BIRTH of a LEGEND
GUITAR-INTENSIVE MUSIC was a huge attraction during the summer of 1978, and I got lucky on my very first gig as the new guy at Guitar Player magazine. Our editor, Don Menn, sent me to Bill Graham’s Day on the Green concert in Oakland, California, to interview a guitarist named Pat Travers. I dutifully showed up, my little tape recorder and questions in hand, and knocked on Travers’ trailer door. Surrounded by scantily clad hangers-on, his face to a mirror, Travers looked up just long enough to slur, “Not today, man,” and he dismissed me with a petulant wave.
I did not want to come back to the office empty-handed. To steady my anger, I picked up a basketball and started shooting hoop at a small court Bill Graham had set up backstage for the performers and workers. A lean, wiry kid about my age came over and said, “Hey, man, can I shoot some hoop with you?” I said sure, and a spirited game of one-on-one ensued. With his speedy maneuvers and trick hook shot, he won the contest. Afterward, we sat on the lawn at the side of the court to cool off.
“What band are you in?” he asked.
“I’m not in a band. I’m an editor for Guitar Player magazine”
“What are you doing here?”
“I came here to interview Pat Travers, but he blew me off.”
“Pat Travers blew you off? I can’t fuckin’ believe it. Why don’t you interview me? Nobody ever wants to interview me.”
“HEY, MAN. IF YOU PUT ME ON THE COVER, I’LL TELL YOU ALL OF MY SECRETS”
“Who are you?” I asked.
“Edward Van Halen.”
Praise God almighty! Two weeks earlier an advance copy of the first Van Halen album had arrived at the magazine. After listening to it, Don Menn summoned me into his office. Tom Darter, editor of Keyboard, stood alongside him. Don lowered the phonograph needle onto a section of “Eruption” and asked, “What is that — a guitar or keyboard?” None of us were dead certain. Turns out it was Eddie doing finger taps, but at that moment the technique was so fresh, so revolutionary in the context of a rock song that even music journalists who played the instruments they wrote about were mystified.
And now, backstage at that Day on the Green, the man himself was asking me to interview him. I switched on the tape recorder, winged it with the questions and landed Eddie’s first-ever interview. The story ran in the November 1978 issue.
Eddie liked the write-up so much that he started calling me from the road, just to “shoot the shit,” as he liked to describe it. The. “Hey, man,” he said, “if you put me on the cover, I’ll tell you all of my secrets.” I happily accepted his offer, and that April 1980, the Eddie Van Halen cover quickly became the best-selling issue in ’s history.
