Guitar Legend’s Secret: The Name He Never Wanted You to Use
Eddie Van Halen, one of rock’s greatest guitarists, had a surprising dislike – his own nickname. According to his brother Alex, the musician strongly preferred to be called Edward rather than the name fans knew him by worldwide.
“He hated it”, Alex Van Halen told Chris Jericho during their conversation. “He’s lucky they didn’t call him something else.”
During the interview, which wrestling star turned rock frontman Jericho conducted for his Talk Is Jericho podcast, Alex also shared that even using Van Halen as their band name wasn’t an easy choice at first. “It sounded awkward in terms of being egomaniacal. That just wasn’t who Ed and I were,” he explained.
Sounds like a shirt company
Interestingly, it was singer David Lee Roth who suggested keeping Van Halen as the band name, even when KISS leader Gene Simmons thought it ‘sounds like a shirt company’ and wanted them to choose something else, like Virus.
Alex also explained the meaning behind their family name: “The actual name means that you came from a town called Halen. If you go through genealogical searches, the Van is just a preface. It’s the equivalent of Mac in Scottish names. It’s son of or from so and so. So we are from Halen.”
