Bio

Edward Lodewijk Van Halen, (born January 26, 1955) is a virtuoso guitarist and a founding member of the hard rock band Van Halen.

Edward, commonly referred to as Eddie, was born in Nijmegen, Netherlands to a Dutch father (Jan) and an Indonesian mother (Eugina). The Dutch Roman Catholic Van Halen family moved to Pasadena, California from The Netherlands in 1962. Eddie Van Halen immediately started classical piano training and won talent competitions as a child (although during a radio interview he said that he cannot read music). Eddie claims that one of the first things his parents did upon arriving in America was to seek out a piano teacher for him and his older brother, Van Halen drummer Alex Van Halen.

Eddie once said in an interview, "Who wants to sit in front of the piano? Thats boring." Soon after Eddie became bored, Alex (his brother) began playing the guitar while Eddie bought a drumset. According to Eddie, while he was delivering newspapers to pay for his drum kit, Alex would practice on them. It was when Eddie heard Alex's mastery of the Surfaris drum solo in the song "Wipe Out" that he got annoyed that his brother had overtaken his ability and decided to switch and begin learning how to play the electric guitar.

Eddie was around age twelve when he started playing guitar. He was so committed to the instrument that he played it all day, every day. Sometimes, he would even skip school to stay at home and practice. Eddie claimed that he had learned almost all of Eric Clapton's solos in the band Cream "note for note" by age 14, though in other interviews he claims that in fact he could never learn to play the solos precisely and would therefore modify them to suit his style.

The initial incarnation of "Van Halen" manifested around the time Ed graduated from high school and was a three-piece consisting of Ed, Alex, and bass player Mark Stone - a friend from high school. However, the band was not performing under the name "Van Halen", but under the name "Mammoth". In this lineup, Ed played lead guitar and sang lead vocal. They had no P.A. system of their own, so they rented one from David Lee Roth, who had auditioned for the band, but had failed as he was not an accomplished vocalist at the time. David charged Mammoth $50 a night to rent his P.A. system. After a year playing with this lineup, Ed became frustrated singing lead vocals, and figured they could save money by letting David Lee Roth into the band because he had the P.A. system. Eventually Roth agreed to join the band.

Bassist Mike Anthony first saw Mammoth performing at the same festival as his band "Snake", which he fronted. A year or so later Ed and Alex realized they needed a new bassist as Mark Stone had a hard time with the instrument and couldn't remember all the songs the band was covering. Michael Anthony was called over to David Lee Roth's dad's house to jam (at this time the band rehearsed in Roth's Dad's basement). Anthony accepted because he knew Mammoth was playing well-known clubs in Pasadena while Snake was just playing local parties. Roth was not at this first jam of what would eventually become the first incarnation of "Van Halen", but Ed, Alex, and Michael Anthony jammed late into the night and when it was all over Michael Anthony was the new bass player for Mammoth. At first Anthony thought he would just play bass but eventually he was asked to sing backup vocals and this became a trademark of the Van Halen sound. Roth is typically accredited with eventually suggesting the band simply call itself Van Halen (although the name "Rat Salad" -- the name of a Black Sabbath song -- was also considered). With this lineup (Ed, Alex, Anthony, and Roth) Van Halen started playing clubs in Pasadena and Hollywood more frequently and to increasingly greater audiences.

Van Halen quickly developed a "following" or a legion of fans who made it a point to see the band play wherever they happened to be performing. For Van Halen's part, they worked hard to increase their popularity through self promotion: before each gig they would pass out flyers at local high schools in Pasadena and the vicinity. Van Halen fans soon became notorious for being rowdy; at an audition for a club in Pasadena the band was denied because their fans were too rowdy. At a backyard barbecue where Van Halen were performing the police were called in to break up the party but were met by a mob of Van Halen fans who flipped over police cars and handcuffed one officer to a tree.

Van Halen's appearance also helped boost their popularity. When they played before audiences in Pasadena everyone thought they were a Hollywood band because of the way Dave dressed and behaved on stage. When they performed in Hollywood everyone thought they were from Pasadena because Ed, Alex, and Anthony were always in jeans and T-shirts.

There are bootleg recordings of many of Van Halen's early shows where they would play original material (some of which made it onto the band's first two albums) along with cover versions including songs by Deep Purple, Cream and ZZ Top. Roth has been known to say they tried to cover and write songs people could dance to in order to boost popularity. However, Roth's penchant for wanting to play cover songs purportedly annoyed Ed (especially on the album Diver Down: Ed and Dave apparently argued a lot over whether or not Dancing In The Streets - which Dave liked and Ed didn't - would make it on the album).

In 1976 Gene Simmons saw Van Halen performing at an L.A. club and decided he wanted to record some of the material they were playing. Eventually Simmons flew the band to Electric Lady studios in New York to record a demo. The songs on this demo were "House of Pain" and "Runnin' With the Devil". Ed disliked his playing on the demo because he wasn't using his own equipment and had to overdub guitar parts, which he had never done before. Ultimately Van Halen ended up with a demo tape but no recording contract. As Simmons was getting back with his band Kiss, he decided to forgo any more involvement with the band.

A year later, in 1977, Mo Ostin and Ted Templeman of Warner Bros. records saw Van Halen performing at the Starwood in Hollywood. Although there were few people in the audience that night, the two were so impressed with Van Halen that within a week they offered them a recording contract with Warner Bros. records, which Van Halen signed. In October of that year, Van Halen entered Sunset Sound Recorders studio and recorded their first album, Van Halen.

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