineer Donn Landee briefly toyed with the idea of convincing the rest of Van Halen to fire their singer and hire Hagar.

Van Halen, led by original lead singer David Lee Roth, is regarded as one of the most debauched bands in rock history, with its after-show antics backstage and in hotels seemingly as important and fun for the band as rocking out. "I slept with every pretty girl with two legs in her pants," Roth explained to the Brisbane Times.

Roth's demonstrably insatiable appetites likely have something to do with a rumor that he insured his entire body for a large sum of money. He didn't do that — just the part that helped him entertain Van Halen fans, and not his vocal cords. Prior to the original Van Halen lineup embarking on its first tour, the band ordered some policies. "We had to insure [guitar player] Edward's fingers, since he will be using those a lot on the road, and [drummer] Alex Van Halen's elbows. So I said, 'What about Little Elvis? We're going to be using him a lot, thank you very much,'" Roth admitted to "HuffPost Live" via (NoiseCreep). The policy to insure Roth's reproductive organ was actually granted. "This is one of those cases [where you] get out of the way of a good rumor," he added.

For more than 40 years, an urban legend has dogged Van Halen, claiming that the band wouldn't perform — or trash its dressing rooms — if its backstage bowl of M&Ms included brown ones. It turns out the story is true, but it stems from David Lee Roth acting thoughtfully. Van Halen's 1982 concert rider — a list of backstage demands and concert technical requirements — indeed called for the exclusion of brown M&Ms. It was a test. Roth feared that local crews hired at each stop weren't necessarily experienced in how to mount the audacious rock shows that Van Halen presented, so he asked the band's management to plant the M&Ms line deep in the rider otherwise full of precise instructions on how to rig lighting and equipment in a safe manner. If Roth arrived at the venue and saw brown M&Ms in the backstage bowl, it "guaranteed the promoter had not read the contract rider, and [Van Halen] had to do a serious line check," the singer explained in a 2012 video via YouTube.

Before a 1980 concert in Pueblo, Colorado, Roth destroyed a dressing room after catching a glimpse of some brown M&Ms. Sure enough, promoters had neglected several other details in the rider, like failing to notice that the arena's floor couldn't take the weight of Van Halen's gear. The band went on anyway, and the show caused about $80,000 worth of damage, per Snopes. 

In 1984, Van Halen released its sixth album, "1984." By far the group's top-selling LP, Van Halen's best album signaled a breakup, too. Strictly a guitar-driven hard rock band to that point, "1984" was the first Van Halen record to feature synthesizers, played by virtuosic guitarist Eddie Van Halen, a piano prodigy in his childhood. For example, the opening, title track of "1984" is a solo synthesizer performance; the single "Jump" features synths throughout, and it became Van Halen's only No. 1 hit.

It was a period of great artistic and commercial triumph for Van Halen the band, but singer David Lee Roth wasn't happy about it. "Dave said that I was a guitar hero and I shouldn't be playing keyboards," Eddie Van Halen told Guitar World. Van Halen was able to incorporate as many synthesizers on the record as he did because "1984" was recorded at his home studio, affording him some control over the proceedings. That contributed to already significant creative and personnel tensions within the band. By 1985, Roth was out.

The music videos for Van Halen's singles in the first half of the 1980s generally featured frontman David Lee Roth grinning for the cameras and doing comedy bits. Couple that with his quotable, humorous, and colorful live and interview appearances, and Roth became the breakout star of Van Halen. Before he left Van Halen in 1985, Roth expressed a desire to act, and so that goal earned his immediate attention when he went solo, not his musical career.

CBS Films signed on to produce, and provide at least $10 million to film, a screenplay called "Crazy from the Heat," also the name of an EP Roth released in 1985. Roth would play a rock star named David Lee Roth who, along with his manager and a bevy of women in skimpy swimsuits, heads to a weird place called Dongo Islands and engages in a series of absurd misadventures. "The jeep breaks down in cannibal country, but we escape and are rescued by Madame Dugay and her senile husband. They're royalty who live in Deep South antebellum architecture on the other side of the island," Roth wrote in his memoir also called "Crazy from the Heat." Roth turned in a 90-page screenplay and planned to direct and hire a crew. Before filming began, CBS Films went defunct. Roth successfully sued to get his promised directing fee.

David Lee Roth, never a man of few words or without a story to tell, decided to tell his life story and share his observations of his then-40-plus years on the planet, most of it spent as a world-famous rock star. Hyperion Books released "Crazy from the Heat" in 1997, but this wasn't the usual lightweight celebrity memoir in which a ghostwriter did all the heavy literary lifting. To compile the raw material that would become "Crazy from the Heat," Roth hired a Princeton grad student to trail him, record whatever he said, and then transcribe it all. Roth turned in 1,200 such pages of musings (made from 100 hours of recordings) to editor Paul Scanlon, who got it all down to a digestible 359 pages.

A highlight of "Crazy from the Heat," which made the New York Times bestseller list upon its publication: previously unseen poems written by Roth. One of them is about the joys of owning a Maserati sports car, which Roth labeled "a Zen poem, on account of it doesn't rhyme."

As of 2025, David Lee Roth released his final studio album in 2003. He still performed and toured, both with Van Halen and on his own, over the years, but in the immediate aftermath of the end of his solo recording career, Roth entered a new profession: emergency medicine. In 2004, Roth went through the extensive training to become a New York City certified EMT, or emergency medical technician, also known as a paramedic. "It's a part of my family: Be of value; have a job," Roth, badge holder 327466 told Vogue. "If trouble strikes, what good are you? Things like this kind of inform and give the day shape."

During his time working as an EMT in Manhattan, Queens, and the Bronx, Roth participated in hundreds of rides. "Not once has anyone recognized me, which is perfect for me." Roth told the Associated Press (via EMS World). While still in his training period, Roth used a defibrillator to revive a person in the midst of a heart attack. He claims that his rock star background never got in the way of the job, but that his funny demeanor and use of humor was an asset. "That is your only weapon. That is your only life preserver that you can give someone who thinks they're gonna die," Roth told "CBS Sunday Morning."

Lots of stars can't stand Howard Stern, but the radio star's show was a massive hit with the general public for years. In 2004, Stern announced that he'd take his program to Sirius Satellite Radio, which promised an uncensored environment and a $500 million contract. The switch was planned for early 2006, leaving Stern's broadcaster some time to find a new host to fill the vacated slot, and in the summer of 2005, it landed on "The David Lee Roth Show," starring frequent Stern guest David Lee Roth.

That program hit the air in January 2006, with Roth signing a $4 million contract. By late March, the four-hour daily show was already in trouble, with CBS Radio executives ordering format changes that if not immediately implemented would lead to Roth's firing. Roth said he did what was asked of him, but nevertheless, CBS Radio pulled the plug on the show in April 2006 after just three months. "I was booted, tossed, and it's going to cost somebody," Roth said during his final broadcast (via Foster's Daily Democrat), indicating a forthcoming suit against CBS Radio. An executive with that company, Rob Barnett, said in 2010 (via Blabbermouth) that the admittedly unprepared Roth was responsible for his own demise: "The meltdown came day one or day two when he got in the chair and wouldn't listen to anyone that was there to do only one thing — to help him."

It's not exactly uncommon for contemporary rock stars to have a few or a lot of tattoos. David Lee Roth is a rock star, but from another era when tattoos weren't mainstream, and he only recently fully committed to the artist's needle. "I got my first tattoo 40 years ago, a little seahorse on my ankle," Roth told Vogue in 2018. "I took a much more gentrified approach: I waited until I was 60." Across two years, Roth spent 300 hours getting tattoos of exactly what he wanted. "I planned it for the 30 years prior, and it's my design: kabuki faces, the original showbiz, rendered Edo style — it looks like a woodblock print," he explained.

Roth also found a way to monetize his new interest: with tattoo entrepreneur Ami James, he created Ink The Original, a company that made skin care products designed to keep tattoos and the skin underneath them in good condition and looking healthy. "Surprisingly, there's almost no competition," Roth said of his merchandise. Nevertheless, Ink The Original closed down in 2022.

David Lee Roth found fame and fortune as a man who screamed and sang about partying hard. But he's a man who contains multitudes — in addition to straightforward, populist rock tunes, Roth is an appreciator and creator of more elevated art forms. While confined to his home in Los Angeles during the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020, Roth took up painting as an extension of his lifelong interest in art. "My hand has always been in wardrobe, background sets, stage sets, album covers, video direction. This is part of it," he explained to The New York Times. "Social commentary is what I do." 

There aren't a lot of secret meanings hidden in these artworks. Roth began by making humorous drawings and comics about COVID-19 and put them up on his social media accounts before trying out more abstract styles and portraiture, depicting himself and frogs. Roth has completed more than 100 pieces, which he shares publicly on a dedicated website.

Van Halen, with David Lee Roth back at the helm, hit the road for what would be its final tour in the summer of 2015. After the death of Eddie Van Halen in 2020, the band Van Halen has ceased to exist. Roth's days as an active solo musician may be over, too, as he can't seem to find a way back into the live performance circuit.

In March 2020, Kiss, with Roth on board as its opening act, postponed the last three dates of a North American tour due to coronavirus concerns and lockdowns. When Kiss rescheduled those shows in 2021, it did so without Roth. "He was the ultimate frontman," Simmons told Rolling Stone. "And then, I don't know what happened to him ... something. And you get modern-day Dave." In response, Roth posted to his Instagram — 18 times — a picture of a child holding up a middle finger with the caption "Roth to Simmons :"

By late 2021, Roth had booked a residency at the House of Blues in Las Vegas. First, the New Year's Eve and New Year's Day shows were called off due to coronavirus concerns, and then the entire five-show slate, marketed as Roth's final concerts, were canceled. Roth may also be a star who couldn't stand Eddie Van Halen — he walked away from a reunion with the surviving members of Van Halen because he didn't want to participate in a mid-show tribute to the guitarist.