When the bus rolled into sunny Houston, Eddie Van Halen declared that everyone was playing —- not music, but golf.

And Ed Roland, the face of the tour's opening act from Georgia, heard him loud and clear.

"It was Eddie Van Halen; you do whatever he tells you," Roland says, with the reverence of one of Roland's own fans —- the millions who love Collective Soul —- talking about him.

"If he says we're golfing, that's what we're doing."

So began, a decade ago, Roland's other tour —- this one at tranquil outdoor venues. Here, leather belongs strictly on belts and bags. Here, silence and security reign.

"Eddie told me that every hotel room —- the bed, the TV, the dresser —- it's the same," Roland says of being on the road. "But you go out and play golf, and you see different trees and everything. My best friends I've made on the golf course."

This is the stage that brings out the nerves and punishes the ego of this self-confessed show-off.

Dancing with a mike stand in front of thousands? Easy. Teeing off in Scotland with an anonymous caddie? "I was never so scared."

Here he's not the multiplatinum rock star, Collective Soul's lead singer and songwriter, but a hacker bringing the party from the night before into the bright outdoors.

Roland rolled into Chateau Elan's Woodlands course the morning after an acoustic benefit show in Atlanta, his head pounding.

When did the party end? "It didn't," he says.

He likes golf so much he still makes his 11 a.m. tee time, ties his blonde locks into a ponytail and lets everything else fly.

"We want people to judge us by our music, nothing else," he says as he tees off on one hole.

As his shot sails off line: "Definitely not [on] the golf game."

Watching from the first tee are his bleary Soul mates, non-golfers sporting metal accessories, mussed hair and black everything else.

"Who wears denim on a golf course?" Roland shakes his head. "My golf game [stinks], but I try to look good."

Every rock gig needs an eye-catching prop, so there's Roland, with a "who me?" grin, riding his new Segway —- equipped with a space and strap for his golf clubs.

He spun circles on the tee box, where golf etiquette dictates only feet should tread. After his manager wipes out, the Segway is retired.

As the day warms, Roland never passes up the beverage cart. He alternates Amstel Light, Heineken and Dr. Pepper. Between sips he quotes lines from "Smokey and the Bandit" and "Caddyshack."

His golf clubs are a mishmash of brands with no head covers and include a $350 Ping driver with a humongous dent.

"I think I play better with it that way!" says Roland, who shoots around 90. "I think I'm on to something."

The 5-foot-11, compact Roland swings it like a second baseman for the Stockbridge High School Tigers. He turned down recruiting interest from Georgia Southern and other schools to attend music school in Boston.

"I never struck out. I was very consistent," he says, and so he is in music and golf —- with a sunny attitude and no regrets.

Show me where to look, he wrote in the hit "Shine" —- unless his golf ball strays too far.

He drops another. No one keeps score.

"Seriously I think I am still drunk," he says after his less than great approach shot on hole No. 4. "Just thought I'd mention that."

Two holes later: "Are all these holes uphill and into the wind? And I've got the shakes!"

His mood sours in the "Beat the Rock Star" contest against corporate guests, where Roland, in between autographing CDs, misses the green his first 11 tries.

He determines that Will Turpin, his childhood friend and the band's only other golfer, has supplied the wrong distance.

"I'm relying on a bass player?" Roland asks. "No wonder my back hurts!"

A prolific songwriter, Roland parks that brainpower before he plays. "Hell no!" he says of composing on the golf course. "I'd have to have a parental advisory sticker on my next CD if I did."

As frustrating as this sport can be, even for the sober, the challenge always lures Roland back.

"Music is natural," he says. "This is very unnatural."

Growing up, Roland sang in his living room and church. His Dad worked as a Southern Baptist minister and music director.

"A lot of Jesuses and saving words," Roland recalls after hitting from the rough on Hole No. 6. "I could use more of that in my life about now."

Ed Sr., who passed away in 2004, was so bad at golf he never beat his son. Father blanched at son's swearing on the course. But they both loved the game. Before the final round of each Masters, Pastor Roland would preach wearing a green jacket.

Like a rock star, "Dad was living in a fantasy world!" Roland says.

And like the music business, golf is about breaks and relationships.

The more famous Roland became, the more he needed a refuge where "he's able to step away from where someone only wants something from him," says manager Alison Taylor.

Roland also uses golf as a proving ground for would-be friends. "It's like [noted golf teacher] Harvey Penick said: You can know more about a person's character on the golf course than anywhere else," Roland says.

Chris Kuehn, for one, could have been just another fan with a Sharpie. But he's a scratch golfer with a locker next to Roland's at White Columns Golf Club in Alpharetta.

Roland loves to try to beat Kuehn, who spots Roland a stroke a hole.

Roland dreams of having a celebrity charity tournament like Hootie and the Blowfish does in Myrtle Beach. Kuehn, the senior vice president of national marketing for Arby's, said Roland could start by juicing this charity event at Chateau Elan.

Roland's concert and golf round raised $250,000 for Big Brothers Big Sisters of Atlanta.

The dollars that really count to Roland, though, are in Kuehn's pocket.

"Can you break a hundred?" Roland says before their five-hole match.

"Do I have change for a hundred?" Kuehn says in disbelief.

Roland: "Hey man, that's how I roll."

A gleeful Roland wins $25. Whether a Grammy would make him happier is anyone's guess.

Soon he'll hit the road, where golf opportunities usually dry up. But Collective Soul's opening act is Josh Kelley, a former Georgia state high school golf champion who competed for Ole Miss.

Their spring tour begins March 21 in Reno. Roland's already eyeing places in the desert to play —- not music, but golf.