Watch Dave Grohl and Greg Kurstin Cover Van Halen’s ‘Jump’
Dave Grohl and producer Greg Kurstin marked the fourth night of Hanukkah with a spirited rendition of Van Halen’s “Jump” — complete with a keytar solo.
The duo staged their performance much like their take on the Ramones’ “Blitzkrieg Bop”: playing in a bare-bones setup with Grohl handling both drums and vocals. They went all-out with the lo-fi staging and showmanship: drum-stick twirls, spotlights, slow-mo leaps, quick poses in a truck bed, even overt nods to the 1984 song’s music video.
Naturally, Kurstin jumped behind the synthesizer this time, impressively recreating all of Eddie Van Halen’s arpeggiated licks and stabbing chords — building to an intense keytar solo. Grohl added a bit of extra hard-rock growl to the vocal, a slight shift from David Lee Roth’s signature air-siren attack.
“Quite possibly the loudest and proudest of hard-rocking Jews, David Lee Roth has gone on record crediting his Bar Mitzvah preparation as his earliest vocal training,” Grohl and Kurstin wrote in the video’s YouTube caption. “He became a rock star the day he became a man: Diamond Dreidel DLR and Van Halen ... with ‘Jump.’" You can watch the video below.
“Jump” is the latest in a series of goofy and entertaining covers, following a metal version of Lisa Loeb’s 1994 folk-rock tune “Stay (I Missed You),” their faithful take on “Blitzkrieg Bop” and a swanky edition of Barry Manilow’s “Copacabana.”
The 2021 series marks the second year of "Hanukkah Sessions,” in which Grohl and Kurstin pay tribute to a different Jewish artist on each night of the holiday. The 2020 kickoff included salutes to Bob Dylan, the Knack, the Velvet Underground, Beastie Boys and Mountain.