Wolfgang Van Halen slams rock auction selling his father's guitars

Wolfgang Van Halen has criticized Julian’s Auction House, saying they exploited his father Eddie Van Halen’s death with its Icons & Idols Trilogy: Rock ‘n’ Roll auction this week where three Van Halen guitars sold for $422,000. He also brought into questions how much the guitars were actually used by his father.

In response to a tweet about the sale of the three guitars from metal site Blabbermouth, Wolfgang wrote, “The headline should read: ‘Three guitars that are striped were sold at an auction for charity.'”

“They weren’t stage guitars,” he continued, adding, “I had nothing to do with this. I don’t EVER plan on selling any of my father’s iconic guitars. The only place they’d possibly belong in is a museum.” In another tweet, he also noted, “one was a gift. I don’t know who’d want to give that away. Timing is a little fishy to me.”

Van Halen then corrected his previous tweet. “It WASN’T for charity. They’re just taking advantage of my father’s passing. What a surprise.”

In the descriptions for the guitars on Julian’s Auction House, they noted that one was a gift Eddie gave to his friend Bryan Cash (that one fetched $231,250), another had been played by Eddie on stage in San Antonio and that there were pictures of him applying the stripes to the guitar himself (that guitar sold for $140,800). The third guitar was a scaled-down, non-playing guitar that was used in Van Halen’s “Hot for Teacher” video and sold for $50,000.

The Icons & Idols Trilogy: Rock ‘n’ Roll auction also featured items from Kurt Cobain, The Beatles, Elvis Presley, Jimi Hendrix, Rolling Stones, Fleetwood Mac, New Order, Madonna, The Clash, Ramones and more.