The Tapes Archive

Sammy Hagar: I’m good, man. I’m eating pretzels, but

 I’ll stop now.

Marc Allan: Oh, well continue eating pretzels; it’s okay.

Sammy Hagar: No, you’ll probably get half the stuff I say wrong to begin with.

Marc Allan: I will?

Sammy Hagar: No, I’m joking.

Marc Allan: Uh Sammy, we get-

Sammy Hagar: You’re a journalist, aren’t you?

Marc Allan: We got it all on tape, Sammy. We don’t mess around with these quotes. We don’t sit here and do that kind of crap. Here’s what I want to know. I want to know when are you going to dive off the stage looking for a camera, criticize the security force, and storm off in a tizzy?

Sammy Hagar: Oh, probably when my first album sells four, five million records. I don’t know, you know, I think Nugent had it right.

Marc Allan: What did he say?

Sammy Hagar: You know what Nugent said, right?

Marc Allan: No I don’t know, what was that?

Sammy Hagar: Well he said that If he was that ugly, he wouldn’t want anybody taking a picture of him either. I don’t know, I got nothing to say about it. You know, everybody’s got their own trip. The music should be all you really worry about.

Marc Allan: Well it just seems like you guys are certainly on the same level of success, if not greater than those guys. And they don’t seem to have any idea how to enjoy it, and you guys always seem to be enjoying yourself.

Sammy Hagar: Nope, I’ve even got this whole thing. It’s like, you gotta enjoy yourself first, and what you’re doing, and then just everything around you just kind of falls into place. But if you’re miserable, you’re miserable in any situation. I don’t care how much money you have, if you’re miserable, you’re miserable! So maybe that’s it, I don’t know. I could rag on him all day, cause it does just kind of make me sick, cause the fans are the ones that end up getting burned. They’re still gonna make their money. The show was over and done, and they walk away, and the fans are the ones that get burned. Because then somebody else comes to town, in that market. The security’s gonna be all pissed off, they’re gonna be uptight, and the fans are gonna suffer. They’re gonna make them hold them back more and it’s just not gonna be as much fun for the next two or three months, for other bands that come through because Guns went out there and fucked up. And that’s the only part that pisses me off. Other than that, I don’t give a shit what those guys or anybody else does.

Marc Allan: Okay, there was all this talk for awhile that rock was dead, that the charts were dominated by all these dance divas and rap acts, and I guess that really occurred most heavily while you were probably putting the finishing touches on the new album.

Sammy Hagar: Yeah.

Marc Allan: Were you hearing all that talk? Were you anticipating blowing all that other stuff off the charts when the album came out?

Sammy Hagar: I was, man. I mean, I was looking so forward to it. It’s like, there were times we’d sit back hearing what we were doing, knowing that in our hearts that it was great, and that’s not an ego rep, that’s like, honest. We were real proud of this shit. And we were just going “blegh”. You know, you’re sitting there and you’re watching TV and all this stuff, and you’re going “I can’t wait “to blast them fuckers out with this shit”. I mean, it really was. It was almost like we were out loading our guns up, getting our ammunition ready so that we could just hit them. But you know, our fans have always been so true for us. It’s like we don’t have to release singles, we don’t have to do anything. And not because we’re so goddamn great, it’s because our fans are so great, that we know that they’re gonna be there. So, they trust us completely. We don’t have to have a hit single, or cop-out and make some dance music that crosses over into clubs or something in order for, to hook people into buying our records.

Marc Allan: Yeah, well obviously even rushing to making a record. You certainly didn’t have to rush to make one.

Sammy Hagar: But that was for our fans, that wasn’t for our leisure. And that’s why our fans are there, I guess. Because they know they can trust us, that we’re gonna go in, that we’re gonna do a great show. We’re gonna come out on stage, sell them a ticket, they’re gonna get their money’s worth and more. If we make a record, they’re gonna get their money’s worth and more, and it’s not gonna be just two or three hit songs on it, and then the rest is a bunch of bullshit. So it’s really our fans that have put us in this position. And we just knew they’d be there when we released this record. It was like, fuck yeah they’re gonna be there. We’ve never ripped them off, you know, and we ain’t going to, so they’re gonna be there. So all this bullshit that’s been out there, a lot of it, we were really just– The whole army was gonna come to the rescue. The whole infantry was gonna come and put the album’s debut at number one, or whatever.

Marc Allan: And was this stuff also playing on your mind when you’re writing the songs?

Sammy Hagar: Fuck no.

Marc Allan: No?

Sammy Hagar: We don’t plan anything for that. That’s the secret to Van Halen, is we just go in and do. But what we do is taken very seriously. Not to the point where we overwork it, but seriously to the point where we know that if it’s that good out. And we just go in there and please ourselves. It’s like really self-indulgent, in a way. But with a little bit of a higher, it’s hard to explain, a little bit of a higher consciousness of hey, this isn’t good enough. We’re just not gonna go take a big piss and say “here you go, drink this”. We’re gonna really make sure it’s a good piss.

Marc Allan: Oh, getting these quotes in the paper’s gonna be fun.

Sammy Hagar: Oh yeah, yeah, yeah, I see. That’s what I meant, when I first talked initially. You know, half the shit I say ain’t gonna be right anyways, so I might as well be eating fuckin’ goldfish and spread bullshit, I don’t-

Marc Allan: No, no. I thought maybe that was what “Man on a Mission” might be about, that you felt on a mission to blow out all these other bands.

Sammy Hagar: No, you know there’s actually, believe it or not, now you can get stuff you can print. Lyrically, there is a concept to this album. Even the cheesy songs which people could say “Oh, that’s just about pussy”. Oh no, man, you can’t put that. But like, a song like “Pound Cake” where people might think it’s just a sexual thing, it is tied into a concept. And whether someone agrees with it or not, or whatever, but you know. The dream is over, is basically the concept. And it’s not a negative, it’s like the dream is over but dream another dream. Just stop believing in this old-time crap and the changes have to be made, and so forth. And “Judgment Day” is basically what I’m talking about. Is that, that isn’t my attitude. I think that’s the attitude of a lot of people in the world today. Everyone’s putting it off, everyone’s just going for what they can do. Oh, what’s in it for me? And all that consciousness has just gotta change, and it’s time to wake up. So a song like “Man on a Mission” is about once you know what you want, and I’m talking sexually, like “Pound Cake”, it’s like I’m more attracted to a down-home, homegrown woman than I am to some designer style. And to me, it’s more beautiful to see things kind of in the nets. I wanna know what I’m eating. You know what I mean?

Marc Allan: Yeah.

Sammy Hagar: Like “Pound Cake” is what I’m saying, it’s like a simple, you know what you’ve got. And so that’s the parallel there. And that “Man on a Mission” is basically once you see it, the pound cake, and you know it, and once you know what you want, then you’re a man on a mission. Then you’ve got a mission, you can go get it. Boom, done. Nothing can distract you. If you don’t know what you want, then you’re not a man on a mission, you’re a lost dog. You’re out there looking, “Oh, maybe “I want that, oh maybe I want this, oh maybe I should “try this, maybe I should try that”. And that’s the way I see people on the planet. That’s the way I see everything, priorities are all screwed up. And so basically, that’s what the album is about. Even “Spank Line”, it’s about that. Censorship, people trying to keep a record off the market that says fuck in it, and putting the sticker on it. But yet you can sit home with your family and be watching a family TV show, ESPN sports, whatever. And bang, call up this number, and this lady will tell you what you wanna know, you know? And do what you want right over the phone. And to me that blows my mind. And so that’s really, it’s wake up, people. I wanna start running around the street, grabbing people by the neck and shaking them, saying “wake up, you son of a bitch!” You know, it’s like-

Marc Allan: Okay, but the dream that you’re talking about. The dream that’s over, which dream are we talking about here?

Sammy Hagar: I’m talking about kind of the American dream. All the promises, they’ve all been raped. You can’t trust a lot of people. And I’m not anti-America, I’m very pro-America.

Marc Allan: Right.

Sammy Hagar: This is a very pro-American statement. I’m saying the jive bullshit that we’ve been fed. The “hey, if you just go to school, get a good education, “and if you do everything this way “and that way, you can have this.” Bullshit. People got around it completely, now. You know, the stock market thing, all this crap. Well that’s success, in order to be a good American you have to be successful. You have to own your house, you have to have a couple cars in the garage, and dress nice, and be a yuppie family, and then you’re okay. It’s bullshit. Those people are just as bad as the crack dealers on the streets, sometimes. Because they’re the reason that the real estate prices go up, and so forth. And you know, the developers and all these guys who come. I live at the beach here, right? It’s a wonderful life, everything’s great. Some asshole’s trying to build a house on my beach. Right dead in front of my house. On the beach, where people come and lay. Not one house, 17 houses across this beach. And the point is, okay, I live in a wonderful neighborhood and all rich people live here, and it’s a wonderful life and there’s guys starving in the streets, fine. But those people that are starving in the streets are allowed to walk down and lay on my beach, and enjoy it. But this asshole’s trying to put up houses there and make 17 million dollar profit, and no one can lay on the beach. And my kid has to sit here and look at the house. All right, it’s a tough life, great. But it’s bullshit, it’s bad for the environment, too. The guy’s gonna be flushing his sewage into the ocean, and there’s no beach there at the end of the day. To me, you know, that’s wake up. The dream is over, man. People have abused it, they raped it, and they’re raping the country, and so okay, it’s over.

Marc Allan: Okay, so you’re telling people, what are you telling them to do, then? Or what do you suggest they do?

Sammy Hagar:  Just kind of wake up to the environment and don’t get sucked in by the whole thing, and take out your trash, or recycle your trash or whatever. I haven’t come up with all the answers, I’m just kind of painting the picture.

Marc Allan: You just want people to ask the questions?

Sammy Hagar: Yeah, exactly. Because I’m not, I don’t believe rock has an artist. Whether it be a painter, a poet, or anything. I don’t believe that you should sit there and say “this is the way to go, do this and do that”. There’s way too much responsibility to that. I wouldn’t want to be in that position, because I’m not sure I’m right all the time. But what you can do is what the artist’s job is, I think. Is to paint the picture. Just say “here’s the way I see it, is there any truth “to this, can you relate?” You know, “can you help me? “Can you tell me what I’m seeing is wrong?” You know, what I’m saying? I think we just tell the world, whether it be radio, through the radio, through MTV, what you see. Because maybe some of these people are doing it and they don’t see it. So we’re fortunate enough to be able to have time to step back, a lot of times. Live a kind of an eccentric, weird life. And sometimes you get little glimpses of things that maybe you can’t see if you’re not there. And that’s, I think that’s the artist’s job. And that’s all we’re responsible for. Not changing the world, but kind of painting it as we see it, and therefore those that are intelligent enough, and have the insight, and the answers to make the changes. Maybe they’ll see it through what we see, and therefore make the changes. Because we can’t go out there and make changes. It’s stupid, it would be like revolutions and shit. You know, I’m not looking for the revolution. I just want to wake people up a little bit, it’s a little bit higher consciousness kind of stuff. And that’s about as far as it is. Other than that, I just wanna have some fun and have people have fun to the music. That’s why there’s all these double meanings to “Pound Cake”. And that’s why I intentionally try to put a little humor in it, as well. Otherwise, then it’s no fun, and it becomes this real serious– Then I’m Joan Baez, all of a sudden, you know? For Christ’s sake, I don’t want to do that either. That’s depressing! You don’t want to depress the people, you wanna wake them up, make them smile and say “shit man, I’m happy now!” So anyways, that’s it, that’s as serious as it goes. There’s an asshole trying to build a house on my beach.

Marc Allan: That’s uh, whereabouts, can you tell me where you live? Or roughly where you live?

Sammy Hagar: Yeah, it’s just on the LA coast.

Marc Allan: And right on the beach? Right where the waves roll up to the-

Sammy Hagar: Yeah, on big stilts, so that the guy’s gotta get a boat half the time to get out of his pad. I mean these guys, they’ll build a house anywhere to make a buck. It blows my mind. I’m thinking “You know, I’ll let you do it on my front lawn. “Please, don’t take the beach away from me and my kids “and the people from the valley that drive over here.” Thank god there’s a beach down there. They’ll just, it’s like the oil rigs that gotta be out there in the middle of the ocean. You know, come on, there’s plenty of oil. Go drill somewhere else.

Marc Allan: Who owns the beach?

Sammy Hagar: Well, some guy owns it.

Marc Allan: Really? I didn’t know anybody could own the beach, that’s kind of, I guess in California, they can.

Sammy Hagar: Well here’s the deal, exactly. There used to be a road there, and it got washed out about five times. So the roads got… So now it’s this beach. But I guess someone owned it. It’s hard to explain, that’s why the government, I mean the coastal commissioner, he’s trying to fight him. He’s trying to fight the coastal commissioner. He’s saying “you can’t put houses here!” For Christ’s sake, it’s dangerous. And there’s a beach here, and people should be able to live on this beach, I mean use this beach. It’s a private beach, but it’s open to the public. I mean it’s privately owned, for some reason. Two mile strip. And some asshole, he’s fighting it, and fighting it, and fighting it. He’s spent millions of dollars trying to develop it because it’s worth so much money. I mean, to have a house right on the beach, of course it’s wonderful, but they don’t realize how stupid it would be. The guy’s gonna end up being sued. But that’s why I’m saying, it’s judgment day. He knows he’s wrong, and he knows he’s doing everything bad, not only for the environment, but for the people that are gonna buy the house. They’ll sell the house for three to four million bucks, and they’ll be ripped off to the bone because their house will be in the ocean about every four years. So, cause there’s a big deal. When they have high tide, it comes right up to my gate. And I’m sorry, you know. It’s like, anything in front of my gate is gonna get washed away.

Marc Allan: Yeah, it sounds dangerous.

Sammy Hagar: It is.

Marc Allan: I mean, who would want to buy a house like that?

Sammy Hagar: But everyone’s putting it off till judgment day. That’s the whole thing, everyone’s taking chances. It’s a piss poor way to do things, but it’s because everyone’s desperate, you know? Or everyone’s greedy, one or the other. You’re either desperate – The crack dealers are desperate. You know, the kids in the street that are robbing stores. They’re going “well, I know I shouldn’t be doing this “but hey, I gotta survive.” And it’s “I’ve gotta take my chances.” So you go, you blow somebody away, and you get caught, and you go “all right, fuck, well I got caught. “But it’s all I had.” And these guys are going “hey, I’m greedy man, “I need another five million bucks cause my rent’s due, “cause I spent 12 million dollars on my house, “and I couldn’t afford it, and I gotta pay for this “and pay for that, and so I gotta build these houses! “I need seven million bucks, quick!” You know? I mean, it’s a consciousness, you know? I don’t care, stop! I’m gonna go on stage and do a hell of a show. And have so goddamn much fun that – It’s just like, my only relief. It’s like comic relief, to go on stage and kick it out and act like everything’s wonderful.

Marc Allan: Are you neighbors fighting this as well?

Sammy Hagar: Oh yeah.

Marc Allan: Well that’s good.

Sammy Hagar: The whole goddamn neighborhood is up in arms. The coastal commission is fighting it! I mean these guys, he’s a real big-time developer. And he’s got a lot of political clout. He’s actually, he looks like he might be going to get it done! I mean, I don’t know, you know?

Marc Allan: Man, maybe you should put on a concert right next to his house or something like that.

Sammy Hagar: Hey, if there’s any houses out front, we’ll be putting on concerts on the beach constantly while they’re out there trying to work. We’ll go down and play for free, for the construction workers, man. And we’ll tell them “hey, bring your family down. “Shit, we’ll play for you guys.” You know? And maybe nothing will get done.

Marc Allan: All right, I wanted to ask you a few other Van Halen related things.

Sammy Hagar: Oh, yeah!

Marc Allan: When did you know, was there a specific instance, that you knew that the fans accepted you as the frontman of Van Halen?

Sammy Hagar: Hmm yeah, the first show.

Marc Allan: Really?

Sammy Hagar: Yeah.

Marc Allan: So from the first time, you knew. There was never any feeling like, you know, they miss David Lee Roth or anything like that?

Sammy Hagar: Well, I don’t know if they did or not. But they didn’t show it. And they showed nothing but respect and warmth to me. I mean, we walked on stage in Shreveport, Louisiana. And there’s a town I had never headlined, solo. There’s maybe five towns in America I’d never headlined as a solo artist because of lack of business, or lack of record sales. We said we didn’t wanna chance it, right?

Marc Allan: Okay.

Sammy Hagar: So we started the 5150 tour in Shreveport. And I said “oh, this is wonderful.” You know? I was really nervous. It sold out first hour or whatever. We walked out on stage, and there were probably 50 banners in the audience that said Van Hagar, The Red Rocker, Van Halen we love you, or you know, Dave sucks. There was this, it was so unbelievable. And we walk out on stage and they fuckin””””” busted the barricades out, and I just said “well shit, let’s go!” You know? And I’m a pretty confident human being, anyways. I’m not like a real insecure kind of guy. Though I walked on stage a little shy, and it was wonderful. I haven’t had one single bad incident. And then the next thing that kind of told me what was happening, was when 5150, the third week, went to number one. And Van Halen had never had a number one record. They had a number two record.

Marc Allan: Yeah.

Sammy Hagar: But 1984 was a very big record for them, so. Coming off a record that big and so forth. And that was it, the only people that ever complained about it were just some critics, to be honest with you. Every now and then, it’s about 30, 40 percent of them would come to the show and say. You know, they’d bring up “oh well Sammy was like this, but you know, Dave did this.” You know, they would try to compare us. And I don’t think the fans were really trying to compare us. I think they thought it was just different, it was new. The fans that liked Dave, they split. I don’t believe they were there. You know, I had my own fans, I was selling out coliseums myself. And then Van Halen is selling out coliseums, you add those two together, I just thought we just – As far as I’m concerned, we just had twice the people. Or at least the amount of people that left, that were disappointed with me and the band. I think my fans kind of filled a bigger hole than they left. And I’m sure some of my fans were disappointed. I got fan letters that were disappointed for me joining the band too, you know? And now, I mean obviously seeing what’s happened with Dave, I think it’s obvious.

Marc Allan: Yeah, he needs you more than you need him, is all.

Sammy Hagar: We don’t need him.

Marc Allan: No, I know you don’t need him.

Sammy Hagar: But you know, the point is, is that I think it’s kind of cut and dry now, I think. The truth of the matter has just surfaced. I mean, this is, we’ve had three number one albums in a row, and I think it’s just an old issue now. I don’t think it’s there anymore. Ten more years from now, maybe they should do a reunion, I don’t know. But right now, I think if I split and Dave came back, my gut feeling is that it would hurt the band. First of all, the band would never do it. If I left this band, Dave would not be the guy who came in. There’s not a happy mutual thing going on there. So, and second of all, these guys would have to cut my neck and throw me out of the band.

Marc Allan: Right.

Sammy Hagar: So it’s not, that isn’t even an issue.

Marc Allan: Yeah, okay. Well then we leave it alone, then.

Sammy Hagar: Yeah, it’s really going good within the band. We kind of have more than a band going with that. We’re actually friends. From the day I first walked into this situation and played with these guys, we all just kind of smiled and warmed up. It was like “hey, this is fuckin’ great. “We’re the same kind of people, we get along. We talk about music, old albums, an old Led Zeppelin tune, an old Cream tune, and it’s always the same song that we all love. And it just, it’s unbelievable. You know, Eddie lives right next to me. It’s his beach as well. It’s the same family, we’re friends. You know, you don’t live next door to somebody you hate. It’s a real special situation, and outside people don’t even know. Because if you hear the music, and if you’re really sensitive, maybe you can hear that there is a marriage there. Some people just take it like “oh, it’s a great band, everything’s good.” But it goes so far beyond that. You can’t even imagine how close we are, as people.

Marc Allan: Mhm, there’s a reference book I use. “The Encyclopedia of Pop Rock and Soul.” And it has a long and interesting entry on you. And it starts out by saying “there are more than “a few contradictions between the public and private “phases of Sammy Hagar. “On stage, thrashing out red hot licks “while he screams out raw-edged rock lyrics” “and makes no holds barred comments between numbers, “he seems the personification of the cruisin’ “and boozin’ blue collar town he grew up in. “Offstage, he was typically relaxed and reflective, “enjoying detailed discussions of favorite topics, “such as astronomy and the reality or non-reality of UFOs.” Is that uh, is that you?

Sammy Hagar: Yeah, I think so.

Marc Allan: Yeah?

Sammy Hagar: Damn, who is this asshole who nailed me? I’ll kill him! No really, someone wrote that, huh?

Marc Allan: Yeah.

Sammy Hagar: Well, if I– God, you know, I’d pretty much say that’s about as accurate as I can think of myself. I’m not a real kind of person who sits around and thinks a lot about myself, but damn. When you were reading that I was going “if you wouldn’t “have said my name, I would have said “shit, that sounds like me.” So I mean yeah, it’s pretty good.

Marc Allan: Yeah, all right. So are there UFOs or not?

Sammy Hagar: Oh yeah.

Marc Allan: Yeah?

Sammy Hagar: Yeah, the latest book I’m reading now is called “Watchers.” It’s kind of the latest details of some people. Betty Anderson’s case. It’s uh… It’s scary, I wrote a song called “Someone out There.” It’s scarier to me to think that we’re the only people in this whole, big universe. If you know anything about astronomy or space and time, how big everything is, how minute this planet is, and how unsophisticated our sun and so forth, and our little solar system is. To think that we are the only ones. That scares the shit out of me. You know what I mean? That means that there’s no God or nothing, so I’d rather believe in God and hope that we’re not just out here on our own. Because if that’s the case, then fuck it. I might as well have a real good time. If there’s no dues to pay, if there’s no judgment day, shit, you know? I’ll join the family, you know?

Marc Allan: Of course the line that everybody always says is how come UFOs always land in a farm, or in a 32 IQ’s back yard, how come they never land in the middle of Manhattan?

Sammy Hagar: Well they do, there’s that classic case. John Lennon, of all people, was one of the people that saw it in 1967 or something like that? Seven UFOs that were spotted right downtown New York. In the air, they were doing all these acrobatics and shit, and then they just boop, disappeared. And there’s like 50 people in one group, on one street corner, were all questioned about it or something, and it’s documented in project bluebook. You can look it up, find that book. And there’s been many cases in a lot of cities. But for one thing, in a city where people are crazed and busy and shit, a lot of things happen you don’t see. And the skies are pretty funky, too. But it’s like, out in a farm, it’s a lot less– You know, these guys don’t wanna have some cat come out and blow their brains out and shit, you know?

And have the police come chasing them or whatever. I mean these guys, they probably – There’s three different kinds, I think. I don’t have all the answers, but I believe there’s three different kinds. One is a manifestation of your brain. You’ll look up and you’ll see something, only because your brain just projects it. Almost like a hologram, it’s almost like your brain’s a projector all of a sudden. Taking things in, but your eyes can also– There’s imaginary ones, okay? But they’re real to same people. Then there are robots that some people, like us, end up in a space shuttle with computers and so forth. And then well, some people, I think they actually have robots that have functions. R2D2 kind of characters, only that’s a a little bit far fetched, but scientific machinery, that can– Like computers that come down and make all these tests, you know? They get Earth samples just like we can go to the moon and get a scoop of Earth, you know? They come down here and cut somebody’s god damn dick off, you know?

 They wanna look at it, take it up, see what’s going on, you know? And then, there are real creatures like us. But other type creatures. I don’t know, they could be ants, you know? They could be anything, depending on the environment. They come from other dimensions, not our planets in our solar system, other worlds. And they come down here and they are real curious little creatures, and they are much more sophisticated, in order to be able to come here. And they visit people, and they experiment. They grab guys like me, and they just fuckin’, just with the chop, you know? Instant little thing, boom, you know. Your memory goes, you lose time, and until you’re hypnotized, you don’t even know it happened. It might have happened to you, it’s happened to me before.

Marc Allan: It has?

Sammy Hagar: Oh yes it has.

Marc Allan: Okay, what happened?

Sammy Hagar: I don’t know, exactly. But it happened.

Marc Allan: Do you know when it happened?

Sammy Hagar: Yeah, 1967.

Marc Allan: 1967, okay.

Sammy Hagar: And it was like a computer situation. I was kind of plugged into, and it was either feeding me information, as if you took a computer and you transfer something from one disk to another?

Marc Allan: So tell me, where are you and what, you know-

Sammy Hagar: I’m in my house in Fontana, California.

Marc Allan: Okay.

Sammy Hagar: And I’m asleep.

Marc Allan: Okay.

Sammy Hagar: Middle of the night. And all of a sudden, I almost felt like there was this cord in me, in my head. And it went up on this mountain top, behind where I live. It was an electrical connection, I’m calling it a cord. Nothing makes sense. It was in dream state, it’s like “what the fuck? “Wait a minute.” You know what I mean? It’s like trying to explain it, you’re going “well it was like a cord was coming out of me.” I was plugged into, okay? And it was connected to these three creatures. Which I can’t even explain what they look like, but when I sort of think, if you can just sort of see them, it’s almost like… Just a glowing being. It’s like in ET, that kind of thing.

No, “Prelude to the Landing” No, god damn, what is it? The movie Henrik was in. “Close Encounters.” All those creatures kind of glowed like that, okay? And they said, in their own way, there’s no speaking. They were far away, they were a mile away. They’re going “he’s waking up.” And they yelled out a numerical system, like a code that was my code. None of the numbers were from our numerical system. I can’t even tell you what they were, but they were numbers. And all of a sudden, boom. It just went zap, and I open my eyes. My room was completely white. It was just light as if the brightest light in the world was in there. I couldn’t move my arms or anything, just my eyes were open. And then, bang, my eyes closed. I went back to sleep, woke up the next day, remembered the whole thing, and there it was. It was not a dream. You know what I mean?

Marc Allan: Did you report it?

Sammy Hagar: Hell no, to my wife.

Marc Allan: Your wife just slept through this whole thing?

Sammy Hagar: Yeah, totally.

Marc Allan: Wow. Okay, that’s-

Sammy Hagar: So, but I’ve read – Ever since then, I have had this intense curiosity about astronomy and everything. I would go into a book store and I’d pick up a book, and I would open up chapters about UFOs and everything. And bang, somebody had the same type of experience. Exactly. I mean like, I’m going “shit, this is me talking.” So just things like that. It sent me on a mission. For a long time, and now I’m kind of over it because I take it for granted. It didn’t scare me, I’m not scared at all. I sit up, some nights I go out and stay up all night wishing that I could see one, that it would happen, that they’d come and get me and explain everything to me. I’m like out there making myself available to them. And then another time, in the middle of the night, one of the creatures was outside my window. And I was meditating, and I was saying. I was meditating, trying to make contact in my head. I mean, I did this and people think, you may think I’m crazy, but I’m not crazy. And I’d go “well wait a minute, I am crazy.”

And then all of a sudden, it was there, out my window. And I was afraid to look. First time I got scared, and I wouldn’t roll over and look. And I could see the same thing. It was like my room was kind of glowing. A tinge, you know?

Marc Allan: Okay, so the first thing that happened was in 1967?

Sammy Hagar: Yes.

Marc Allan: So you were like 19?

Sammy Hagar: I’m 43, I was probably 20. I had just gotten married.

Marc Allan: Just gotten married, okay, wow.

Sammy Hagar: I’ve been married since, same person.

Marc Allan: Whew, that’s amazing, huh?

Sammy Hagar: Yeah, it’s great.

Marc Allan: All right, so you-

Sammy Hagar: See, I’m not totally crazy.

Marc Allan: No, that’s pretty incredible given your line of work, that you’ve been married for 24 years or something like that, that’s great.

Sammy Hagar: It’s incredible.

Marc Allan: A couple other things and I’ll let you go. I wanted to ask you about one other thing in this entry, in this encyclopedia. And the way it describes your life, you’ve faced a childhood that not a lot of people would seem to envy, and I’m wondering if that makes you more conservative? Like, are you the kind of person who thinks that people should pick themselves up by their bootstraps, or does it make you more sympathetic to people?

Sammy Hagar: Both, it’s really crazy. Because I’m so adamant that each man should take care of himself. But, everyone needs compassion, or a reason, or something to get them to do it. I think the whole key to taking a person that’s down and out, and getting them out of that, is hope. You give them hope somehow. Whether it be, it depends on what they need. If it’s a person that’s down and out because they’ve been mistreated by mankind, and because they’ve been fucked over by their loved ones and everything, then you gotta show them love and proof that it’s worth it. If it’s a person that’s been just down and out because it’s a racist thing and so forth, you have to give them hope that there’s gonna be a change, you know? That there’s a light at the end of the tunnel for them. Without that, there’s nothing. And that’s where the belief in God comes in. And I’m not religious at all. I’m not a Christian, none of these things. But you have to believe in something, and that’s the importance of it. Whether or not it’s even true, I’d rather think that maybe even if it wasn’t true, that I may become like the pope, and who knows? He may know something we don’t know, but maybe he’s just saying “look, mankind needs this.” And then you give him all that, and then they’ll grab themselves and lift themselves up by their bootstraps, and go out and start doing it. But without some kind of hope, some kind of compassion from another man, they won’t have it. And I’m so sympathetic to people who are down, cause I have been down. My father died in a park, as an alcoholic at 56 years old. And a bum, a derelict in the streets, my father. You know, and he never got to see what I’ve done. He never got to see me as a man. And I’m real sympathetic to anybody that’s down, I can’t take it. And it’s like, I’ve got too soft of a heart for it. But at the same time, you can’t just give to people. Like if a guy’s a drug addict and he’s hurt, and he needs a fix, so you give him money and let him go get it again? No. You give him help, and you give him insight, and you give him inspiration, and you give him some love or something. But you don’t just hand people money, and you don’t just take care of people, because then they’ll want you to take care of them forever. So they’ve gotta grab their own bootstraps.

Marc Allan: Yeah, I wonder if given what everybody’s talking about with Clarence Thomas, who apparently grew up a very poor child and picked himself up by his bootstraps, and you know, now became a supreme court nominee. But he doesn’t seem to have a lot of sympathy for others who face the same sort of life.

Sammy Hagar: Well maybe he had to do it too much the hard way. Maybe he never got a break, you know? He figures even though where he is, maybe he’s a little bitter about it, maybe he figures he had to break his ass, so you gotta break your ass. I don’t, I’ve had a real, real soft life. Considered the hard edge that it started. I’ve been an artist my whole life, and I’ve been so gifted, you might say, that I was able to do all this stuff. I just

Marc Allan: Okay.

Sammy Hagar: I’m happy about it.

Marc Allan: Yeah, yeah.

Sammy Hagar: And so, you know, maybe he’s just one of these bitter guys. I’ve seen guys like that, too. It’s like the old fathers that worked their ass off in a steel mill their whole life, my father did but he got tired of doing it at about 40 and became a drunk, and killed himself, you might say. But the guys that did it and stayed too, and raised their kids were fuckin’ hard on their kids a lot of the times. Look what I had to do. You know, the old I walked five miles in the snow routine, so you’re gonna walk at least four, you know?

Marc Allan: Yeah.

Sammy Hagar: I don’t believe in that.

Marc Allan: Tell me about the show. What are people gonna see, and–

Sammy Hagar: The greatest rock and roll show they’ve ever seen in their god damn life!

With all this fire and– This is just me, that has all these problems. That I’m gonna go out on stage and just, you know, let them all out, probably. And I don’t mean layin’ scripture, I never do that on stage. I would never preach anything, unless I just, something really bugged me at the moment. I don’t take my problems out there. I get rid of my problems out there. So they’re gonna see a long, long show. We haven’t played in so long. We’ve got so many records now, we’re doing, going all the way back to the first Van Halen record. Some of the stuff, some of my solo stuff, we all still do our solo sections in the show, which is really special.

Marc Allan: Are you doing “Red“?

Sammy Hagar: Ah fuck, I don’t know. I got so many, I make my own clothing now. You know, Red Rocker Clothing. And it’s kind of sports leisure clothing, is what I’ve invented, a line of clothes that I can do anything in. I can sleep in them, I can go to eat in them, I can go on a stage in them. You know, it’s like I don’t ever have to change my clothes now, for any event. Just saves so much time. And so much decision, you know? You look in your closet and you’re going “oh gee, should I wear Versace, Yohi Yamamoto, “what am I gonna wear today?” You know? I go in there and go “I’m the Red Rocker, bam!” I’m the man, I’m solid. No, the show’s incredible. We haven’t worked out our show, per se, the show happens. We don’t work it out, you know what I mean?

Marc Allan: Yeah, it’s–

Sammy Hagar: We’re not working out the songs. But the lights and everything, there’s a lot of new techniques, a lot of new things. We have these new spotlights from the back of the stage that have been used maybe twice. And they’ve only been on big outdoor shows, the stones used them. They’re so powerful that people are gonna get a good look at us. And we’re gonna be walking around with this scorched hair on the back of our heads, but it’s pretty intense. We’ve, you know, Van Halen is never skimpy.

Marc Allan: How long will you be on stage, do you know?

Sammy Hagar: Between two and three hours.

Marc Allan: Wow.

Sammy Hagar: That’s the other thing, you never know. The songs might be twice as fast, but at rehearsal it’s over two hours and I’m not even talking. Give my 24 hours, you know–

Marc Allan: Yeah.

Sammy Hagar:  And once I start getting long-winded, but I’ll say about anything to anybody, you know? And uh, shit I don’t know, that could add another 45 minutes.

Marc Allan: Are you taking an opening act out with you?

Sammy Hagar: Yeah, Alice in Chains.

Marc Allan: Oh, okay. Oh that’s right, yeah.

Sammy Hagar: Yeah we won’t do it by ourselves. You know, everyone’s saying “evening with, evening with.” Bullshit. Nowadays, as good as we are, it’s still I think, it’s not as good of value. I’m always for hang bank, give the people as much as you can. There’s a time limit, which really makes it difficult for us. Our manager, everyone’s saying “do an evening with “and it’ll save us about 100 thousand bucks a night.” Or whatever, because of the overtime. And you know, after a certain– you play too long, and then all of a sudden all the stagehands get paid a whole other day. To make it long story short, you know, it does cost a lot of money after a certain hour. And I don’t believe in that kind of thing, too bad.

Marc Allan: Are you playing “Everybody Wants Some”?

Sammy Hagar: Uh, no.

Marc Allan: No? Oh, damn, I think that should be the national anthem.

Sammy Hagar: Oh yeah yeah, I agree with you. There’s some songs that aren’t me. And I hate to give anything away, as a matter of fact, just please don’t print this.

Marc Allan: Okay.

Sammy Hagar: But we’re playing “Jump”.

Marc Allan: Oh.

Sammy Hagar: And it’s never been me, and I never would play “Jump” before, because lyrically, I didn’t like it. But we put it in a different key, cause it sounds too low, you know? So I gotta get up and everybody gets me down. When I singing, that’s where it is, you know? So I can’t stand to sing that low, so we’ve put it in a different key, we reworked it, and it’s great. But “Everybody Wants Some” didn’t make the cut. The band, we rehearse a lot of the tunes, and we find out which ones fit. Which ones I feel good singing, which ones the band plays best, and “Everybody Wants Some” wasn’t in there.

Marc Allan: Whenever I hear that song I think “damn, that should be the national anthem!” Because, you know-

Sammy Hagar: It is a cool song, man. Except you know, all the talking in there–

Marc Allan: Oh yeah, you don’t need that bullshit, but-

Sammy Hagar: I can’t, I can’t go out there and do somebody else’s rap. I can sing somebody else’s stuff, that’s difficult enough sometimes because I don’t believe in what exactly it is, but to sit there and do somebody else’s rap is tough.

Marc Allan: Okay.

Sammy Hagar: That’s a tough one.

Marc Allan: Last question. Is music better or worse today than when you started? And I don’t mean your music, I mean music in general.

Sammy Hagar: In general? I think it’s better.

Marc Allan: Why?

Sammy Hagar: Because I think it’s gotten, there’s better musicians and there’s better production and all that stuff. Now I’m not saying all music. The only element that I don’t like is the fact that there’s so much contrived music, because it’s being rehashed so much, and so many people know what makes a hit. The formula writing, what I call the LA songwriters that write for the bands that have the hits, I hate. It sucks. And most dance music that is just contrived, taking a beat and just fuckin’– To me, stinks, most of it. I can’t stand that stuff because it just, it reminds me of disco. Like, this is prefabricated shit that just, just too prefabricated, too contrived. But, to where older music when I first started wasn’t like that. There were the pop bands, but then there were so many, you know, Deep Purple, and Zeppelin, and all these bands. Black Sabbath, and you know, Montrose. These kind of bands that were not contrived bands. They just went out and – But there’s still a lot of that now! I mean, you’ve still got Metallica, and you’ve still got Anthrax, and Faith no More. You’ve got a lot of cool bands out there right now. I think music’s starting to –  Not necessarily pop radio. Or MTV, but music is great.

Marc Allan: Anything else you want people to know?

Sammy Hagar: Yeah. That this is the baddest motherfuckin” band in the goddamn world, but they already know it! But for those that don’t!

Sammy Hagar: It is, man, it is.

Marc Allan: Well, it was fun to talk to you, and I’m looking forward to seeing your show.

Sammy Hagar: Yo Marc come on backstage, man.

Marc Allan: Okay, thanks man. All right.

Sammy Hagar: Take care, bye bye.