The one person who broke up Van Halen, according to Sammy Hagar: “He poisoned the band”
There’s usually no single person to blame when a band decides to break up. While some members may not be pulling their weight, personal differences often become too overwhelming, making it impossible for everyone to stay in the same room for more than a few minutes. Although Sammy Hagar had been increasingly unhappy with Van Halen toward the end, he believed that their manager, Ray Danniels, played a key role in tearing the band apart.
Ever since Hagar joined the group, it felt like they had grown exponentially in just a few months. There were still some silly moments to be found across every one of their records, but that hardly mattered when it came time for them to throw down tracks like ‘Dreams’ and ‘Right Now’ whenever they played live.
There was also the added bonus of Hagar being down to Earth. Despite having to structure most of the tunes when he was in the group, the fact that he wasn’t the larger-than-life presence that David Lee Roth was left many fans loving what he brought to the table as if he was playing the role of a singer who knew he won the musical lottery with Eddie behind the fretboard.
After the release of Balance, the group had already started to fracture slightly. The record was far from the standards that they had set before, and given how Eddie walked away from the album and almost automatically relapsed on booze, it probably meant that he and Hagar weren’t exactly on the same page.
As the group prepared to put music together for what would become a greatest-hits album, Hagar thought hiring Danniels as their new manager was a big mistake. Danniels had experience working with artists like Rush in the past, but Hagar saw his main mission as tearing the bond between him and Eddie apart.
When talking about his final days in the group, Hagar thought he was watching his band being taken away from him, saying, “He was manipulating Eddie, saying, ‘Why would you let this guy run the band?’. It was my band. They went along with everything, and then this new guy comes in and starts needling Eddie. I didn’t like the new guy, but he poisoned the band, and he broke us up. We would still be together.”
While it’s hard to see someone like Hagar claiming that Van Halen was his group since it’s named after the guitarist and drummer, it’s easy to see where he’s coming from. No matter how many times they butted heads, Hagar always had the group’s best interests at heart, so when someone else comes in to disrupt everything, it tends to turn everything on its head pretty quickly.
And it’s not like Van Halen recovered quickly from Hagar’s departure. Say what you want about Eddie’s guitar playing, but whatever ended up on Van Halen III was light years below what their normal pay grade was, especially when they made newcomer Gary Cherone sound like Hagar on more than a few songs. There were probably more than a few factors that went into Van Halen splitting, but whenever the businessmen rear their heads, it’s bound to spell trouble.
