| VAN HALEN!! |
| Only a couple of weeks after my Triumphant meeting of Metallica, Van Halen hit our shores in their first ever Australian tour. Now unfortunately it was not with singer Sammy Hagar (who I�d meet in the coming month) but with Ex Extreme singer Gary Cherone. Now I didn�t mind the album 3, but it wasn�t vintage Halen, but would I miss seeing Eddie Fuckin Van Halen on stage, HELL NO!!!! So, they were doing a signing at the Hard Rock caf� in Melbourne, we arrive at the Hard Rock and couldn�t get in cause we didn�t buy the album from HMV on a certain day where you had to buy it to get into the signing. So me and Anthony again! Just milled around, as we cross the road to get there, a Red Tarago pulls up at the lights as we�re crossing. In the van are Eddie VH, Valerie Bertinelli, Wolfgang VH and Alex VH. Holy shit! So we follow the van around the back. They get out, give us a wave and head in. So we mill around and wait for them to come out the side door. They came out and zoomed back to the hotel. No autographs were exchanged then, but many a wave was given Follow that van! So we do, back to the hotel, we knew where they were anyway, but the old fashioned police chase was fun, memories of not Meeting Kiss that�s another story. We get to the hotel and hang. Hang for a while, when who comes out? Gary Cherone, he is a legend, I got him to sign all my Extreme CD�s and a Guitar body, he was talkin to us for ages and was a cool dude. He asked us who went and saw Extreme when they toured in 1993, I said �Me!�he was all like �Did ya dig it?� I said �Man that was one of the best shows I have ever seen!� He loved that! He stayed out with us for ages! Michael Anthony was next, now this dude is short and by short I mean he comes up to my armpit. But how drunk was he! He signed my Guitar and we had a chat, I asked him if JACK was gonna come out at the gig and he said �Sorry man, I left Jack at home� We were all shattered and never spoke to him again, well not really. He spent ages out with us, was talkin to people on their mobile phones, havin a laugh, was just plain cool! We saw Eddie, through the window, but gave us a I�m going to bed look as I�m really tired. So we thought, he�s not coming out and we called it a night. The next day we got there Mutant early, as to hope not to miss anything, it was a glorious day, one that they write about in songs! There were about 10 or so fans there, so we all had a good yarn. Gary came out again and went shopping, he scared the hell out of us by saying �Has Nuno come out yet?� We all as one said �IS NUNO HERE?� �Eddie, I meant Eddie.� �No� we said, Gary says �I�ll tell him you�re here and see if he�ll come down.� Cool, we all said and we waited. It was about 1:30 when we were all waiting and talking, nothing exciting was happening. As I turn around to look back to towards the hotel, there is none other the Eddie Van Halen standing there with his arms crossed with a look on his face saying �Here I am, what can I do for you?� A collective �Holy Shit� is said and we go over. Now I can not say one bad thing about Eddie, he is one of the nicest guys I have ever met, ever! He spent 30mins with us out the front, signed heaps, took heaps of photos and just plain rocked. We thanked him so much for coming down and said �Yeah we wanted to before but someone didn�t want to� Someone as in Sammy. Yeah Eddie, not what Sammy said. He said he loved it and if we were looking forward to the gig! Oh hell yeah!!!! So all that was left was Alex, he had a sore neck the whole tour, so didn�t come out, but being the champions we are went back to the hotel on the day they were leaving and got him on the way out. Very quick! But got it! So we said Thanx to them, they thanked us for being a great crowd and they left. VAN HALEN! How cool is that, you don�t get to see my pics cause I look mutant wearing my glasses, but I�ll try and put my guitar pic up. ROCK ON, let�s see and what Sammy Hagar had to say�. |
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