Sammy Hagar confirmed that he sent an Instagram private text message to David Lee Roth about the vicious art photo Dave posted depicting him after the death of Eddie Van Halen.
A fan asked Hagar, “If Dave is as cool as I would like to think he is he would wrap it up and send it to you as a gift. Who knows maybe he will. I would love to have one of his pieces of artwork. I actually think they’re kind of interesting because they’re totally Dave.”
Hagar responded, “That would be fantastic if he did that high sent him a message on his Instagram that I want to buy it and I do and I will maybe he will donate the money to charity let’s do something right here.”
Another fan added, “In fairness Sam, you did knock Dave once again on Trunk. I’m guessing this is Dave responding.”
Hagar shot back, “I didn’t knock him I was saying that he’s a tough guy to work with and believe me that’s the truth. But he couldn’t have painted it that fast this is too good. There’s absolutely no angst from me I love it.”
David Lee Roth recently discussed his Eddie Van Halen tribute song “Somewhere Over The Rainbow Bar & Grill.”
“I don’t usually write autobiographically,” he told Variety, “but this was a specific effort to replicate a time and a place.”
Roth then said the line about the “smell of fresh sawdust” on the floor of the venues that hosted early Van Halen shows, DLR explained how the song touches on playing with Eddie early on. “There are two kinds of burials in show business. One’s very quiet, behind the scenes, nobody attends. And then there’s a ‘show biz’ approach, where you have a solemn ceremony and it’s followed by a reception where everybody gets up and tells stories.
They can be off-color, they can be tear-jerkers, they can be of any nature. When my dad passed, the reception was at a Mexican restaurant around the corner. Everybody was eating and drinking and then the speeches become more colorful and much more energetic.
Sometimes that’s the most heartfelt, heartbreaking, best material ever. And so I thought, if that occurred for Ed — which it did not — and everybody was going to get up and tell a story, when it got to my turn I would start with, ‘The smell of fresh sawdust on the floor…’ And go from there.”
“That’s the beginning of the story, at least for me. Because that was everywhere we played — the smell of fresh sawdust on the floor. And we were famous for breaking drinking records. Still are! And solo, too!”
