Today it was announced Eddie Van Halen the co-founder of rock legends Van Halen has died aged 65.
The rock star died surrounded by his family at St. Johns Hospital in Santa Monica, US, after a long battle with throat cancer, which had spread to his brain.
Van Halen formed in 1978 and has become one of the most revered heavy metal bands the world has ever seen.
The band started out as a backyard party band in Los Angeles with the two Van Halen brothers Eddie and Alex.
And the line-up was complete they hired bass player, Michael Anthony and untrained vocalist David Lee Roth.
Van Halen in 1985 (Image: WireImage)
After clinching a record deal, they hit the road and embarked on tours which were brimming with sex, drugs and hotel room destruction, according to a book by their personal manager Noel Monk.
The book published in 2017 tells how the lad’s motto was “drink a bottle of booze, pop a couple ludes, smoke a joint or two (or ten) and see where the night takes you”.
Monk wrote in Runnin’ with the Devil: “They perfectly embodied the West Coast surfer, stoner and partying culture – bongs, babes and parties.”
Eddie Van Halen tragically passed away from cancer aged 65 (Image: WireImage)
But the band collapsed in 1985 after it is said they became embroiled in fighting, out-of-control alcoholic consumption and drug binges.
Monk said: “Too much talent and too much ego, too many disparate personalities, too much drugs and alcohol. They had to be great right from the beginning, because there was no way it could last.”
Before the party ended, Valerie Bertinelli, star of the hit TV show One Day at a Time, met Eddie Van Halen after seeing his photo on an album cover, the book claims.
Van Halen rose to prominence in the 1970s (Image: Michael Ochs Archives)
Bertinelli, aged 20, at the time described herself as strait-laced but admitted that she enjoyed a wilder side of life after meeting Eddie, it’s claimed.
Monk said: “Valerie would later admit that she, like her more infamous costar, Mackenzie Phillips, had used drugs and experimented with a wilder lifestyle than her viewing public might have realized or appreciated,” wrote the author.
“But her pursuit of, and eventual marriage to Edward Van Halen, was a head slapper to millions of Americans – and why in the name of God is he willing to give up hot-and-cold-running groupies for her?”
David Lee Roth (L) and Eddie Van Halen of Van Halen perform at Tiger Jam XI in Las Vegas April 19, 2008 (Image: REUTERS)
The groupies who joined the high-octane tours looked like they were Playboy or Penthouse and were willing to do anything to meet and hang with the band, according to Monk.
He told how the groupies were dead-set on felating every member of the crew.
Bertinelli is said to have heard the superstar musician’s reputation for wildness.
Van Halen pose for a photo session by the pool at Eddie’s housestudio on Coldwater Canyon in1985 (Image: Getty Images)
Monk said: “David was the one who was always saying , “I’m going to find myself a f***in’ movie star’, someone who could add to his own fame and further attract the paparazzi.
“David loved all of the attention and fame while Edward was content to write and play music and get ‘f***ed up’ in his free time.”
Monk said prescription drugs were required to keep the band going such as Odeine to Percodan, along with street drugs and booze.
After clinching a record deal, they hit the road and embarked on tours which were brimming with sex, drugs and hotel room destruction, it is claimed by their manager (Image: Reuters)
Valerie and Van Halen had their wedding planned for April 11, 1981.
But the prior November, a woman in San Diego filed a paternity suit against Eddie, who is said to have had sex with Eddie often in the front seat of his car.
Edward told Valerie about the suit and finally conceded to take the test that did exonerate him.
David Lee Roth then bizarrely decided he needed some protection from groupies wanting to trick him into fathering a child or a lawsuit.
He then came up with the idea of paternity insurance, telling Monk: “I need to protect my penis”.
Van Halen announcing their North American tour in 2007 (Image: AFF/PA Images)
Monk got the idea to leak news that David had purchased a $1 million paternity insurance policy as a joke but the press believed it.
When they got back on the road, Eddie reportedly kept lines of cocaine on a nearby amplifier near the beer and whiskey and Alex got intoxicated throughout the performance, according to the book.
He also had cash from a personal drug dealer willing to meet him anywhere in the world to supply him Peruvian cocaine.
Van Halen made their last and biggest album, 1984 and later reformed several times but were not able to recapture the old glory,
Monk said: “Van Halen should have been the biggest band in the world. But it wasn’t. It was a band on hiatus…a band with no direction’.”
Source: Celebrities - dailystar.co.uk
