“How is Michael Anthony?”
This is the first thing I say to Eddie Van Halen, the legendary guitarist and namesake of the rock band Van Halen. Rather, it’s the first thing I say to someone who probably is, but probably isn’t, Eddie Van Halen. I mean, who am I kidding? There’s no way Eddie Van Halen’s real email address is available for anyone to find in a public database — and it certainly shouldn’t be an America Online account.
In other words, it can’t be him, which is why the first email I send is something so stupid and slapdash. Those familiar with Van Halen history know that Anthony — the band’s original bass player — wasn’t so much fired from Van Halen as replaced in 2006 by Eddie’s son, Wolfgang, without anyone bothering to tell Anthony. At least that’s what Anthony said. So my opening line is something you might see a Van Halen traditionalist hold up a giant sign at a concert just to troll Anthony’s replacement.
This is not just a fan’s tale. In a previous life, I was a music journalist, including a stint as editor of the Rolling Stone website. Then I got to interview everyone from Ozzy Osbourne to Diddy. But now it’s 2015 and I’m more than a decade removed from my dream job. Today, as a market researcher for a health insurance company, I stare at spreadsheets until my eyes water and follow my employer’s social media mentions, including angry posts about how only “fraudsters” and “#scumbags” would work there.
Sending emails like this has become something of a pastime, an exercise in nostalgia when a hard day’s work gets too much to handle. I recently discovered that old logins to LexisNexis—a directory used by lawyers and journalists that shows, among other things, a person’s criminal record, residences, phone numbers and, yes, email addresses—had never been deactivated. After using it to look up a few exes, I turned to the rock stars. I quickly contacted whoever Nexis told me was Gene Simmons, Eddie Vedder, Stevie Nicks, and pretty much every member of the original Guns N’ Roses. But I didn’t get any response.
So, I released Michael Anthony’s email close to 5 o’clock on Sunday, May 31, 2015, and I think that will be the beginning and the end of it. But 51 minutes later: “You have mail!” That response began five-plus years of correspondence that would change my life.
I don’t actually see the email until Monday morning when I go to work. My insides flutter slightly.
“Not as good as Wolfgang Van Halen, nor will he ever be!! Who the hell is that, you’d know if you had a brain and ears!!”
Whoever this is, they are quite protective of Wolfie. Here’s another thing: The email’s timestamp is 6:46 p.m.—or what time it would have been in California, where Eddie Van Halen is known to live, when it was sent.
And it’s a bit of a reach, but twice the writer uses double exclamation points – the same way Van Halen does in the song “Everybody Wants Some!!” This has always annoyed me and, frankly, makes me enjoy the song less. Most normal people use either one or three exclamation points as a point of emphasis or volume. But two? I’m starting to think this guy is either Eddie Van Halen or the world’s greatest Eddie Van Halen impersonator.
There is one more thing I notice. Next to the email address is a name: Edward Van Halen.
Eddie Van Halen in 1978. Forty years later, he said people don’t recognize him as much as they used to, but he sometimes hears them say as they walk by, “Holy shit, that was Eddie Van Halen!”
Fin Costello/Redferns/Getty Images
But no, it’s going to take more than that to catch me. So I immediately write back, throwing in a Van Halen reference A different kind of truth which was issued three years earlier. This is their first album featuring David Lee Roth since then 1984 (released the year of the title), and seven of its 13 songs have origins that predate the band’s self-titled debut in 1978.
“Regardless, you screwed up the classic line-up and, with all due respect to your son, with DLR’s voice in shit, you need Anthony more than ever. And what about new music that you didn’t write in 1975? You are super lazy.”
I sound like Principal Ed Rooney talking crap to someone he’s pretty sure isn’t Sloane Peterson’s father. Yet the question seems to strike a chord with me. A few hours later, five new emails arrive in my inbox. They are a little stream of consciousness filled with rage and mistrust. I quickly read them all.
The writer says they “can’t control Roth’s voice” and mocks my temporary decision to have Anthony rejoin the band to help cover Roth’s vocal inadequacies. “And now you think Mike is a ‘lead singer,'” reads one email. “He sounds like Mickey Mouse. He just has a high voice. They then blamed Roth for leaving the band initially in 1985 and lamented the decision to bring in Sammy Hagar to replace him later that year: “Once Hagar joined, it just wasn’t the same.”
“This is the last thing I will say,” reads the final email. “When Hagar left, Mike went with him instead of staying with Alex and me. It was as much a betrayal as Roth blindside us when he left. We didn’t see one coming!! All we had was us, Alex and me. A wolf happened to be there and [it was] fun again. Life is change. I can’t control it any more than you can. If I could, I would change a lot of things, starting with never having my first drink and maybe sticking to piano instead of guitar!!”
damn that’s a lot to unpack. And those damn double exclamation points!!
“When Hagar left, Mike went with him. It was as much a betrayal as Roth blinding us. We didn’t see one coming!! All we had was me and Alex.
Not including pre-Van Halen band Mammoth, the 2015 incarnation of Van Halen is their fourth, with Eddie and his drummer brother Alex serving as regulars. This happened when Wolfgang got permission from his father and uncle Alex to call Roth and ask him if he was interested in playing with the band. He agreed and from then on it was Eddie, Alex, Wolfgang and Roth. As Roth told crowds on the 2007 tour, the lineup was “three parts original, one part inevitable.”
But the classic lineup, featuring Anthony instead of Wolfe, has sold 57 million albums thanks to ubiquitous classic rock songs like “Jump,” “Unchained” and “Dance the Night Away.” It ran from 1974 until Roth left in 1985 to try to become a movie star (he failed) and a solo artist (middling success). If you include the two new songs Roth contributed to 1996’s The Best of Van Halen Volume 1 and a trainwreck reunion at the MTV Video Music Awards that year, this period marked Roth’s third stint with the group.
Still, Eddie and Roth never got along. For many years Roth wasn’t in the band, Eddie often didn’t even mention him by name, instead referring to “the previous guy”, “a certain guy” or occasionally “cubic zirconium”, an unsubtle jab at “Diamond Roth’s Dave. An equally mature Roth once said he was tasked with replacing three members of his “last band” for his first solo album.
Besides Roth, Eddie’s other enemies were alcohol, cigarettes and cancer. He started smoking and drinking heavily early in his career as a way to “medicate” his performance anxiety, and despite many attempts to quit, he just couldn’t. He made a valiant effort around the time Wolf joined the band, but fell off the wagon again just before the 2007 tour. The shows were canceled and Ed returned to the rehab clinic. Now finally, after years of relapse, he is clean and sober.
Amidst all this, in 2000, Eddie learned that he had tongue cancer that had spread to his esophagus; two years later, a third of his tongue was removed, after which he was deemed cancer-free.
Given all that the real Eddie Van Halen has endured – and if it happens to actually be him – maybe it’s time to tone it down.
“Damn, fine. . . I didn’t mean to annoy you,” I reply 21 minutes after the sender’s last email. “Maybe Mike was mad because VH hadn’t done anything in years… I mean it took, what, 15 years to make True? Just saying’ . . .”
It works. After saying that this will be “the last thing I’ll say,” the writer says much, much more—enough to more or less confirm that this is indeed the real Eddie Van Halen. (A representative for Van Halen said the band and Eddie’s family declined to comment on the correspondence. A representative for Wolfgang also declined to comment.)
The same day he tells me that he “gets mad because I’m always blamed for everything.” Then he guts Roth, or so I see it then. It will turn out to be tame by future standards.
“The reason it took so long True is Roth, including all reworked demos,” he begins. It’s the same reason, he says, the band has “nothing but a live record [2015’s Tokyo Dome Live in Concert] to show a three-year stint.” Roth, he explains, just wants to be on stage doing his ‘Vaudeville!” He then says that ‘Roth is out of his element’ and not at all interested in rock ‘n’ roll, which makes the recording of new music almost impossible. He says Roth only likes “dance music” and “hates bands like AC/DC,” adding that Roth calls the group’s fans “culturally illiterate.”
“Well, I guess that makes me one of them, because I love AC/DC and their simplicity,” he continues, saying the band has inspired many Van Halen songs he’s written, including “Panama,” “Drop Dead Legs,” and “Okay…
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