“He obviously felt threatened, which is crazy to me. You’re f**king Eddie Van Halen!”: Yngwie Malmsteen claims EVH refused to share a stage with him and pretended he’d never heard of him
Shred legend Yngwie Malmsteen claims Eddie Van Halen was intimidated by his guitar skills when they both shared the limelight in the ‘80s.
In a new interview with Classic Rock, in which he recounts meeting some of rock and metal’s biggest names, Malmsteen says EVH refused to share a stage with him, and at one point even pretended he’d never heard of him.
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“I never said a bad word about him. I never will. Because I think he was amazing,” Malmsteen says. “But I used to know a guy that worked in the grocery store where Eddie would shop, and the guy would ask him: ‘Hey, what do you think about Yngwie Malmsteen, the new Swedish kid?’ And Eddie would say: ‘I don’t know who that is.’
“Meanwhile, Dave Roth told me that Eddie would have his ghetto blaster, playing my shit on it all day long.”
Malmsteen even claims that Van Halen made a special effort to ignore him when they both attended the Grammys in 1986. Malmsteen was nominated for Best Rock Instrumental Performance for his album Rising Force.
“I go to the show – I had my tux on and everything – and I see Eddie there,” he remembers. “I’m waving at him, trying to get his attention, and he sees me… and he runs away. He literally ran away!”
Malmsteen was made even more sure of Van Halen’s alleged issue with him when both were scheduled to play a show in Holland, and Van Halen pulled out.
“I was doing a concert festival in Holland, and Van Halen were headlining,” he recalls. “I’m like, ‘Great, I finally get to meet Eddie and give him my concerto.’ Because I’m proud of my concerto, you know?’
“But I find out they cancelled the show. They said Alex Van Halen had broken his little finger or something. And then I hear that the promoter got a phone call from Eddie himself, who said: ‘Just to let you know, if Yngwie Malmsteen is playing, I’m not playing. And I will never fucking play the same stage as Yngwie Malmsteen.’
“I’m like, ‘What?’ He obviously felt threatened. Which is crazy to me. You’re fucking Eddie Van Halen. No one could threaten you!”
Elsewhere, Dave Dalone, guitarist of the Swedish band H.E.A.T, recently spoke of Eddie Van Halen’s influence on the guitar gear market. Noting Kramer in particular, he explained: “I guess he was the one who helped turn them into such a global brand. At one point they were the biggest guitar company in the world. Can you imagine Kramer being more successful than Fender and Gibson? It sounds crazy, but Eddie made that happen.”
The post “He obviously felt threatened, which is crazy to me. You’re f**king Eddie Van Halen!”: Yngwie Malmsteen claims EVH refused to share a stage with him and pretended he’d never heard of him appeared first on Guitar.com | All Things Guitar.
Source: www.guitar-bass.net
