Wolfgang Van Halen Didn’t Originally Wanted To Be A Musician

Wolfgang Van Halen was recently interviewed by Loudwire‘s Lauryn Schaffner. His band Mammoth WVH is Loudwire’s 2021 Artist of the Year but when asked if being a musician is what he originally wanted he said,

“I wanna do stuff with video games when I was little, I was just all about that. I was like ‘I wanna be a video game designer’ and then I went into a camp where you learn how to do it and I was like ‘this is way too hard’ I don’t want to do that.”

You would think that because he’s the son of the late Eddie Van Halen that he would automatically be into music. But just like a normal kid, you try things and find your own way to what you really want and he did. Growing up he would just play drums and bass and try to figure out how his influences play it.

Wolfgang played all the instruments on his self-titled album and he said that he will do it again because it’s fun and challenging but rewarding at the same time. He was also inspired by Dave Grohl when he did the same with the first Foo Fighters album.

Grammy’s once asked him to play “Eruption” as a tribute for his father, but he declined because he felt that it wasn’t the right thing to do and he knew his dad would have agreed with him. And now his song “Distance” is nominated for Grammy’s Best Rock Song.

“In a way, it’s validation for not going up there and being my dad and playing his stuff and it’s a validation that what I make is good enough on its own and I don’t have to go up there and play Panama or Eruption to worth the shit.”

Wolfgang said.