Former Van Halen bassist Michael Anthony recently sat down with Detroit’s WRIF radio host Meltdown for a candid conversation. During the chat, he was asked to reflect on the internal dynamics of the group during the highly successful Sammy Hagar era, specifically addressing the question if it often felt like a strict divide between the Van Halen brothers and the rest of the band.
Anthony confirmed that the sibling connection was indeed an impenetrable force, explaining (as transcribed by Blabbermouth):
“Even from the beginning of Van Halen, it was always the brothers [standing firmly as one]. ‘Cause Eddie and Al had this bond that [was] unlike any bond I had ever seen brothers have — musically and also as human beings. And so people naturally say it’s the brothers and everybody else. But they always supported one another in anything that they did. And so, you know what?! Thinking about it, I guess it was the brothers and everybody else.”
He went on to describe how daily lifestyle choices ultimately drew the clearest lines between the band members on the road:
“The biggest thing with when the band one was together with Sammy is Eddie and Alex both smoked a lot, and Sammy and I didn’t smoke. So everything was — it was smoking or non-smoking. It came down to what buses you rode on or the dressing rooms. There was always the smoking and the non-smoking.”
Because they spent so much time together away from the smoke-filled areas, Michael and Sammy developed a deep, lasting friendship built on shared interests outside of heavy metal:
“When I first met him, it was on a band level, and then as we hung out more and more, his affection towards cars really grasped me. I only owned, like, two cars before Sammy joined the band, and much to my wife’s dismay, I ended up owning about 10 cars. And, of course, Sammy, he’s a beach guy, and I’m a beach guy. We both live at the beach out here in Southern California. And so we’ve got a lot of stuff like that out in common. And it’s great. But stemming from the love of music, Sammy and I, we just get together as much as we can now when we’re around. He’s got a place in Hawaii, so he spends a lot of time over there now.”
This new interview aligns perfectly with the bittersweet sentiments Michael shared last June during an appearance on the “Get On The Bus” podcast. Reflecting on the legacy of the legendary group, he admitted his greatest disappointment was the band’s anticlimactic conclusion:
“The only regret” that he had was “how things, unfortunately, turned out for Van Halen… It’s a culmination of everything that happened or whatever, because when Van Halen was really firing on all 12 cylinders, we’re living the dream, it’s the fairy tale or whatever, and the first time it ended when [original Van Halen singer David Lee Roth] left the band, luckily Sammy joined the band and it was like a rebirth,” he said. “And, obviously, the band was even bigger at that point or whatever. But the only regret I have is the way it all ended. It should have gone out with a fricking bang that shook the world, and it was more like a whimper, the way everything ended.”
He also revealed the heartbreaking reality that a massive, all-inclusive reunion was actually in the works before the iconic guitarist passed away, meaning fences were very close to being mended:
“Unfortunately Eddie and I never [made amends] — we had some issues, and I’m sure that if he had not passed when he did that we would’ve reconciled or we would’ve really calmed all that stuff down, because I did hear, and I’ve talked to Wolfgang [Van Halen, Eddie‘s son and Anthony‘s replacement in Van Halen] about it, that they were planning on coming to all of us and putting together a big reunion tour with all of us,” Anthony added. “And at that point in Ed‘s life, I think he was a little bit more, like, ‘Hey, the past is the past. Let’s all… Fricking water under the bridge,’ that whole bit. But, unfortunately, it was not to be.”
