Watch Van Halen perform So This Is Love in an Italian dinosaur theme park
The video was first broadcast in 1982.
Footage of Van Halen performing the track So This Is Love has surfaced. The clip is made all the more interesting by the fact the clip was filmed inside an Italian dinosaur-themed “Prehistoric Park,” (Parco Della Preistoria) and only broadcast on Italy’s state television channel, RAI 1.
A Van Halen Fan who runs the YouTube channel Kosmo VanHalenItalia, of the Van Halen Italia Fan Club, uploaded the footage with the caption: “At the end of 1981 Van Halen filmed some videoclip settled in a Jurassic park in Italy, the ‘Prehistoric Park’ of Rivolta D’Adda (near Milan).”
“These videos aired on Italian state television, RAI 1, during a TV show called Happy Circus.”
Happy Circus ran for one season, between October 1981 and January 1982. The hosts interviewed a number of guests per episode, and occasionally threw to bespoke clips like the Van Halen one that’s just now hit the web.
While they’ve got a killer filming location and are clearly having a great time, it’s safe to say that Van Halen are miming to a track in this clip. Unless there’s some expertly-concealed wireless kits and amplifiers off-camera, that is. Or maybe hiding in the brontosaurus. Speaking of concealment, that’s something David Lee Roth’s outfit was absolutely not concerned with. You can take a look below, but you have been warned.
Regardless of the amplification situation, it does look like Eddie Van Halen is indeed playing one of the original ‘Frankenstrat’ guitars, complete with paint striping and mangled pickguard.