Eddie Van Halen life and biography

Eddie Van Halen is a Dutch-American guitarist, keyboardist, songwriter and producer, best known as the lead guitarist and co-founder of the hard rock band Van Halen, inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.

Born Edward Lodewijk Van Halen on January 26, 1955 in Nijmegen, The Netherlands. While growing up in Pasadena, California, Eddie and his brother, Alex, took classical piano lessons. As teenagers, Eddie switched to guitar and Alex to drums, and they started a band called Mammoth. In 1974, they hooked up with vocalist David Lee Roth and bassist Michael Anthony to form Van Halen. Within a few years, the band had become hugely popular in the Los Angeles rock scene.

The band got a break in 1977 when Kiss bassist Gene Simmons discovered them at a local club and financed their first recording session. Soon after, Van Halen signed with Warner Bros. In 1978, Van Halen put out its self-titled debut album, which featured the hit single Runnin' With the Devil. The combination of Eddie Van Halen's electric guitar riffs and Roth's tongue-in-cheek antics launched the album to platinum status within six months of its release.

During the next few years, Van Halen became one of the hardest working and most profitable bands in the recording industry, releasing a string of multi-platinum albums in quick succession; 1979's Van Halen II, 1980's Women and Children First, 1981's Fair Warning and 1982's Diver Down. But true superstar status did not come until the release of 1984, which showcased the now classic mega-hits Jump, Panama and Hot For Teacher.

During this time, tension began to grow between Roth and the other band members. And in 1985, after recording his own successful solo album, Roth left the band to be replaced by former Montrose frontman Sammy Hagar. Showing a remarkable resiliency, Van Halen continued to put out several successful albums with Hagar as frontman, including 1986's 5150 and 1991's For Unlawful Carnal Knowledge. In 1993, the band released its first double-live album, Van Halen Live: Right Here, Right Now.

By the mid-1990s, tension resurfaced, this time between the clean-and-sober Eddie and the unrepentant wild man Hagar. Hagar put out his last Van Halen record, Balance, in 1995. Shortly after Hagar's departure, Roth returned for a much-publicized Van Halen reunion. But after recording two songs for a greatest hits album and making an appearance with the band at the MTV Music Awards, Roth left again. This time, he was replaced by Gary Cherone, formerly of the heavy metal band Extreme. Cherone's debut with the band, Van Halen III, was released in 1998, but after slow sales he made his departure.

Solo work

* Eddie van Halen was invited by Quincy Jones to play guitar on the song Beat It, from Michael Jackson's 1982 album, Thriller. Steve Lukather of Toto played the main guitar riff and rhythm, while Eddie played an improvised guitar solo.
* In 1983, Eddie collaborated with Queen guitarist Brian May on the Star Fleet Project, a three-track EP consisting of a rock styled rendition of the theme to the popular anime children's show, a May penned track (Let Me Out), and an improvised blues track (Blues Breaker).
* In 1984, Eddie recorded several instrumentals for a movie called The Wild Life. Some of those recordings used ideas that showed up later in Van Halen songs such as "A.F.U. (Naturally Wired)" and "Right Now." However, only "Donut City" was included on the soundtrack album, which was released on vinyl and cassette, and never made it to CD format.
* Also in 1984, he provided the score for the 1984 television film, The Seduction of Gina.
* He played bass on Sammy Hagar's 1987 solo album I Never Said Goodbye.
* Also in February 1987, he appeared on Saturday Night Live as a guest musician with G. E. Smith and the Saturday Night Live Band when Valerie Bertinelli hosted the show. About twenty seconds into the performance, G. E. Smith could be seen telling Eddie, "Go faster!" Eddie van Halen also appeared in one sketch with Valerie Bertinelli on that evening's show, which actually featured the Robert Cray Band as its scheduled musical guest.
* In 1989 he played bass on the opening track, (Twist the Knife) from Steve Lukather's debut album, as well as giving the guitar part which was taken from an outtake from the 5150 album titled "I Want Some Action". The main riff was also later used by Eddie Van Halen in the 3 album for "Dirty Water Dog".
* In 1993, he co-wrote and played a song with Black Sabbath members, Tony Martin, Tony Iommi and Geezer Butler called "Evil Eye" on Cross Purposes album, but he wasn't credited.
* He has also done soundtrack work for movies such as Over The Top (Winner Takes It All, a collaboration with Sammy Hagar), Twister (the instrumental Respect The Wind), The Wild Life (one song was reused in the movie Back to the Future, and Lethal Weapon 4 (The track Fire In The Hole from Van Halen III)
In the 1998 he performed guitar solos for the Roger Waters song "Lost Boys Calling" from the film "The Legend of 1900."
* He has recorded with Dweezil Zappa, Jeff Porcaro, and Thomas Dolby.
* In July 2006, Eddie Van Halen recorded two new instrumental tracks (Rise and Catherine) which debuted in an unusual format: in a pornographic feature entitled "Sacred Sin" directed by a friend of the guitarist, well known adult director Michael Ninn. These tracks have since surfaced on the internet. Eddie also composed some minor uncredited piano interludes in the feature.
* In 2009 Eddie guest-starred as himself in an episode of Two and a Half Men where he played his guitar in a mens room.
* In 2010 Eddie Van Halen appeared on Lopez Tonight and gave George Lopez one of his Wolfgang Guitars.

Eddie Van Halen married actress Valerie Bertinelli in 1981, and their son, Wolfgang, was born in 1990. The couple announced their separation in July 2002. In 2009, Van Halen married girlfriend of three years, Janie Liszewski.

Van Halen Live: Right Here, Right Now :

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