Alex Van Halen has shared a snippet of Unfinished, the final track he recorded with his brother and bandmate Eddie Van Halen before the guitarist died in October 2020.
Unfinished will be part of the audio book version of Alex’s upcoming memoir, Brothers. But the drummer has taken to Instagram to give us a sneak preview.
It’s not what you might expect – this isn’t some ‘lost’ Van Halen classic. There are no vocals – it’s just a simple drum beat, plus interwoven layers of electric and acoustic guitar. But set against pics of the two brothers and their parents on Alex’s post, it is nothing if not poignant.
The drummer has chosen to remain out of the spotlight since Eddie’s passing – he hasn’t performed in public nor given any interviews. He did though release a statement about Brothers, saying: “This is my tribute to my brother; my way of saying goodbye. Ed, I love you and miss you. When I see you again, I’m gonna kick your ass!”
Brothers will be published by Harper Collins on October 22. The publisher has said about it: “In this intimate and open account - nothing like any rock n’ roll memoir you’ve ever read - Alex Van Halen shares his personal story of family, friendship, music and brotherly love in a remarkable tribute to his beloved brother and band mate.
“Told with acclaimed New Yorker writer Ariel Levy, Brothers is seventy-year-old drummer Alex Van Halen’s love letter to his younger brother, Edward, (Maybe ‘Ed’, but never ‘Eddie’), written while still mourning his untimely death.”
“I was with him from day one,” Alex writes. “We shared the experience of coming to this country and figuring out how to fit in. We shared a record player, an 800 square foot house, a mom and dad, and a work ethic. Later, we shared the back of a tour bus, alcoholism, the experience of becoming famous, of becoming fathers and uncles, and of spending more hours in the studio than I’ve spent doing anything else in this life.
"We shared a depth of understanding that most people can only hope to achieve in a lifetime.”
