Rare unearthed footage of Van Halen messing around during filming for Jump and Panama

Footage and outtakes from the filming of Van Halen's Jump and Panama has been resurfaced. According to director and long-time associate Peter Angelus, there's hours of recording for both videos.

As there was so much filmed, some of the content for Jump actually ended up being in Panama. Reportedly, some of what was filmed for Panama was recorded before and during Van Halen's two-night stay at the Providence Civic Center in Rhode Island. However, most of the film location was shot in Los Angeles, where David Lee Roth can be found driving around town on a motorbike, as well as with Alex Van Halen in a Mercury lowrider.

Other shots include scenes of the band relaxing in various hotels whilst receiving room service from what we can only assume is a groupie dressed in a maid outfit (she spends most of her time dusting plants), David Lee Roth getting arrested whilst shirtless, Eddie charmingly suited-up playing on a grand piano, mechanical furry robots – simply a heck load of unruly, rock’n’roll fun. Interestingly, one of the alleged locations includes the Riot House/Hyatt House hotel where Lemmy wrote Motorhead and where Led Zeppelin’s John Bonham rode up and down the hall on a motorbike. Rock’n’roll indeed.

The footage originally contained no backing music, but YouTube user My Collection kindly added audio from a handful of early Van Halen demos to get that full nostalgic effect.

Liz manages Louder's social media channels and works on keeping the sites up to date with the latest news from the world of rock and metal. Prior to joining Louder as a full time staff writer, she completed a Diploma with the National Council for the Training of Journalists and received a First Class Honours Degree in Popular Music Journalism. She enjoys writing about anything from neo-glam rock to stoner, doom and progressive metal, and loves celebrating women in music.