Late last week, Sammy Hagar shared his new song “Encore, Thank You, Goodnight,” which he claims he wrote in a dream with Eddie Van Halen. “This was one hundred percent a communication from the beyond,” Hagar told Rolling Stone. “There is no question about it. I dream about Eddie all the time, quite honestly.”
We dove deep into the creation of “Encore, Thank You, Goodnight” in an article a few days back, but Hagar is truly one of the most entertaining interviews in rock, rivaled perhaps only by Noel Gallagher. He wasn’t going to hop on a Zoom with Rolling Stone and speak merely on a single topic. And so during the course of the conversation we covered a lot of other ground, including his feelings toward Alex Van Halen, who hasn’t spoken with Hagar in 21 years, and refused to even mention him by name in his recent memoir, Brothers.
“I hate to say it, but I dreamt about Alex the other night, man,” he says. “It was crazy. And it was so friggin’ real. I was saying, ‘What are you pissed off at me about, man? What the fuck? Now just tell me what your problem is. What did I do? Just tell me.’”
Dream Alex merely laughed at him. “It was kind of a friendly laugh,” says Hagar. “And he goes, ‘You really don’t know, do you?’ And I said, ‘No, I don’t.’ And so then it became this game, and he was saying, ‘Well, I’ll tell you what, let’s flip a coin, and heads, I’ll tell you, tails, suffer.’ Now that’s a fucking pretty realistic dream.”
I think I have a pretty good idea why Alex doesn’t want to talk to you.
Why?
He’s an extremely private guy, especially when it comes to his family. Your memoir went pretty deep into the worst period of Eddie’s life. That surely didn’t sit well with him. Also, you talk about the band a lot in public. You speak your mind. He’s the complete opposite. I imagine he sees you as a loudmouth that refuses to shut up.
No. I don’t think that’s it. And I’ve had this conversation with a few people, including [former VH manager] Irving Azoff. I’ve asked him, “What’s the problem?” And some people have said to me, “Oh, Cabo Wabo. At one time, Van Halen, when you built it, you guys were all partners in that. And then they didn’t want it anymore when it was losing money, and they gave it to you, and you turned it around and made hundreds of millions of dollars on it. And they’re angry. Alex is angry about that.”
To that I said, “How the fuck could they be angry about that? They gave me the damn thing, they walked out on me, left me with it. And they made me indemnify them in case I got sued and lost everything. They made me sign off big time.” And I’m going, “I hope it’s not that.”
The book has been brought up. The book was honest. It was well documented that Eddie was a mess on that tour. But I don’t want to drag Eddie through no coals now. That’s just water under the bridge.
I think Al’s angry because I’m out doing it, and Mike and I are out doing it, and he can’t. He’s not a singer. He’s not a guitar player. He is not really a band leader. And he seems like he doesn’t want to play drums or can’t play drums anymore, and he can’t go write a new record. Alex wasn’t the songwriter in the band. He was the drummer. Eddie and I wrote the songs. Dave and Eddie wrote the songs, and so we can go out and do them. And I think that really bothers him that Mike and I are still out there doing it. I would feel bad. If I put myself in his shoes, I would feel terrible if I couldn’t do it anymore.
But I’m the happiest guy out of all of them. That pisses people off in itself. Being too happy, people don’t like that.
He’s had real health issues. Obviously, his brother died. None of this has been easy for him. He has reasons to feel bitter.
Yeah, I’d say so. And I’m okay with it. Al, you’re fine. Just leave me alone. I’ll leave you alone. Everything’s good. I’m making you money, by the way, Al. I’m out there selling Van Halen records and keeping the name alive, keeping the music alive.
Speaking of that, let’s talk about your upcoming Las Vegas residency, with Michael Anthony, Joe Satriani, and Kenny Aronoff in the band. Will the setlist be different than your show last summer?
It’s going to be a little bit different because, number one, when we went to Japan last year, we added a couple of different songs that were huge hits in Japan, like “I Can’t Stop Loving You.” That was number one for five weeks in Japan, was the song of the year, the number one single of the year on the charts and awards and all that. So we had to add it.
I plan on changing about three or four songs on the three nights. We play on Wednesday, Friday, Saturday, and there’ll be about three songs at least different each night. Now, you have to play certain songs like “I Can’t Drive 55,” “Right Now, “Why Can’t This Be Love?,” “5150,” “Summer Nights,” “Mas Tequila.”
And so at first we thought that we’d change out the deep tracks, and then we realized that Van Halen doesn’t have deep tracks. Every album sold five, six, seven million records. There’s no deep tracks on those records. We have what we call semi-deep tracks, but the deepest track you could play off of a Van Halen album, I play them live, I can hold the microphone up and the audience knows every word.
Are you going to take this show back on the road after Vegas? Maybe go to Europe?
My man, if I were 60 years old, I would take this band and this show all over the world. I wouldn’t miss one place. I would tour for three or four years, whatever it took. But I can’t do that. At my age, I know I’ll break down. I know something will go wrong. I won’t be able to sing. I won’t be able to fuckin’ walk, or something’s going to prevent me from going on, and I don’t want to do that to the fans.
I just don’t know what to do about that. All things must end. I’m waiting, fingers crossed that it doesn’t happen, for the time when I walk up to the microphone and it just ain’t there. Or just walk out on stage and it isn’t there. It’s got to be physical, mental, and spiritual. It’s a three-lock box. And so right now, I’ve still got my three-lock box. Everything’s good. I can sing, I can jump around, I can physically do the whole show, but the travel kills me.
What I’m getting to is that I would never ever announce retirement. I would just go away. But if I had 50 more shows left in me…I believe if I went to Vegas and did residences without all the travel, the packing and the unpacking, the bad food, the bad beds, the bad hotel rooms, all the crap that beats the shit out of you on tour, I might be able to do 75 shows instead of 50.
So I’m going to do this residency and see how I feel at the end of that. And if I feel really good, I might want to do that again. But other than that, I might just do one-off things like Stagecoach. I’d consider doing a show like that as a one-off anytime if everyone’s available.
I’ve got to be careful. I don’t know how many shows I got left in me and I want to milk it as long as I can because I love this shit. Like I said, I feel sorry for Al. God, if I couldn’t go out and play after what I did my whole life, and what gave me what I have, everything I have is from that, I don’t know how I could handle that. I might turn into an alcoholic or something.
I want to bring up Jason Bonham for a second. He was a little upset when you gave his slot to Kenny Aronoff. Are you in communication with him?
Oh, well, Jason and I talk all the time. No, we’re all cool. Of course, he’s a little disappointed. But listen, he’s the one as much as me that bit off all these things he’s doing. He’s in Europe with the Black Country Communion and stuff. He can’t be here for rehearsals, can’t be there for the residence. He could have got back the day of the residence. No, no, no, no, no. We got to make more time for this band.
But that isn’t all of it. His mother was sick, we all know that. And he left in the 23rd show, after 23 shows on that tour, and we only had four shows to go. And he just had to up and go. I gave him my blessings. I said, “You do what you got to do, but I’m not canceling this tour. There’s a guy named Kenny Aronoff. If you give him at least five minutes notice, he can roll one song.” So 24 songs, 24 hours later, 24 songs on the 24th show of the tour, Kenny flies in.
The first night in Cincinnati, Ohio, he made less mistakes than I made. He’s unbelievable. And his energy is so up. He’s just so positive. He brings love and joy to every show, and no drama. He’s the happiest guy in the world to be there. So when it came for the residency, even if Jason would’ve been available, I felt guilty for Kenny coming in like that and doing what he did…and then he’s been there. And then he lives here on the West coast. Jason would have to fly home every Sunday and fly back on Tuesday, because you can’t fly in the day of the show. I know he would’ve called in, “Dude, me plane. I missed me flight.” I’d have been calling Kenny anyway.
That makes sense.
It does make sense. I’ll play with Jason again. I was thinking about this October. I don’t know what Kenny’s doing for my birthday Bash in Cabo. I don’t know if Kenny’s going to be around. Joe works more than anybody, but if Kenny can’t make it, I’m just going to call Jason and say, “Jason, you hanging out this October, come down to the Bash. Let’s do the Bash again.” That’s how we started our band was him being in Cabo anyway.
So, David Lee Roth is unretiring this summer and playing some shows.
[Hagar literally falls off his chair, roaring with laughter, out of the frame of the camera]
Why are you laughing so hard?
It ain’t over until it’s over. Listen, he may not… Let’s see if he makes the shows. Who knows what Dave is up to?
Imagine if some promoter called you up and proposed another Sam and Dave tour or even just one show. Would you consider ever sharing the bill with him again?
The circumstances would have to be right. Dave always wants too much. He always tries to upstage. He tried to pull stuff on the Sam and Dave tour [of 2002]. The nights when he was opening, when we flip-flopped…which I would never do again. I would never bother. But look, I’m not an opening act for anybody.
On those night, he would call in and say, the bus broke down, 10 minutes before he was supposed to go on. And because I care about my fans, I would go on. And I did that about four times. I wanted to break the guy’s fuckin’ neck
And the stupidest thing is, he did the worst when he headlined. He couldn’t follow me with a band of kids playing Eddie’s guitar solo note for note and playing “Eruption” and shit. He did his whole Van Halen show from 1983, and I’m going, “What an idiot!” He should have represented himself a little more like who he was as a solo artist.
I’m so fortunate that I had a solo career before I joined Van Halen, because even Mick Jagger and people will tell you, being in the biggest rock band in the world and then trying to go solo ain’t the easiest.
Mick tried really hard a few times. It didn’t really go anywhere.
Exactly. This is Mick fuckin’ Jagger! And so I’m saying, I’m a very fortunate guy, and I have my own music and my own image.
You also have your voice. Dave, on the other hand…he really doesn’t.
No, he doesn’t. But there’s a lot of guys out there that don’t. He can join that club. That’s sad. That’s what I’m talking about when I say all that about retirement. Not retirement, but just quitting.
If I can’t sing the songs, I ain’t going to sing the songs. And fortunately, I got a lot of songs. I got about 600 songs I’ve written in my life between all my bands and my solo career where I can pick enough songs where I could probably do a show that are low enough to where if I can’t hit the high notes. But I don’t even want to do that. I don’t want people out there screaming for “Dreams.” And I can’t do it.
Biopics are the rage right now. Can you ever imagine a Van Halen biopic?
Oh, I would love it if it was done right. But Van Halen is so dysfunctional, as you well know. Because it’s Sam and Dave, and then Al. There’s no Ed now… There’s just no way we would all agree on anything. Dave wants it to be all about him. Al wants it to be all about him and Ed, nobody else matters. Just a bunch of singers in the band. It is all about him and Ed. It’s really all about Eddie, to be honest with you, and his co-writers, David Lee Roth and Sammy Hagar. That’s what the music’s about.
You should all just let a great filmmaker make a documentary.
A hundred percent. I’ll tell you some dirt. I’ve received offers all the time to make a documentary about me. They did one on a couple of different channels. And every time I try to put anything about Van Halen in there, Alex jumps in and calls his lawyers and they stop me from using it. He stops the use of any Van Halen music. It’s like, “I wrote these songs. You played drums, okay? Your brother and I wrote this song. I sang it. You didn’t sing it. You played drums. Come on, dude.” But because Eddie’s not there, and he has the Van Halen power, and it just… Yeah, I’m over it.
It would be in his interest to green light a documentary about the band.
I don’t think there’s a director on the planet that wouldn’t do it. Martin Scorsese would do it.
It could be a three-part, six-hour Netflix documentary.
It should be. It should be the early times, my times, and then where everybody’s at in their life now. What a wonderful documentary, and what a beautiful story. And I’m in. [He raises his hand high into the air.] Okay, see, I raised my hand. I say, let’s do it. I’ll do it for free. I don’t want any money. Alex can have all my money that resonates from it. I’ll just say okay for it to be done, and let me have approval on my parts.
The Beach Boys documentary on Disney+ introduced them to a new generation of fans. A Van Halen one could do the same thing.
Yeah, it would be wonderful. And it’s well deserved, but I don’t see it happening. The closest thing that can happen to that will be probably some kind of a… What is it? Some of these frickin’ things they’re doing with holograms and AI generated stuff and all that. It’s probably the closest you’re going to see. That’s why my song feels so important.
“Encore, Thank You, Goodnight”?
It’s Van Halen-esque, and I’m not trying to cheat on it or anything. This is real. I had this dream. I love this song. I loved Eddie like a brother. I miss him so bad. Every time I play music, every time I pick up a guitar or go to rehearsal or jump on stage or try to get with Joe Satriani rehearsing a song we might want to play or write, I miss Eddie.
Joe is the closest thing on this planet for me, not for the world, but for me, to Eddie Van Halen. The way Eddie and I wrote, Joe and I, we write that way, and it’s very special. Joe’s music inspires me to sing a melody and inspires lyrics to come out. That first Chickenfoot record is a good example. The second one we struggled with, because of timing. We were too rushed. But the first record, that’s a great fuckin’ rock record.
Eddie, I’m telling you, I could be sitting around dry, laying on the beach, not a thought in the world about music. And Eddie could walk out there and start humming or start noodling a song out in my front yard, across the fence when we lived next door to each other. He’d come out with the guitar around his neck and go, “Hey, listen.” He’d go, “Nah-nah-nah…,” like “5150” or something, and I’d go, “Holy fuck!” I would drop everything, jump over the fence, go in there, and we would write a song. His music was so inspiring. The world knows.
That’s why it’s so sad he basically stopped releasing new music in the 2000s.
Yeah. Look, everybody gets fuckin’ dried up a little bit. And also, he had to be inspired by something. You know what I mean?
When I joined the band, everyone says, “Oh man, they started playing keyboards, and Hagar wants to write all these love songs.” I didn’t bring the music to Eddie. Eddie brought the music to me. He had used that guitar neck up. He did everything and anything that that neck could do, and changed his amps and got his sounds. And over the years, he kept changing his sound to try and re-inspire some new guitar things. That’s why he wrote “Can’t Stop Loving You.” It’s a classical piece of music, and so is “5150.” I had to find a place to sing. But he sat down at a keyboard. It felt fresh. And I always say that to the hardcore Eddie heads: Eddie’s musicianship blossomed when I joined the band.
People don’t realize that Eddie expanded as a musician because he got a singer that could say, “I can sing that.” And we went on a fucking musical adventure. So, that’s why he stopped writing, I think, because he just ran out. Shit, how much do you need? How much can you squeeze out of the dude? He gave his blood, brother.
