Eddie Van Halen Allegedly Pulled a Gun on Fred Durst After Failed Jam Session

There are many wild stories in Van Halen lore, but this one involving Eddie Van Halen and Limp Bizkit frontman Fred Durst is a whole new level of wild.

Author Andrew Bennett chronicles this story in his new book Eruption in the Canyon: 212 Days and Nights with the Genius of Eddie Van Halen. The book is filled with all sorts of anecdotes, including how EVH was having “just one of those days” and pulled a gun on Durst.

As transcribed by Ultimate Classic Rock, Bennett says a record executive introduced Van Halen and Durst in 2001 and recommended they work together. Durst allegedly said, “That would be hilarious. The greatest guitar player ever plays with the worst band ever,” however, Van Halen obliged and said, “F*ck it, let’s jam.”

The jam session allegedly took place in a home in Beverly Hills, but it didn’t last long, and EVH left suddenly leaving behind all of his gear due to people smoking marijuana. The next day, however, Van Halen went back to the Beverly Hills home to retrieve his gear, but he didn’t come empty-handed.

According to Bennett, “Eddie once bought an assault vehicle from a military auction. It has a shine gun mount on the back and is not legal. Eddie drove that assault vehicle through L.A., into Beverly Hills, then parked and left it running on the front lawn of the house Limp Bizkit was rehearsing in. He got out wearing no shirt, his hair in a Samurai bun on top of his head, his jeans held up with a strand of rope and combat boots held together by duct tape. And he had a gun in his hand.”

As if that doesn’t paint a vivid picture, Bennett continued and recalled Van Halen saying, “That assh*le answered the door. I put my gun to that stupid f*cking red hat of his, and I said, ‘Where’s my sh*t, motherf*cker?’ That f*cking guy just turned to one of his employees and starts yelling at him to grab my sh*t. … Eddie Van Halen stood on the front lawn of a residential home in Beverly Hills in broad daylight, smoking a cigarette while holding a gun on Fred Durst as he went back and forth from the house to the assault vehicle, lugging amps and guitars.”

EVH has yet to publically comment on the story, and since he’s a very private person, who knows if he ever will. However, you can read that story and more in the book which is available for purchase at EruptionInTheCanyon.com for $51.50. (Get it?!)

‘Van Halen’ & Other Classic Debut Albums Panned by ‘Rolling Stone’

• Van Halen – ‘Van Halen’

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  Charles M. Young declared in the first sentence of his review on Van Halen's debut, "Mark my words: in three years, Van Halen is going to be fat and self-indulgent and disgusting, and they'll follow Deep Purple and Led Zeppelin right into the toilet." It's pretty safe to say that Charles was a little off in his prediction.

• AC/DC – ‘High Voltage’

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  Billy Altman wrote that with the release of AC/DC's debut, the hard rock genre "unquestionably hit its all-time low."  On top of that, "Lead singer Bon Scott spits out his vocals with a truly annoying aggression which, I suppose, is the only way to do it when all you seem to care about is being a star so that you can get laid every night." And what's so wrong with that?!

• Jimi Hendrix Experience – ‘Are You Experienced’

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  It's difficult to imagine anyone saying anything negative about the Jimi Hendrix Experience, but Jon Landau found a way.  While Landau praised songs like "Purple Haze," "Hey Joe" and "The Wind Cries Mary," he wrote of the rest of the album, "Everything else is insane and simply a matter of either you dig it or you don't. Basically, I don't for several reasons. Despite Jimi's musical brilliance and the group's total precision, the poor quality of the songs and the inanity of the lyrics too often get in the way." Yeah...whatever, Jon.
• Led Zeppelin – ‘Led Zeppelin I’

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  John Mendelsohn spent the bulk of his review comparing Zeppelin to the Jeff Beck Group. Mendelsohn saved his harshed critique for Jimmy Page calling him "a very limited producer and a writer of weak, unimaginative songs" and that "the Zeppelin album suffers from his having both produced it and written most of it (alone or in combination with his accomplices in the group.)" It's a good thing Jimmy improved a little in the writing department, right?

• Black Sabbath – ‘Black Sabbath’

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  Lester Bangs tore Sabbath a new one in his review on their debut writing, "The whole album is a shuck...the album has nothing to do with spiritualism, the occult, or anything much except stiff recitations of Cream cliches that sound like the musicians learned them out of a book, grinding on and one with dogged persistence...The even have discordant jams with bass and guitar reeling like velocitized speedfreaks all over each other's musical perimeters yet never quite finding synch - just like Cream!  But worse." Bangs may have been lauded as "America's greatest rock critic," but we're sure there are plenty disagree with his assessment here.