Tom Weber - Eddie Van Halen’s Guitar Tech

Introducing Master Luthier Tom Weber- Eddie Van Halen’s Guitar Tech

(Intro from the “VH News Desk” Written June 4, 2008)

"Ed is a force of nature. I understand the math behind how a guitar works. Ed does things on the guitar that defy the math," said Weber.

"I've sat with him and watched him do things that you can't do. Ed doesn't play guitar, the guitar submits to Ed's will. It's truly an amazing thing. It's a very inspiring place to be.

For Weber, who logs 14 or 15 hours on concert days setting up gear, stringing guitars, replacing electronic pickups and making sure every instrument is in optimum condition for sound checks and performances, the Van Halen tours represent the latest highlight of a colorful -- and often difficult -- career in music. That "long hard road," as he puts it, includes surviving a battle with cancer in the 1980s. For the past 12 years, he also has served as a guitar tech in stints with Cincinnati rock band Blessid Union of Souls and Poison lead guitarist C.C. DeVille.”

Though in demand in normal times, the last few years have been especially trying for Tom, not just with the passing of Ed Van Halen, an employer and friend, but also with the loss of his business at the hands of a predatory landlord, who successfully forced him out of the building where his guitar repair shop had been located for 25 years, while he was on tour! The loss of the business has been compounded by the sale of two other buildings where what remained of Tom’s business has been stored. One of the buildings was sold recently, which makes it necessary for him to move yet again, at a time where there is no income, and no potential for work on the horizon in the foreseeable future due to the total collapse of the live entertainment industry because of COVID19.

“I’d try to get back into a shop if I wasn’t in a position to lose my home” he says, but with the coming expense of having to relocate, or lose what’s left of what was supposed to be his eventual exit from touring, and ever growing debt on his family’s home, it will soon be a choice between one or the other.

"Things are looking pretty bleak at the moment, I won't lie", says Tom. "I have been looking for employment, but am told I am over qualified for the jobs that are available in the area I live in, or that the job is more suited to a younger candidate, and now with the uncertainty about the house, it feels like I am chasing my tail... I'm most worried about how this is affecting my family and the uncertainty each day brings.. I just don't know.."

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