“You don’t replace that”: The singer Sammy Hagar hailed as irreplaceable
Being asked to join any legendary band is always a big job to consider. Although it should be an easy decision if someone’s looking for work and the perfect musicians show up on their doorstep, it’s a much different call when it comes to replacing someone who’s already known to be a legend in their field. And while Sammy Hagar managed to make a second career out of joining different bands, he knew there would always be those acts that he should never touch.
But ‘The Red Rocker’ was never meant to be tied down to one project, to begin with. He always wanted to make music with anyone he could hang out with, and by the time he finished working in Montrose, he was ready to deliver some stellar tunes in his solo career. Then again, Hagar always liked to surround himself with people who were good at their craft, so it was a no-brainer when he got the call to join Van Halen.
When looking at the version of Van Halen that came out in the late 1970s, no one would have expected someone like Hagar to be a good fit. David Lee Roth was one of the most energetic frontmen of all time, and while Hagar did have boatloads of charisma, his down-to-Earth mentality was a far cry from what ‘Diamond Dave’ was used to. But that never mattered when it came to the music.
Since Eddie was already going through a significant tonal shift on 1984, Hagar’s voice worked like a charm on tunes like ‘Dreams’ and ‘Summer Nights’, and even by the time they were making ‘Right Now’, their attempts at a more mature version of rock were still interesting. When ‘Van Hagar’ came to an ugly end in the late 1990s and again in the 2000s, though, Hagar felt it was time for him to be more of a free agent again.
He would always work with his supergroup Chickenfoot when he could, but outside of his solo career, his collaborations with the Waboritas were signs that he was actually having fun with music again. Right as he was getting comfortable in his solo career, though, Hagar never expected to get the call from Aerosmith to jam with them.
“I was asked to be in Aerosmith and I said no. Certain bands and certain singers are more difficult to replace than others. It’s still always been Steven at the front of Aerosmith. You don’t replace that.”
Sammy Hagar
Steven Tyler’s involvement was always up in the air in the 2000s given his involvement with American Idol, but as much as Hagar loved the members of the band, he knew that there was now ay that he was going to be able to do their songs justice live, saying, “I was asked to be in Aerosmith and I said no. Certain bands and certain singers are more difficult to replace than others. Steven Tyler and that band have stayed together for forty years and you don’t want to walk into something like that. They had one moment years ago, when they replaced Joe Perry, but it’s still always been Steven at the front of Aerosmith. You don’t replace that.”
Then again, few mortal men could manage to do with Tyler did throughout his career. Despite finally retiring from touring, the frontman has always been the litmus test for what a frontman should sound like, and no matter how much Hagar might try to sing a tune like ‘Dream On’, there was no way that anyone was going to forget Tyler’s manic screams towards the end of the original.
Hagar was no doubt leaving a lot of great ideas on the table by turning down Aerosmith, but it was more about the longevity of his career at that point. He had all of the money that he could have hoped for by this point, and while singing along to ‘Walk This Way’ would have certainly been fun, he would have much rather made the music he wanted to rather than get stuck in the role of replacement singer again.
