I didn’t expect him to come out looking like David Lee Roth in sequins and a boa, but I also didn’t expect someone who looked like Gollum from Lord of the Rings dressed like a 1930s hobo. He took a swig of the bottle, leaned forward and said, “Andrew, we’re going to get along just fine.”ĭid seeing this wealthy rock star behaving like a punk rocker surprise you? The look on his face - I don’t think he had met anyone in 30 years who didn’t know who he was or couldn’t name at least five Van Halen songs. He goes, “You know nothing about my band?” I told him that I knew the song “Jump” because it came out when I was 7, and “Right Now” because it was in a Pepsi commercial in the ‘90s. I don’t really know anything about your band.” His smile might cure coronavirus.Īll he said was, “So you’re Andrew Bennett.” I didn’t know what to say, so I said, “So you’re Eddie Van Halen.” He said, “The last time I checked.” He grabbed a bottle of wine and I asked him, “Where do I grab a glass?” He took a pull out of the bottle and said, “Glass? It comes in a glass.” So, we’re just sitting there across from each other handing the wine back-and-forth and one of the first things he asked was, “Are you a fan of my band?” I said, “Well, I don’t really have an opinion. Eddie Van Halen has a smile that can bring us world peace. In the wake of the publication of Eruption in the Canyon, Bennett talked to Billboard about Van Halen’s perfectionism and what he came to call his many “DEFCON” experiences living with the mercurial guitarist, among them, a scuffle with his brother and the band’s drummer Alex Van Halen that trashed the latter’s Porsche Eddie’s fraught relationships with Sammy Hagar, Michael Anthony and Roth and that much-publicized dust-up with Limp Bizkit frontman Fred Durst.ĭid you and Eddie have an instant chemistry when you met? I took the money, but he owed me way more.” He probably thought I was desperate and he could get me when I’m most vulnerable. Then he finds out I’m about to get out of rehab and that’s when the offer comes. “Technically, there is no settlement contract,” claims Bennett. The depression from it is what kills me the most.”Īlthough Bennett says that he was paid $7,500 per the settlement agreement, he also says that neither he nor Van Halen signed the document. He saw how hard I worked and then he f–ked me over. “I’m more confused, disappointed and hurt than angry,” says Bennett. The injunction halted the release and sale of the footage. claiming that he owned the rights to the documentary, per a 2015 agreement. When Andrew released some of the footage online in 2018, Van Halen successfully filed for an injunction to halt the release and sale of the footage. Bennett says he never received the full payment of $248,500 that Eddie promised him for his work. The experience resulted not in a documentary but a photo book, Eruption in the Canyon: 212 Days & Nights With the Genius of Eddie Van Halen, the book, self-published by Bennett, chronicles the two weeks he spent filming the guitar virtuoso in 2004, and then living with him from 2006 to 2007.ĭuring that time, the visual artist says he witnessed the best and the worst of Van Halen’s moods - the guitarist’s unflagging dedication to his art, the sometimes volatile rehearsals for his band’s 2007 reunion tour and, Bennett says, a terrifying half hour during which Eddie held a gun to the filmmaker’s head because of a meeting Bennett had taken with then-Van Halen frontman David Lee Roth.ĭespite the unprecedented access that Van Halen gave Bennett, their collaboration ended in litigation. It has since been reported, however, that he is battling throat cancer - although a spokesman for Van Halen declined to comment and Eddie could not be reached.Īfter swigging from a bottle of wine with Van Halen, Bennett accepted the job, beginning a wild rock ‘n’ roll ride ― replete with firearms, countless bottles of six-dollar Smoking Loon Cabernet Sauvignon, and a legal skirmish. After having a cancerous section of his tongue removed in 2000, Van Halen had been declared free of the disease in 2002. The guitar god didn’t say as much, but mortality may have been on his mind. “Then he started playing guitar and I was almost convinced he’s an alien.”Īs the night progressed, Bennett learned that Van Halen wanted his life story documented, and Ballard had recommended him as the man for the job. “When I saw him, I thought, something is going on with this dude,” says Bennett. Shirtless, he wore ripped jeans held up by a makeshift belt of rope and duct-taped combat boots. Billboard Cover: Eddie Van Halen on Surviving Addiction, Why He's Still Making Music and What He…Įddie Van Halen appeared a few minutes later, his face gaunt, his long hair done up in a Samurai-style topknot.
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