 |
 |
|
| ::. Eddie's Links |
|
|
"18 With...Eddie Van Halen" (Page 4)
By: Ron Del Barrio with Andy Meisler
Maximum Golf (August 2001)
|
seen you hit some golf shots. I'll give you 10 years of backing if you need it. Right now money for me is just a tool to help the people I love. I f---ing love you. So let's go!"
Eddie looks me in the eye, and I look back at him. We start crying right there and sob away like two big babies. A few weeks later I sign a contract with Eddie's management company. I stop working with most of my teaching clients and spend most of my time working on my own game. I sign up for the satellite tournaments ont the Pepsi and Buy.com tours. In my first five starts, I get five top-five finishes.
I have Eddie to thank for all of it.
"Hey Jules! It's Eddie! How're you doin'?" It's 1 P.M. The badass rock god is on the kitchen phone with the mother of one of his son's classmates. Eddie apologizes profusely that he has to do this "golf thing," trades off his hot-lunch day, and begs a huge favor--that she pick up Wolfie at his after-school tennis lesson and drop him at his afternoon baseball game.
Favor secured, Eddie goes deeper into the house and makes a half-hour's worth of private calls. He returns and apologizes for holding up the photo shoot. "You can't believe what my life is like these days," he groans.
Back up to the studio. Eddie happily does his thing in front of the Hasselblad. Between setups, the Ghost corners Eddie and mentions some of the articles that have been appearing about his battle with cancer. "I really don't understand it," says Eddie, peeved. "I mean, everybody I know has been getting calls asking what's going on with me. Guys pull up beside me at red lights--as if I'm gonna give them an interview at a stoplight."
"I don't know why people want to know what only my wife and son and maybe my best friends have a right to know. I say to everyone else, 'Look, all I have to say is that I'm doing great.' But I'm not about to go into the details until the cancer is completely gone."
"But that's not enough to satisfy the jackals. They say, 'Everyone wants to know everything right now because you're a famous rock star.' That's crap! I'm not a rock star! I'm just a musician, a kid from Holland who knows what it looks like from both sides of the fence."
"I used to get wasted because I didn't know how to act," Eddie continues. "I was, and still am, very uncomfortable being a so-called 'rock star.' I would get so hammered that I would make a complete fool out of myself. I was like, 'Okay, I'm a rock star. Now, what is that?' I sure as hell didn't know--regardless of whether I was drunk or straight. So I figured I might as well go straight, because drunk, I was a complete idiot; straight, at least I have the chance of just being half an idiot. Funny thing is, after all these years, I still don't have a clue what a 'rock star' is."
Note to the editor, editors, Editor, or Editors: I know the title of this article is "18 With...Eddie Van Halen." But by the time we finish the photo shoot, it's 3:30 P.M., and there's no way we'll finish a round here before Eddie is supposed to pick up Wolfie post-baseball. We load up our golf bags anyway--Eddie plays a set of custom-made clubs called Red Planet, by Ohio-based Mars Golf--and motor at the usual speed (illegal) over to Lakeside. We hit from the first hole sans warmup and discover what kind of golf certain famous musician plays when (1) his best friend and golf teacher is too busy recently to give him any golf lessons; (2) some guy with a notebook and another with a
::. Page 1 • Page 2 • Page 3 • Page 4 • Page 5
Top of Page
Interview © 2001 Maximum Golf Magazine
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
