During the late '70s and early '80s, Van Halen dominated record charts with hits like "Runnin' with the Devil," "Jump," and "Panama." The classic lineup of Alex and Eddie Van Halen, bassist Michael Anthony, and vocalist David Lee Roth sold well over 57 million albums worldwide, and are one of only five rock bands to have had two albums certified Diamond by the RIAA for sales in excess of 10 million copies: their eponymous debut album Van Halen (1978) and 1984 (1984), which peaked at #2 on the Billboard charts right behind Michael Jackson's Thriller. Yet when it comes to Van Halen, success and drama have always been intrinsically intertwined.
By 1985, tensions between the substance-abusing Eddie Van Halen and flamboyant, egomaniacal frontman David Lee Roth had come to a head, culminating in Roth's departure from the band. Sammy Hagar, in the meantime, was fresh off the road from his 1984 tour and looking forward to some much needed some down time to begin work on his next album when his phone rang. Eddie Van Halen was on the line. In his memoir, Red: My Uncensored Life in Rock, Hagar recalls not being completely surprised by the call. "Who else were they going to get?" he writes. "There was Ozzy Osbourne, Ronnie James Dio and me."
Hagar flew to Los Angeles and jammed with the band. By the end of the five-hour session, the members of Van Halen were psyched, convinced they had a band with Hagar. But the man himself wanted time to sleep on it. Hagar went home with a cassette of the session and says he got goose bumps all over his body when he popped the tape in his stereo and gave it a listen. "I realized it was Cream all over again," he says. "There was something about it that was slow, confident, almost majestic. I decided I was in."
Being part of a band as big as Van Halen were at the time was a dream come true for Hagar. Although Eddie and Alex were "tight as nails" (they even passed cigarettes back and forth, according to Hagar), he never felt excluded. At least not initially. "We loved each other," he says in Red. "There was no animosity, no egos, no nothing. They wanted me to be in this band, and I wanted to be in it. We knew we were good." As a show of solidarity, Hagar even nixed the idea of changing the band's name to Van Hagar, as was proposed by Mo Ostin, chairman of Warner Bros. Records.
With the addition of Hagar to the lineup, Van Halen began a new era. Over the next decade, the band released four consecutive multi-platinum albums, including their debut, 5150. The album, with its mega-hit "Why Can't This Be Love," shot straight to #1, silencing naysayers who thought Roth would be an impossible act to follow. OU812 followed in 1988, For Unlawful Carnal Knowledge in 1991, and Balance in 1995. On tour, the band minimized the use of pre-Hagar Van Halen songs in their set (other than their best known classics) as the group's repertoire expanded.
According to Hagar, the group's chemistry began to change after the release of Balance. More often than not, the band were split into two camps: Hagar and Anthony, and the Van Halen brothers, who allegedly drank from the time they woke up to the time they went to bed. Creative differences arose between Sammy and Eddie, whose dictatorial ways got out of hand, and his once-great guitar playing became sloppy and unpredictable.
Sammy Hagar left Van Halen in the summer of 1996 under considerable controversy and press coverage. "I didn't quit the band to make a solo record," Hagar writes, "they replaced me with David Lee Roth. A lot of people don't realize that, but that's exactly what happened. He'd been in the studio singing on my microphone with my band for two weeks before they even told me. I was home changing brand new baby diapers and I get the phone call father's day, June 16th, 9 AM in the morning, Sunday. I can tell you right now man, it was jaw dropping."
Van Halen foundered after Hagar's departure. An attempted reunion with David Lee Roth misfired, and an album recorded with Gary Cherone, ex-singer of the defunct band Extreme, sold poorly. Hagar had returned to his solo career with his new backing band The Waboritas and continued to release albums to moderate success when Eddie Van Halen called yet again. The year was 2004. Would he be interested in a reunion? Turns out he was.
Hagar went to the band's old studio to meet up with Van Halen and was shocked by what he found there. Eddie swigged cheap wine straight out of the bottle, recalls Hagar, and pulled out his own teeth with pliers. "I'd never seen him so skinny in my life," Hagar recalls. "He was missing a number of teeth and the ones he had left were black. His boots were so worn out he had gaffer's tape wrapped around them, and his big toe stuck out." Despite a slight lisp from having lost a third of his tongue to cancer (which Eddie claims resulted from putting guitar picks in his mouth while he used his fingers to play), Hagar says Eddie "walked up to me, hunched over like a little old man, a cigarette in his mouth. This was Eddie Van Halen, one of the sweetest guys I ever met," Hagar writes. "He had turned into the weirdest f--- I'd ever seen, crude, rude and unkempt."
Hagar rejoined Van Halen briefly to record three new songs for the platinum-selling compilation disc, The Best of Both Worlds (2004), and embarked on an 80-date summer tour with the band. Throughout the tour, reports of Eddie's alcohol abuse cropped up in reviews. Eddie tripped over his guitar cable multiple times during a show in Chicago, unplugging it, which necessitated a guitar tech to chase him around the stage to help keep things together. Eddie later stopped in the middle of a guitar solo, lying down and simply saying "I'm sorry folks, I done run outta gas." Hagar says, "He made some terrible mistakes and it seemed like he couldn't remember the songs. He would just hit the whammy bar and go wheedle-wheedle-whee." The ill-fated tour ended in disaster in Tucson, Arizona, when Eddie finished the set by smashing his guitar, sending shrapnel into the audience and running off stage. "I went straight to my plane after the show and home to San Francisco," Hagar writes. "I never spoke to him again."
Post-Van Halen, Hagar resurrected his solo career, returning to work with The Wabos, and focused more attention on his business ventures, Cabo Wabo, both cantina and tequila. In 2008, he released Cosmic Universal Fashion, his first solo album since 1997, and started his next project, a self-titled album with the supergroup Chickenfoot, featuring Mike Anthony of Van Halen, Chad Smith of the Red Hot Chili Peppers, and guitar virtuoso Joe Satriani, who had previously played with Mick Jagger, Steve Vai, and Deep Purple. But the specter of Van Halen never went away. The years Hagar spent with the band provided him with some of the highest highs and the lowest lows of his life, and some of Red's best passages. "Being in Van Halen was one of the greatest experiences in my life," he says. "I wouldn’t trade it for anything. I'll take the dirt right with it." And apparently, dish it as well.
Despite all the trash talking he does in Red, Hagar is unconcerned about the bridges he may've burned. In fact, he says he'd welcome a reunion with Van Halen. "I would love to make another record with Van Halen," he says. "If Eddie really got his life together, which it seems he has judging by the pictures I've seen, then definitely." Just not soon. "Right now (with the release of his memoir), there's zero chance. But someday, before we all die, f--- yeah."
Red: My Uncensored Life in Rock recently landed at #1 on The New York Times Hardcover Nonfiction Best-Sellers list.
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In August 2010, Warner Bros. Records issued a press release indicating that a new Van Halen studio album and tour are planned for 2011 with Roth back in the saddle again and Wolfie Van Halen (Eddie’s son with actress Valerie Bertinelli) replacing Mike Anthony on bass. Hagar, for one, remains skeptical. "Look how long it's been. They haven't made a record in… who knows when? (The group's last studio album, Van Halen III, was released in March 1998.) If it takes that long to make a record… I just don't see a new Van Halen record happening. I don't see Dave and Eddie being able to work it out."
