The top Van Halen songs are not easily arrived at.  The list you see to the left is my choice for the top 50 Van Halen Songs.  It's sequential so the top 10 is what I feel are the top 10 Van Halen songs, the top 20 is my top 20 songs.  It's impossible to stop there, and number 20 is hardly much better in my mind than number 30, or 40, or 50.  I've learned the David Lee Roth albums make me happiest as a fan.  A Different Kind Of Truth is second only to Van Halen 1 and slightly betters Van Halen II, Fair Warning, 1984 and the only Hagar album of the top 6, Balance.  So the new album makes it up there with Van Halen 1, Fair Warning and 1984!  'In my eyes, any way...

To begin with, the reason it's so difficult to narrow the list down is the brevity and the quality of Van Halen songs.  There are 133 studio songs on disc that have been released by Van Halen.  There are arguments for other songs on Japanese release and unreleased well known songs, and the fact there are 24 live tracks on Right Here, Right Now, with other songs on extra discs connected to that live album.  My iTunes has 1,351 Van Halen tracks as of February 27, 2012!   

The whole list of songs (following, below) of 133 (or is it 164?) released songs by VAN HALEN only, includes consideration of the live album, "Right Here, Right Now: LIVE" and 164 also includes all live tracks and 3 recent instrumentals by Edward Van Halen. 

Let's acknowledge what the criteria are for this list.  For my ultimate list of TOP VAN HALEN SONGS I am NOT considering those 24-26 Live Songs with Sammy Hagar from "RHRN Live", except for inclusion of "Won't Get Fooled Again" (which doesn't make it) because they are otherwise not original versions, I am neither including side projects; to meet our criteria of the best Van Halen songs it must be strictly Van Halen or Van Halen with less than 4 members; we include all studio tracks, disregard the live versions, we include all studio instrumentals in the list of 133-164 but not for inclusion into the final list of the top 50 Van Halen songs because instrumentals belong on their own list, yet we defy our rules, even including 3 recent studio instrumentals by EVH, as they were made at 5150 studios although they do not appear (as of yet) on any Van Halen albums.   Plus it's about time for some new Van Halen, any existing had to be considered.  GOT ALL THAT?

We arrive at our total of 164 released Van Halen songs from there being 85 Van Halen songs with David Lee Roth (including "Me Wise Magic" and "Can't Get This Stuff No More" from 1996 and the new 13 tracks); 74 Van Halen songs with Sammy Hagar including live (we are including the extra Balance song,  "Crossing Over", and the three from 2004) ; 12 with Gary Cherone, and 3 recent Edward Van Halen solo tracks ("Catherine", "Rise" and "Joy To The World") which we include because they are recent, by Edward Van Halen, alone,  so it's fair to include them as Van Halen songs.  I left instrumentals out of the equation of inclusion as top Van Halen songs because they aren't comparable to vocalized, song-written material.  They stand alone, in their own realm of consideration so I will later rate the instrumentals. 

To begin arriving at the list, the total list of 164 released Van Halen songs, below, was constructed by listing them in individual order by album, first to last.  Then by labeling the songs that I felt were worthy of a rating of 10 out of 10, it's easy to identify the songs to be considered for the final list.  From that it was a matter of labeling them more descriptively, all those tens, as a rating between 95 and 100 out of 100 possible.  Van Halen I, A Different Kind Of Truth, Van Halen II, Fair Warning, 1984 and Balance had the most 100/100 scores.  My tastes have changed since the first time I did this top 50; four of the top five Van Halen albums were with David Lee Roth and Balance is the only one of Hagar's to make the top five.  Five of the top six are Roth's.  Hey, it's my site; I can update it if I want!  I could have easily told you those were my favorite albums to listen to, before doing this, however by doing this analysis, scientifically labeling them, I can see exactly why I think what I think.