Eddie Van Halen and Alex Van Halen. SGranitz/WireImage
Alex Van Halen is shedding mild on his brother Eddie Van Halen’s habit to prescription drugs.
In his first interview since Eddie’s demise, Alex, 71, defined that his late brother, the Van Halen guitarist, turned hooked on prescribed steroid drugs after present process surgical procedure to take away a mind tumor within the years earlier than his demise. (Eddie died in 2020 of issues from most cancers. He was 65.)
“You recognize, he fought till the tip,” Alex advised Rolling Stone in an interview revealed on Tuesday, October 15. “Anyone who thought he was something lower than that may suck my you-know-what. … In the event you knew what he needed to undergo to beat the most cancers — he wouldn’t do conventional remedy. A few of the off-the-wall s— triggered such a poisonous combine in his physique. And, yeah, you shouldn’t drink with it, Ed!”
Alex added that the drugs made his brother “really feel like Superman,” and in the future he noticed Eddie take each capsule within the bottle. The intent wasn’t to hurt himself however to chase that feeling.
Kevin Winter/Getty Pictures Valerie Bertinelli is wanting again at a few of the darkest reminiscences of her relationship with ex-husband Eddie Van Halen. After watching son Wolfgang Van Halen‘s Behind the Music episode, through which he detailed his relationship along with his late father, Bertinelli, 64, mirrored on their marriage and the way listening to her son’s facet of […]
“I didn’t see the bottle, however the bottle had, like, a thousand drugs in it,” he mentioned. “If two’s good, 20’s higher. That was our mantra.”
Alex, who was additionally Van Halen’s drummer, laughed when he mentioned it, although he accepts that the drugs possible contributed to his brother’s demise.
Eddie Van Halen and Alex Van Halen. Lynn Goldsmith/Corbis/VCG through Getty Pictures
Within the time main as much as Eddie’s demise, he saved creating music as he sought experimental most cancers remedies. Alex concedes the music wasn’t superb, however that’s not the purpose — the purpose was that he was in a position to do it in any respect.
When Eddie died, the household was unable to have a correct funeral with the world nonetheless within the throes of the COVID-19 pandemic. Alex referred to as it “unceremonious,” including that Eddie was cremated and his son, Wolfgang, has his ashes.
C Flanigan/Getty Pictures 4 many years after Eddie Van Halen labored with Michael Jackson, brother Alex Van Halen remains to be upset. “Why would you lend your abilities to Michael Jackson? I simply don’t f—ing get it,” Alex, 71, advised Rolling Stone in an interview revealed on Tuesday, October 15. “And the humorous half was that Ed […]
“I gotta say that Wolf did an exceptional job in dealing with all that s—,” he mentioned. “It was far more than any younger man ought to have ever been in control of.”
Alex, in the meantime, needed to cope with his personal “oceanic grief.”
“I used to be yelling and screaming. I used to be beside myself,” he mentioned. “I simply miss him. I miss the arguments. I stay with it every single day. And I can’t deliver him again. I can’t make issues proper.”
Generally, he can nonetheless really feel Eddie’s presence, telling Rolling Stone, “Ed’s been round a pair occasions.”
“He’s high-quality,” Alex concluded. “Wherever he’s, he’s high-quality.”