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A review by donaldcapone
Brothers by Alex Van Halen
5.0
Alex Van Halen's memoir, Brothers, is a love letter to his little brother Edward. It starts at the beginning—their Dutch father and Indonesian mother getting married, starting a family, and then emigrating to Pasadena, CA. The young boys are raised on music (their father Jan was a musician), and early on Edward is clearly a prodigy. By their teens they are putting together their first band. Of course, when singer David Lee Roth is added to the mix, everything changes. Everything explodes.
Alex covers a lot of ground familiar to VH fans, but he does it with an insider's knowledge and a good sense of humor—and many years of retrospect. His love of Edward is always evident, of course, but surprisingly an almost brotherly love of Roth comes across too.
My only complaint is that at 226 pages the book is just too short. I wanted more stories, more elaboration, more everything. But I guess always leave 'em wanting more, right? The book concludes with the end of the (first) Roth era. I hope there is a Volume II that covers the Hagar era and the reunion with Roth. But there may not be one because this memoir is not about Van Halen the band, but Van Halen the brothers, hence the title.
Alex covers a lot of ground familiar to VH fans, but he does it with an insider's knowledge and a good sense of humor—and many years of retrospect. His love of Edward is always evident, of course, but surprisingly an almost brotherly love of Roth comes across too.
My only complaint is that at 226 pages the book is just too short. I wanted more stories, more elaboration, more everything. But I guess always leave 'em wanting more, right? The book concludes with the end of the (first) Roth era. I hope there is a Volume II that covers the Hagar era and the reunion with Roth. But there may not be one because this memoir is not about Van Halen the band, but Van Halen the brothers, hence the title.