hennemusic

Van Halen made major headlines recently when the band abruptly postponed a full series of summer US dates of its “A Different Kind Of Truth” tour without explanation.

A few days later, singer David Lee Roth explained the situation – via video - saying “As usual, we bit off way more than we can chew when it came to scheduling. The band is winning, but our schedule has been sidelined for unnecessary roughness. If we continue past July 4th and all the way into Australia and Japan, then we’re asking for the robot zombie tour.”

“We’re gonna take a break because this tour is gonna take us about two years,” added Roth.

The singer’s message is now being echoed by Eddie Van Halen, who spoke with USA Today last week about the tour during an interview session with son and bassist, Wolfgang, in San Francisco last week.

"We bit off more than we could chew," explained Eddie. "This record took a lot out of us. And we went on tour earlier than we wanted to so we could play Madison Square Garden (in March, before a renovation), and that threw the schedule out of whack."

The band will have completed more than 40 shows on this leg, and "a lot of the canceled dates were in cities we already played," he says. "So in November we'll hit Japan, and in the new year we'll possibly do something special, but I can't talk about it."

But he will talk about Roth. Contrary to what has been reported (by Rolling Stone), he says there's no tour-nuking feud. "Dave's the same as he's always been, funny, witty," Ed says. Then he laughs. "Sometimes I can only take that in small doses, because he just goes on and on."

Wolfgang jumps in: "He's like the Energizer Bunny— wind it up and see what happens."

"But Dave always lands on his feet," Ed says.

Van Halen wrap up the tour’s first leg in New Orleans on June 26.

Read the full VH session at USA Today here.

Van