Eddie Van Halen Recovering After Hand Surgery : Rolling Stone : Rock and Roll Daily

Hand surgery for a guitarist is extremely frightening...
"...During the last leg of our tour, I started developing pain in my thumb and my pinky. I didn’t think much of it at the time,” the guitarist says. “It got progressively worse to the point that about three months ago I wasn’t able to play at all. My pinky and my thumb were totally locked up and felt like there was something broken..."