Songwriting Credits
The album's original release credits all songs to Edward Van Halen, Alex Van Halen, Michael Anthony and David Lee Roth. The label on the UK single release for "I'll Wait" (catalog #W9213) credited Michael McDonald as a co-writer, but he was not credited on the US version of the single (catalog #7-29307).
Songs from this album which appeared on compilations released after a royalty renegotiation with the band's label Warner Bros. (Best of Volume I, 1996) and a lawsuit brought by Roth (during the preparations for The Best of Both Worlds compilation, 2004), were credited to Edward Van Halen, Alex Van Halen and David Lee Roth, with Michael Anthony's name removed from the credits, as evident in the end song credits of the 2007 film Superbad. Subsequently, Anthony has been removed from all songwriting credits on the 1984 album.
The entry for the album on the ASCAP database lists the songwriters for all songs as (alphabetically by surname) Michael Anthony, David Lee Roth, Alex Van Halen and Edward Van Halen. The ASCAP entry for "I'll Wait" lists Michael McDonald as co-writer. Like many bands starting out on their career, Van Halen shared songwriting credit equally between all members (including guitar instrumentals, which were clearly composed only by Eddie), but subsequent claims would lend credibility to the view that all songs were entirely or predominantly written by Eddie Van Halen and David Lee Roth, with little input from Van Halen's rhythm section.
In 2004, Roth discovered that the rest of the band had renegotiated a more preferential royalty rate with Warner Bros. for all releases made during his time as lead singer, giving them a royalty rate five times greater than his. It is likely that the removal of Michael Anthony from the songwriting credits results from Roth's claim to have a greater claim of the band's song publishing for this album, because he had been cut out of the separate royalty renegotiation with Warner Bros. Records, which according to Roth happened around 1994. Other sources suggest that Anthony was removed from the credits as part of a renegotiation following his ouster from the band but prior to his temporary reinstatement as a hired musician for the 2004 reunion tour.
Read more about this topic: 1984 (Van Halen album)