Wolfgang Van Halen opines Van Halen can’t continue without his father Eddie Van Halen

Wolfgang Van Halen opines Van Halen can’t continue without his father Eddie Van Halen

Van Halen bassist Wolfgang Van Halen was recently interviewed on SiriusXM‘s The Howard Stern Show in his first interview since the passing of his father / legendary guitarist Eddie Van Halen back in early October 2020.

In terms of the rumours of Van Halen continuing without his dad, Wolfgang indicated: “That’s fucking stupid… You can’t have Van Halen without Eddie Van Halen. I’m not my dad. I’m not going to replace him,” he said.  “I’ve spent my life making sure I’m not like him and I’m my own person,” he continued, explaining his father—were he alive—would instead encourage him to pursue his own ambitions. “He’d be like, ‘What the fuck are you doing? Go do your own shit!’” In my opinion, outside of maybe a tribute show at some point down the line and archival releases further down the line, it’s done,” he said. “I don’t have a dad anymore and I’m coming to terms with that,” he continued. “So, I think fans can come to the terms with the fact that we’re not going to have Van Halen anymore. The music is going to live on forever but you can’t continue without Eddie Van Halen.”

In terms of the previous rumours of a massive Van Halen reunion tour, Wolfgang stated: “[They] were very real. Since 2015, I’d been talking with Dad and was introducing the idea … I would be like ‘Hey dad, you know what would be cool? Hear me out … what if I opened for you guys and we had Mike [Anthony] come back?” he said. “As time went on, he warmed up to the idea. I got him excited about it,” he continued. “At a certain point, it turned into what we joked was the ‘Kitchen Sink Tour’ because after he was okay with that arrangement it was like, fuck, then let’s get Dave [Lee Roth] and [Sammy] Hagar and even [Gary] Cherone and let’s just do a giant, fucking awesome thing.”

Excerpt from SiriusXM‘s The Howard Stern Show with Wolfgang Van Halen: