Song

Jump

Van Halen

Album:

1984

Song Meaning of Jump by Van Halen, and what it is about

It is Van Halen's most popular song and the first to achieve the top spot on the US Billboard Hot 100.

Despite having a guitar solo, the song is different from other Van Halen tracks in that it is driven by a keyboard theme. Benny "The Jet" Urquidez, a martial artist David Lee Roth was a pupil of, received a dedication in the song.

Eddie Van Halen created the synth line around 1981, but the band's other members disapproved of it. The unfinished song idea was played for Roth in 1983 by producer Ted Templeman. Roth played the song repeatedly while he drove around in the rear of his 1951 Mercury with band roadie Larry Hostler at the wheel. He thought of a lyric for it after viewing a TV news programme about a suicide jumper the previous evening. Roth anticipated that someone watching the incident would yell, "Go ahead and jump," at some point.

Hostler agreed when Roth brought up the idea, but the lyrics were written as an ontological invitation to action, life, and love rather than as a description of a prospective suicide. Later, according to Roth, Hostler was "probably the most responsible for how it came out."

Ted Templeman recalls that "Jump" was recorded at Eddie Van Halen's home studio. "Engineer Landee and Ed put the track down alone in the middle of the night. We recut it once in one take for sonic reasons. Dave wrote the lyrics that afternoon in the backseat of his Mercury convertible. We finished all vocals that afternoon and mixed it that evening."

Song lyrics of Jump by Van Halen

I get up

And nothing gets me down

You got it tough

I've seen the toughest all around

And I know

Baby, just how you feel

You've got to roll

With the punches to get to what's real

Oh can't you see me standing here

I've got my back against the record machine

I ain't the worst that you've seen