David Lee Roth Stepping Out

David Lee Roth will once again step out of Van Halen, but this time it’s just for a very special one-off show. He says, “I’m going to be playing, probably this November, the 25th anniversary of the Blue Note in Tokyo with a big band. The Duke Ellington Big Band just called recently to see if I wanted to play with them. That stuff is way downtown. There’s some dirt under the fingernails, if you do that kind of music right.”

Roth, who lives in Tokyo, adds, “Big band is the original hard rock. You know, they load up on those low saxophones -- they load up on all the baritones. You can feel the boom in the room. If you look at your beer glass, it’s making those little circles that start in the center. You could feel that in your stomach. The hips don’t lie!”

Roth and Van Halen are now Down Under for the Stone Music Festival in Sydney, Australia on Saturday.