Those in the world of rock ‘n’ roll tend to live life hard and fast, filled with sex, drugs and alcohol. For some, alcohol was around far before breaking out into fame. In his new memoir, legendary rockstar Alex Van Halen reveals that he and his brother, Eddie, were drinking at a very young age, explaining how their speedy lifestyle came from their parents.
Van Halen brothers
The Van Halen brothers, Alex and Eddie, grew up in a musical family, with their father, a Dutch jazz musician, influencing their early interest in music. Originally trained in classical piano, the brothers switched to rock instruments in their teens – Eddie on guitar and Alex on drums. Their natural chemistry as musicians laid the foundation for what would later become one of the most iconic rock bands of the 1970s and ’80s: Van Halen.
The band started in 1974, after the brothers recruited bassist Michael Anthony and vocalist David Lee Roth. The group’s high-energy performances and Eddie’s legendary guitar solos quickly made them a staple of the Southern California rock scene.
Their debut album, Van Halen (1978), rocketed them to fame. Despite various lineup changes over the years, the Van Halen brothers remained the core of the band, maintaining their intense sibling connection throughout decades of success.
Alcohol was around from an early age
In his new memoir, titled Brothers, Alex Van Halen opens up about his experiences growing up and the role alcohol played in his and Eddie’s young lives. He explains how it was his father’s attitude toward alcohol that largely shaped his own, as well as his brother’s. Jan Van Halen introduced him to alcohol at the young age of just six years old. As he explains, alcohol “was definitely a problem in our family.”
Alex writes, “He didn’t give me a pacifier; to placate me he gave me a tobacco pipe. I was young when I first realized that alcohol had that effect on me – that it lifted my spirits like nothing else. For people whose bodies react to alcohol the way mine does, it’s like you’ve gone back to the womb. Everything is warm and fuzzy, no matter where you happen to be.”
Alcohol got the Van Halens into intense situations
Exposure to alcohol in his family certainly had its issues. In his book, Alex Van Halen outlines a couple of instances where alcohol was made available for him and his brother. In one instance, he smashed a bottle over his father’s head after his mother told him to. In another, 12-year-old Eddie was a dog and to help with the pain their father gave him a cigarette and a shot of vodka.
Alex hasn’t been a drinker his entire life. In fact, he’s given up alcohol and has been sober since the 1980s. In a 2021 interview, he revealed it was the death of his father in 1986 that served as the turning point for his sobriety. Alex still suffered from addiction to benzodiazepines, but his wife, Stine, helped him shake that habit in the 1990s.
It’s unsurprising that Eddie, too, suffered from alcohol dependency for years. In a 2015 interview, he explained he’d been sober since 2008, saying, “I was an alcoholic, and I needed alcohol to function. I started drinking and smoking when I was 12. I got drunk before I’d show up to high school… I’m not blaming my father at all, but he was an alcoholic, too. So in our household, it was normal.”
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Sadly, Eddie Van Halen died of cancer in 2020, at the age of 65.