Van Halen drummer Alex Van Halen has been busy promoting the release of his new memoir, “Brothers, which shares the story of he and his late brother Edward on their journey together to success. Alex was a recent guest on Talk Is Jericho, and he talked about his decision to write the book which he calls a love letter to his younger brother.
“Ed and I were tight,” Alex explained. “We worked together, we played together, we did whatever. But when he was near the end of his life, because of COVID it was very difficult to visit him in person and to see him. There was always either a glass barrier or a plastic something surrounding [him]. The times that we could actually touch him were few and far between. And that really put everything in a strange kind of — I can’t explain it, but it didn’t feel right. So we really had no closure, in that sense, and everything was hurried near the end, again, because of the COVID issue. We didn’t really have a ceremony afterwards. He was cremated and his ashes were spread. This is my way of saying goodbye to him. And whatever you believe in terms of spiritual pursuits and all that, I think he’s still here, he’s still here with us in one way, shape or form — not to the point where he’s not allowed to go where he really wants to go. They call it a tether; you don’t wanna tether him to this dimension. So, Ed, whatever you wanna do is cool. We love you. And I just wanted to say that to the point of infinitum, whatever the expression is.”
He continued: “It’s hard to describe what it’s like to not have someone in your life that has been there for 65 years. That’s a long, long time, and it wasn’t just a regular — and I’m not giving other people a hard time in terms of ‘my relationship was stronger than yours’. That’s not the point. It’s just that when you have something that’s taken out of your life after 65 years, it’s difficult. And I’m certainly not alone. I’m not saying I’m special or I should get a medal — no, it happens to a lot of different people. And I think one of the side effects of this book has been a lot of people have contacted me and said, ‘Reading this book has really given me a different way of looking at the parting with people who I loved.’ And I know that grief can be a common denominator, if you will, and that’s not my preference — my preference is the happier times — but with the good comes the bad. And everybody’s gonna go through it.”
The audiobook version of “Brothers” contains a previously unreleased track from Eddie and Alex called “Unfinished.” Alex explained that there’s still plenty of music in the “vault.”
“Now that Ed’s gone, none of those things are really valid because all I have, and Wolf has, is all the recordings in the vault,” Alex said. “And they will stay there until we figure out how and why and what to do with them. And again, you have to remember, it has to be on the level of where Ed and I, where we used to play. We’re not just gonna shovel it in. We have access to some of the greatest musicians on the planet, and a lot of ’em are more than willing to take a chance on some of the stuff.”
Jericho noted that it sounded like there’s more than just a few demos that remain unreleased. “Oh, yeah. Probably three or four records, if not more. I’m serious. There was some good stuff, some good stuff in there. And you have to remember, when in the thick of it, sometimes the really great stuff kind of passes you by. And it’s not until you revisit it going, ‘Whoa, I forgot about that. This kicks *ss.’ But that takes time. And you wanna do it right. I wanna do it right.”
Listen to the full Talk Is Jericho episode here.
