I wasn't writing the music. Ed would write a piece of music. I'd listen to it and come up with a melody and then we would arrange it. We'd put it together and I would write lyrics to my melodies.

When we were on the road, I found out that my greatest hits album went Gold. They freaked out. Things really came to a head when we started arguing about a Van Halen greatest hits package.

Sometimes you're afraid to fall in love with a chick, but she sucks you in anyway.

I had a solo career before Van Halen. My fan base filtered through Van Halen with me and came right on out the other side with me.

I'm still raising kids myself, so I don't feel like a grandpa.

I had written lyrics to a song called The Silent Extreme, which Alex later renamed Humans Being.

I would like to enlighten people.

I've never done a box set, and Eddie's full of it if he says otherwise.

The reason I didn't fly over from Maui at their beck and call is my wife was about to have a baby at any time. Those guys knew that. These guys would not compromise and meet me halfway.

We needed time off from each other after our last tour because there was a lot of personal stuff we had to take care of. Eddie needed hip replacement surgery. Al needed his back worked on. And I was going to have a baby.

Every year on your birthday, you get a chance to start new.

In Van Halen there were moments, like in some of the ballads, I put my heart and soul into those records. Those lyrics when I sang 'em, I gave myself goosebumps.

Everything that Eddie has said about me is the total opposite of what really happened. Eddie says I wanted to be a solo artist. No, Eddie wanted to be a solo artist.

I don't want to talk about negative, dark things. The only thing I've got against stuff like Marilyn Manson is, they make unbelievable videos and unbelievable images.

I've been drinking tequila for a long time now, and it's never been about drinking to get drunk. I don't do that. I never drink tequila during the day, and I don't drive at night.

I didn't think I'd be around 30 years later.

If I would go up on a high note, Eddie would want a low one. That's how petty the situation had become.

When I left Van Halen, I went in the studio and made a CD called Marching to Mars with all studio musicians. I did it immediately. With the disappointment riding on my shoulders of the breakup of the band.

I'm John Lee Hooker in the sense that he was a blues man and he played blues his whole life. I'm a rock guy and I'm going to play rock music my whole life.

I think all the bad blood started when Geffen released a greatest hits package of my solo stuff.

I looked at Mick Jagger and Keith Richards and the boys up there thinking, I want to be that.

All he cares about is going out there with his Jack Daniels bottle. Nothing has changed. That's kind of sad. If David was doing better than he used to be, then that would be different. But it was a joke and he made it that way.

If you don't ever stop singing, your voice stays in shape. It's like the marathon runner. You've got to run, run, run to stay in shape.

It's a good thing I don't read everything Eddie says, or I'd be up in arms and not enjoying my life.

Dave was great in Van Halen. No question about it. He was one of the best at being Mr. Rock Star. But it's sickening to see a guy still trying to be that with a wig on 20 years later.

When they brought Roth back into the picture, obviously I didn't go along with that too well.

I see couples fighting about the stupidest things. You just have to rise above everything.

It's hard to say this about a guy like Eddie Van Halen, one of the greatest guitar players who ever lived, but he's really limited to a style and they're locked into it.

Overall, we had about 50 meetings where the brothers would say that I couldn't do any solo records, I couldn't write for other people, I couldn't do this and I couldn't do that. These guys were trying to nail my feet to the ground.

To stay a great singer or guitar player, you've got to do it 24/7. That's what I do.

I've never met or spoken to David Lee Roth, yet it's rather ironic that even he's saying Eddie's lying about things. I'm saying he's not telling the truth, yet Eddie insists that the two of us are lying! You be the judge.

I wasn't writing the music. Ed would write a piece of music. I'd listen to it and come up with a melody and then we would arrange it. We'd put it together and I would write lyrics to my melodies.

The reason my voice is sounding more passionate is because I'm singing directly from the heart.

If I would have ever dreamed that I wouldn't be in Van Halen anymore and was going to have resume my solo career again, I would have never contributed anything towards my own greatest hits package.

Every year on your birthday you get a chance to start new.

When you use music to worship you are not attempting to entertain.

Pop music, disco music, and heavy metal music is about shutting out the tensions of life, putting it away.

When I did the record, I was coming off a time when my contract had been sold and the music industry had changed a lot. I didn't understand how to make records for big labels. I was waiting for a new kind of record label to emerge.

You've got to realize. In the western world, regardless of what color you are, what title the music is, it's all played by the same notes.

Don't make music for some vast, unseen audience or market or ratings share or even for something as tangible as money. Though it's crucial to make a living, that shouldn't be your inspiration. Do it for yourself.

Whether I'm doing music or I'm walking down the street or I'm in a record store buying a record or I walk into a comic store and I'm buying comics or having a drink with my friends, it's the same me.

When rock came along the lyrics and melodies became less important and it bothered me to think that perhaps they might not regain the value they have to music - they are music.

I want to promote poetry to the point where you got all the baldhead kids running around doing poetry, getting the music out of the way and having only words, the spoken word, and then see what happens.

There is no music that can't be used politically, but the motives behind the creation of that music can be non-political.

The kind of music or the kind of arrangements that I do, the kind of musicians I choose, is just what I like to hear.

If not for music, I would probably be a very frustrated scientist. It's one way to answer the question, 'What is the meaning of life?' I feel music answers it better.

Since I'm allergic to various things, the army wouldn't accept me during the war, and I got into the Office of War Information, which sent music to Europe.

My singing is my hobby. It's me and my brother. We just enjoy writing music.

I was determined to carve out a music of my own. I didn't want to copy anybody.