The rock movement Sammy Hagar was always intimidated by
Some of the best artists in their field thrive on a healthy sense of competition. Whether it’s manufactured rivalries like The Beatles and The Rolling Stones or genuine hatred between Morrissey and Robert Smith, the biggest names in their field have relied on their animosity towards another artist to spark something in their writing. While Sammy Hagar had a bigger rival in David Lee Roth when joining Van Halen, he admitted feeling uneasy the minute that Alice in Chains came to town.
Before Hagar had even sung a note with Van Halen, though, the odds were already stacked against him. I mean, when you have a frontman like Roth, who turned into a glorified cartoon character every time he took to the stage, how can you expect to have the same kind of charisma as he does?
While Hagar wasn’t looking to be the next singer in Van Halen, he eventually got the call when his mechanic was talking to Eddie Van Halen and suggested that Hagar would be a good fit. Not necessarily the ideal way of being introduced to the band, but the auto worker did give them a good idea, eventually gelling from the first few minutes working together.
Leaving Roth behind, 5150 became another smash success, launching their new era with Hagar off the strength of songs like ‘Dreams’ and ‘Why Can’t This Be Love’. Then again, the success of Van Halen’s next era may have had to do with when they switched singers.
By 1984, Van Halen had become the biggest act on the planet, so everyone was already wondering where the hell they were going to go next when they had a newcomer in their ranks. Once they started working on their 1990s masterpiece For Unlawful Carnal Knowledge, though, Hagar thought Alice in Chains was the new generation that would stomp them out.
Although still indebted to the sounds of hard rock and metal, Alice in Chains was the first major success story to come out of Seattle, breaking ground a few months before Nirvana set the world on fire. After being looked at as titans of hard rock, Hagar thought that groups like Alice in Chains spelt the end of their relevance.
Putting together their next tour, Hagar motioned to get Alice in Chains on the bill only to get on their good side, explaining, “They made me nervous. I thought, ‘These guys are going to disrespect us. You know, they’re going to look at us and say, ‘Yeah, your shit’s done, buddy’… I was so insecure about it that I invited Alice In Chains, with their first album and their first single – when they had ‘Man in the Box’ to open for Van Halen.”
For all of their uneasy energy, the members of Alice would eventually strike up a great friendship with the band, with Jerry Cantrell even admitting that he was equally intimidated having to play guitar every night, knowing that Eddie would be in the audience watching him. Van Halen would continue to have relevance until the late 1990s before Hagar’s departure, not wanting to deal with the Van Halen machine anymore. They may have walked the walk as a hair metal act at the time, but the ‘Van Hagar’ era of the outfit was still highly respected even among the alternative crowd.
