Eddie Van Halen has been gone a year and a day. Here is what I wrote when the news came down…
In 1979 I was in 8th grade. It's almost impossible to imagine now what Van Halen did to 8th grade boys back then. We were all musical virgins, and then we weren't. And they didn't ask permission either. Our ears were held back against our will, and were ravaged. I remember hearing "Dance the Night Away" from Van Halen II on an 8-track machine in a car and thinking "thank you sir may I have another..." And then "Somebody Get Me a Doctor" came on and the guy driving the car suddenly gunned it to what had to be 100 mph, and I thought "well this is appropriate...."