£ 19.95
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£ 24.99
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Brothers
Alex and Eddie Van Halen - Book - by Alex Van Halen
(2024)
In this intimate and open account – nothing like any rock-and-roll
memoir you’ve ever read – Alex Van Halen shares his personal story of
family, friendship, music and brotherly love in a remarkable tribute to
his beloved brother and band mate. Told with
acclaimed New Yorker writer Ariel Levy Brothers is seventy-year-old
drummer Alex Van Halen’s love letter to his younger brother, Edward,
(maybe “Ed,” but never “Eddie”), written while still mourning his
untimely death. In his rough yet sweet voice, Alex recounts
the brothers’ childhood, first in the Netherlands and then in working
class Pasadena, California, with an itinerant musician father and a very
proper Indonesian-born mother – the kind of mum who admonished her boys
to “always wear a suit” no matter how famous they became – a woman who
was both proud and practical, nonchalant about taking a doggie bag from a
star-studded dinner.
He also shares tales of musical politics,
infighting, and plenty of bad-boy behaviour. But mostly his is a story
of brotherhood, music, and enduring love. "I was with him
from day one,” Alex writes.
“We shared the experience of coming
to America and figuring out how to fit in. We shared a record player, an
800 square foot house, a mom and dad, and a work ethic. Later, we
shared the back of a tour bus, alcoholism, the experience of becoming
famous, of becoming fathers and uncles, and of spending more hours in
the studio than I’ve spent doing anything else in this life.
We
shared a depth of understanding that most people can only hope to
achieve in a lifetime." There has never been an accurate
account of them or the band, and Alex wants to set the record straight
on Edward’s life and death. Brothers includes
never-before-seen photos from the author’s private archives.
