Sammy Hagar has fired fresh shots at his former Van Halen bandmate, comparing drummer Alex Van Halen to Roger Waters as their feud shows no sign of easing.
The former Montrose singer last fronted Van Halen in 2005, when their union came to an end after four albums. Founding bass guitarist Michael Anthony exited as well, with Eddie’s son, Wolfgang Van Halen, stepping in when the band reunited once again with David Lee Roth in 2007.
In recent years, Hagar and Anthony have formed the backbone of the Best of All Worlds band, Hagar’s Joe Satriani–powered tribute to Eddie Van Halen. The group even helped Hagar complete a track he claims he co-wrote with Eddie in a dream more than a year after the electric guitar virtuoso’s death.
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Meanwhile, Alex Van Halen has floated the idea of assembling one final Van Halen album with help from Steve Lukather, a project neither Hagar nor Roth is expected to be part of. The lingering tension between Hagar and Van Halen surfaced again in the singer’s new interview with Classic Rock.
“I’m the biggest Pink Floyd fan,” Hagar says. “I see David Gilmour say, ‘I will never play with Roger Waters again,’ and I know what he means. I feel that way about Alex Van Halen. They’re negative people.”
That was the biggest part of my career, for god’s sake. It was the biggest band in the world
Sammy Hagar
The Gilmour–Waters feud famously reached its breaking point in the mid-’80s, culminating in lawsuits after 1987’s A Momentary Lapse of Reason became the first Pink Floyd album without Waters.
Hagar also argued that the Best of All Worlds lineup comes closer than anyone else to recreating the Van Halen experience.
“Because frickin’ Mike Anthony’s in the band, I feel good about playing a lot of Van Halen stuff, ’cause no one will ever hear it again,” he says. “That was the biggest part of my career — everybody’s career, for God’s sake. It was the biggest band in the world.”
Alex Van Halen recently revealed that during the 12-year stretch before the band regrouped with Roth for 2012’s A Different Kind of Truth, he and Eddie considered Ozzy Osbourne as a potential frontmen for a new project. In 2017, they began talking about collaborating with Soundgarden frontman Chris Cornell, though that fizzled when Cornell died a few months later.
Anthony, meanwhile, has suggested that if Alex Van Halen and Steve Lukather do move forward with a final Van Halen record, it should be instrumental if they truly want to honor Eddie Van Halen’s legacy.
