This is only a preview. The auction will open on: 10/28/2026 1:00:00 PM
Offered Here: Van Halen 1981 Fair Warning RIAA Platinum Sales Award Presented to Zeke Clark With COA
Item Details: A top-tier offering for serious rock and roll collectors, this authentic RIAA platinum sales award celebrates the incredible commercial milestone of Van Halen's 1981 hard rock masterpiece, Fair Warning. Commemorating sales exceeding one million copies, this highly collectible piece is designed in the classic flower hologram style of the era, featuring the coveted combined record and cassette platinum presentation layout. Adding spectacular, museum-quality insider provenance, this accolade is officially presented to Zeke Clark, Van Halen's legendary longtime guitar technician, making it a definitive artifact from the peak of the band's classic lineup. Measuring approximately 17 x 21 inches, this award represents a monumental chapter in the history of guitar rock.
Provenance/Authenticity: Randall "Zeke" Clark is a renowned luthier and legendary guitar/amp technician who got his start in the San Francisco music scene in the 70s, working with various A-list artists until moving to LA in the 80s, where he worked for Eddie Van Halen.
From 1985 to 1993, he served as Edward Van Halen’s lead guitar and amp tech, transitioning to the crew with Sammy Hagar to maintain the band's gear through the monumental 5150, OU812, and For Unlawful Carnal Knowledge eras.
Beyond his historic tenure as the custodian of Eddie's tone, Clark's elite five-decade career includes building, repairing, and maintaining specialized gear for iconic artists such as Prince, Sammy Hagar, Journey, Heart, Poison, and others. This curated selection of items offers collectors a unique and direct connection to rock history through the hands of a master craftsman who shaped the sound of guitar royalty.
This item was personally handled, vetted, and released by Zeke Clark, ensuring its authenticity and rock-history provenance. Zeke Clark utilizes an Official Personal Signature Stamp to validate and inventory documents and artifacts released directly from his private estate. This item comes with his personal ink-imprinted signature stamp on the certificate of authenticity, which serves as his legally binding, authorized mark of verification and carries the full weight of a hand-signed signature.
Fair Warning, released in 1981 as Van Halen's fourth album with the original lineup of David Lee Roth, Eddie Van Halen, Alex Van Halen and Michael Anthony, is widely regarded as the band's darkest and most aggressive record of the Roth era. Produced by Ted Templeman, it features tracks such as "Unchained" and "Mean Street" that showcase Eddie Van Halen's innovative tapping, harmonics and heavily textured guitar tones, and it reached No. 5 on the Billboard 200. Though it produced no major hit singles, the album has since become a favorite among guitarists and critics for its raw intensity, and it helped cement Van Halen's position as one of the most influential hard rock bands of the early 1980s.
Condition: The award is preserved in exceptionally good condition, displaying a clean and well-maintained appearance with minor signs of wear, aging, and storage from decades of preservation. The front plexiglass shows a couple of minor surface marks that do not detract from the overall display. Consistent with the aging characteristics of this specific award construction, the specialized Formica frame covering is coming loose at the bottom corners along the sides, which can be easily stabilized or left as-is to preserve its original, untouched state.
SKU: RZC2123