Alex Van Halen gets candid about brother's health struggles, tension with David Lee Roth

The world knew him as Eddie Van Halen, guitarist extraordinaire.

But to Alex Van Halen, he was Edward, maybe Ed, but never Eddie. He was also a best friend, the sensitive soul who “couldn’t filter out criticism” and a reluctant guitar hero with a boyish grin.

And he was a brother, born 20 months after Alex, with whom he would form one of the most influential rock bands in history.

In “Brothers” (out Oct. 22, Harper Collins, 226 pages, $32), Alex Van Halen unloads his love for his sibling and the consuming grief he still experiences since Ed died of cancer in October 2020.

Their story includes the two-week boat ride from their native Holland to America in 1962 – the Van Halen family would settle in Pasadena, California – the brothers shunning their piano lessons to play rock ‘n’ roll after hearing The Beatles and the Dave Clark Five and Alex’s migration to the drums and his idolization of Cream’s Ginger Baker.

As a band, Van Halen pioneered musical techniques (just listen to Eddie’s then-unheard-of finger tapping on “Eruption” or Alex’s engine-purring double bass drum opening on “Hot for Teacher”) while blitzing rock fans with “Jamie’s Cryin’,” “So This is Love?” “Beautiful Girls” and MTV staples “Jump” and “Panama.”

Alex, 71, doesn’t scrimp on entertaining anecdotes, such as how the roar that opens “Runnin’ with the Devil” entailed ripping the horns out of their cars, and when on tour with Black Sabbath, frontman Ozzy Osbourne wandered into the wrong hotel and slept for two days.

Alex is also unvarnished when discussing frontman David Lee Roth, whom he thinks was “angry at Ed for being too talented” and expressing his own anger when Ed agreed to play an uncredited guitar solo on Michael Jackson’s “Beat It” (“Why would you burn up creativity on someone else’s record?”).

In an interview with USA TODAY, Alex Van Halen plunged deeper into some of the topics in the book, such as his own addiction issues and Ed’s health struggles, while also extending humor and thoughtfulness.

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Question: The fourth anniversary of Ed’s death was earlier this month. Do you do anything in particular to honor him on that day?

Answer: I remember him every day. There isn’t a moment I don’t think about him and what we have done. We were together 65 years. That was a full lifetime of being on the phone yakking, agreeing, disagreeing – that’s what brothers do. But because we had a creative vision, that was the driving force and the motivation.

Was writing the book cathartic or emotionally brutal?

I was hoping it would be cathartic in a roundabout way. … A lot of stuff came up and forced me to look at certain aspects of our lives, and I’m not making a joke, I wouldn’t change any of it. My dad used to say, don’t live a life of regret.

At the end of the book you mention that David Lee Roth was the first person you called after Ed died, yet there are plenty of instances throughout where you are very frank about the dynamic he brought to the band, good and bad. What is your relationship like with him now?

I think Dave is laying low right now. I don’t know his mental state in terms of how he’s dealing with all of this. I was taught early on that the music field isn’t about the notes and things, it’s about relationships and what we all had (in Van Halen) was deeply entangled. I don’t hold (Roth leaving Van Halen in 1985) against him. We’re not here to hold you prisoner. But it was very telling how the dynamic of certain entities got warped by the people around him. Dave was in the middle of (huge success) where he wasn’t thinking clearly, and he would admit that now. That’s the reason I called him first – only to find out that 23 years changes people.

Meaning, the conversation didn’t go as expected?

He’s the not the same guy. But if he called me right now, I would answer the phone. It’s about human dignity and respect.

I know the book is about your bond with Ed and the musical magic you made together, but I don’t recall any mention of Sammy Hagar (Van Halen's singer after Roth's departure).

For me, the spirit of the band ended in 1984. We did good work after that, but the primary spiritual aspect, the magic, the potential, the looking to the future together, all of that stuff, our mutually strange backgrounds – that’s what made Van Halen. Ed and I were outsiders. Dave was an outsider. Those kinds of intangible things make the fabric of how we were tied together.

You’re candid with stories about your addiction to alcohol and getting hooked on benzos in the mid-‘90s. How do you manage to not fall into those traps while dealing with loss and sadness?

First of all, I have a good support network and ultimately what they teach you is that there is another force out there and to let it go. Let the higher spirit take care of it. How I tend to look at it is that I have responsibilities and you use every tool at your disposal, whether that is fear or taking care of your family. Or look up. I’d say to Ed, just look up and let it go.

How do you feel when you hear and see (Ed’s son) Wolfgang play?

He’s very careful not to be lumped in with Ed. He wants to be his own person and he’s fought for every foot of it. I told him early on, just keep going, don’t stop. The worst thing you can do is stop; the rest is up to the gods.

You mention in the book that you still have your first thousand-dollar Ludwig kit, but you can’t play?

I broke my back (in 2022), but I am healing. It happened right after the thing with Dave fell apart for the quote-unquote Van Halen tribute tour. Hey, 60 years behind the drum kit is grueling.

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I’m sure (U2’s) Larry Mullen Jr. would agree with you.

Larry Mullen, he has a very even-keeled view of things. Months before (my back problems) I called him to see if he had a solution for my joint issues. But Larry opted for surgery, which is not the way to go. There are ways around things.

You make a point of saying early in the book that this would not be a backstage dirt type of expose, like Noel Monk’s “Runnin’ With the Devil” in 2018.

Noel is a lovely guy, but please you’re a tour manager. And that was only because Dave, Ed and I were afraid a real manager would take us to the cleaners. Besides, I’m the one who fired him.

So that said, would you ever do a second book that focused more on the crazy stories?

We’ve still got to see where this one goes. The main thing for me is to have closure with Ed. Because of COVID, it was difficult for me to see him at the end and a lot of people were jockeying for position and he was in a very fragile state. When I was in Switzerland with him (for experimental cancer treatments), we got him into rehab and that meant withdrawal and I wouldn’t wish that on my worst enemy. His doctor made me a bit of an enabler, saying you have to give him one of these pills every 15 minutes and Ed is standing over my bed waiting for the pill. But those are the moments he and I had alone. And he gave it a fight. He really did.

This story has been updated with a clarification.

This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Alex Van Halen goes deep into life with Eddie Van Halen in 'Brothers'