Can't stop thinking about that smile. That boyish grin that seemed to say, "I know that you know that I know exactly how good I am and still I can't believe I get to do this." And that exuberant guitar sound that radiated with the wonder of his own virtuosity. And which, in the past 48 hours, has been reminding me of another superhumanly gifted guitarist who made it look not only easy, but fun, and who wanted nothing more than to share his own wonder. I don't think I'd ever realized how much EDDIE VAN HALEN and PRINCE, who led very different bands in very different lanes, reminded me of each other. Prince had a wider range of guitar-face than Eddie did, and could be a bit more—OK, a lot more—vain about his talents. But there was a wide-eyed, childlike sweetness to both guitarists' playing, and they had in common an absolute commitment to feel over technique, no matter how advanced (obscene even) that technique may have been, and a delirious pop sensibility. You can hear all of that in every riff and every solo Eddie played. DAVID LEE ROTH, for all his considerable talents as a frontman—he was Eddie's greatest foil by far—top-lined some of those riffs with lyrics not worth transcribing or repeating, but that never much mattered because the real lyrics and soul of Van Halen's best songs are embedded in those riffs. His guitars did his talking. (Also, they were abstract expressionist artworks whose paint jobs radiated with that same wonder. It all connects.) This rock death seems to have hit incredibly close to home for a lot of rock fans and it isn't hard to see why. It's going to hurt for a while. MusicSET: "Suddenly There Came a Tapping: Remembering Eddie Van Halen"... Is MORGAN WALLEN the first musical guest kicked off SATURDAY NIGHT LIVE three days before he was supposed to perform? The country star was caught hanging out in a bar in Alabama last weekend without a mask and canoodling with apparent strangers, in violation of the show's Covid-19 protocols (also in violation of common sense in 2020). He used a video of his own on social media to announce that SNL had dumped him, and apologized. "I have some growin' up to do," he told his fans. This remains a great breezy crossover tune. (The East Tennessee native may still have to apologize for being in Tuscaloosa on an Alabama football weekend, which is not what one does when one is from East Tennessee)... WADADA LEO SMITH kicks off the avant-garde jazz VISION FESTIVAL: HEALING SOUL, which is happening outdoors on New York's Lower East Side and on livestream, at 7 pm ET today. The five-day fest will also feature ANDREW CYRILLE, OLIVER LAKE and WILLIAM PARKER... Hi, APHEX TWIN... An Irish poem, just because: "A man will rise / A man will fall / From the sheer face of love / Like a fly from a wall"... RIP REV. JOHN WILKINS, BUNNY LEE, VERNE EDQUIST and RAY PENNINGTON.