Sammy Hagar says he’s tried inviting Alex Van Halen to his upcoming Best Of All Worlds tour but Alex isn’t interested.
Below is an excerpt from an article written by Ultimate Classic Rock’s Matt Wardlaw:
Sammy Hagar will kick off his Best of All Worlds tour with Joe Satriani, Michael Anthony and Jason Bonham this week, promising to focus on a mix of classics and deep cuts from his time with Van Halen.
Despite the nature of the tour, fans shouldn’t expect to see any guest appearances from Alex Van Halen along the way — but it isn’t for a lack of trying on Hagar’s part.
“Mike and I reached out to Alex before we did this,” Hagar tells UCR. “We reached out to him a dozen times before this tour, in every way. Email, text message, phone call, message on the machine, OK? No response. No response. I mean, we made every offer to get together or to just talk or to have breakfast, lunch or dinner. Go to the studio and play. Come to my house or I’ll come to your house. Go ride horses, go sit on the beach. What do you want to do? Let’s just do something. Let’s get together. And nothing.”
Noting that he and Van Halen “don’t have a relationship,” Hagar added: “When the tour came, the first person we called and left all of the messages, sent all of emails, it was Alex Van Halen. Mike and I said, ‘We’re wanting to do this thing.’ Alex’s famous line to me [was], ‘Sammy, we ain’t getting any younger.’ Mike and I said, ‘Alex, we ain’t getting any younger. We’re going out and playing for the people. We’re going to go honor the Van Halen catalog. Let’s just get together and let’s talk about it. Mike and I, we’re going out, we’re going to do this, Alex. Please join us. Let’s be friends, let’s bury the hatchet, whatever.’ There was no response.
“I was saying, ‘He’ll come to a show, he’s got to in L.A. or something. I’m sure he’ll come.’ But no, no, he sold all of his equipment. That was his statement. That was like, ‘Nah, I ain’t coming nowhere.'”