In the middle of Steel Panther‘s ongoing ‘On the Prowl Tour,’ Michael Starr had a chat with Alabama Life & Culture. Upon one of the interviewer’s questions, the singer talked about the time he almost stepped in for David Lee Roth at the ‘Eat ‘Em and Smile’ reunion.
Starr recalled how it all started and said:
“Well, initially, I got a call from Steve Vai, and he says, ‘We’re gonna do an ‘Eat ‘Em and Smile’ reunion, and we’d love for you to come do it because Roth’s busy with Van Halen, and he can’t do it.’ And I’m like, ‘Hell yeah, I’m into it.’ I talked with Gregg because we’re buddies, and he was like, yeah, it’s gonna be awesome.”
But later, the plans changed, as he shared:
“And then, like two days before the show, there was a bunch of press about us doing it. Roth decides he wants to do it. So Steve Vai called me and goes, ‘Hey dude, Roth decided to do, but I really love you to come down anyways.’ I’m bummed, but absolutely, I wouldn’t want to miss it.”
The Steel Panther vocalist also mentioned his meeting with Roth:
“I went down there, went in the dressing room, and there’s David Lee Roth, and he goes [Imitating Roth], ‘Steel Panther’s in the house. Hey, what’s up, man?’ I go, ‘Dude, I love you, man,’ And he goes, ‘Oh man, we love your band. Tell all the fellas I said hi.'”
He continued by saying:
“And he talked to me for like 40 minutes, and while he’s talking to me, the rest of the band’s onstage waiting for him to go onstage. And during that time, the fire marshal shut down the show. So, it was an insane night for me.”
Revealing his feelings about the experience, Starr added:
“Unfortunately, it got shut down, but it was also killer because I got to hang out with one of my rock and roll heroes, ‘Diamond’ David Lee Roth. And the fact that he knew our band was more exciting than I could ever tell anybody. David Lee Roth knows my band! This is awesome!”
The fire marshal canceled the 2015 show at the last minute because of the safety measures and the growing crowd. The incident took place while the band was getting ready to play ‘Yankee Rose.’
Steve Vai remembered the incident in an interview with the Metal Hall of Fame back in January. During the chat, he explained David Lee Roth’s reaction to the situation as follows:
“He [Dave] was waiting for me to hit the chord. And when we couldn’t play, I had to go back and say, ‘Dave, this thing is not gonna happen because the fire marshall’s here; it’s a mad house.’ And he goes, ‘Perfect! We’ll get more press out of it by not playing than playing.’ Man, was he right?”
You can check out Michael Starr’s recent interview with AL&C here.