The biggest song Sammy Hagar ever made: ‘It changed my life’
It’s not really a stretch to call Sammy Hagar one of the saviours of Van Halen when he came on board.
None of the members were exactly hurting when he first joined, but without David Lee Roth, it was up in the air whether they were going to fade into obscurity or pull off one of the greatest comeback stories that any band had ever seen. And while ‘The Red Rocker’ did the best he could to make the band superstars all over again, he was already set before he was even asked to join.
Then again, it wasn’t like Hagar was setting the world on fire when he first started making music. He was barely out of his teens when he worked with Montrose on their first few records, but when he voyaged into his solo career, it took him a few years before he truly started to understand what his fans wanted. He had gone in the singer-songwriter direction, but it was much better for him to make the kind of music that he loved growing up, whether that was worshipping Zeppelin or locking into a groove Aerosmith could be proud of.
But before he even started his solo career, Van Halen were already paying close attention to what he was doing. Their producer had suggested that they get Hagar in the band before they even put out their first record, and when they were playing their first few bar gigs, some of their cover songs included Montrose tracks in the mix. But the late 1970s looked a lot different for both Hagar and Van Halen once MTV started.
Most bands wouldn’t have been able to survive transitioning to such a new art form, but where many acts didn’t adjust to the music video format all that well, Hagar had the perfect idea with ‘I Can’t Drive 55’. The song itself was already the kind of relatable tune about driving fast cars, but coupled with the video of Hagar recreating the situation he was in when he got pulled over by a cop, the song went into the stratosphere.
There were far more hits to come once Eddie called him up, but Hagar said that his ode to driving fast managed turned into one of the biggest paydays of his career, saying, “The song really changed my career — changed my life. Financially, it’s earned me more money than any song I’ve ever written or been involved with, including Van Halen.” But when looking at what he did with Van Halen, you wouldn’t have exactly pictured the same singer behind this song being in the band.
He has a commanding presence, no doubt, but when paired next to Roth’s voice, there was a lot more precision that would have been too overbearing if it wasn’t in the right context. Then again, they didn’t need to worry about a thing the minute that songs like ‘Good Enough’ kicked in. The riffs were made for Roth in many respects, but Hagar transformed them into some of the fiercest rockers of their career.
VOA may have been huge when Hagar first started having conversations with Van Halen, but it’s not like they were averse to playing some of his solo material, either. Everyone might have been in that crowd to hear tunes like ‘Dreams’ and ‘Right Now’, but they did manage to throw in ‘I Can’t Drive 55’ over 300 times when Hagar was in the band, even finding time to cover a few of his other tracks like ‘Eagles Fly’ and ‘There’s Only One Way to Rock’ as well.
And while a wealth of Hagar’s recent tours have featured a lot of Van Halen material, it makes sense that ‘I Can’t Drive 55’ always got a prime spot in the setlist. It was the song that helped build his dynasty in many respects, and even if it may have been fun to jam with one of the best guitarists in the world, there’s hardly any reason to think that he was going to be struggling for the rest of his career if he had this in his arsenal.
