My mom saw me filling out the paper she starts crying. She says you're not gonna do that liquid it did your father and I do the pavers in the trash. And that was the end of my boxing career. So that was an important moment because I gave up on one dream. I was lost for a while. But then I started getting into music and my mom bought me that guitar 2995 that guitar changed my life. My mom made payments at 2995 My mom had to make friggin payments. At some point we were
welcome to a Search of Excellence which is about our quest for greatness and desire to be the very best we can be to learn, educate and motivate ourselves to live up to our highest potential. It's about planning for excellence and how we achieve excellence through incredibly hard work, dedication and perseverance. It's about believing in ourselves and the ability to overcome the many obstacles we all face on our way there. Achieving Excellence is our goal
and it's never easy to do. We all have different backgrounds, personalities and surroundings. And we all have different routes on how we hope and want to get there. My guest today is Sammy Hagar. For more than four decades, Sammy has been one of the best and most accomplished lead singers and songwriters in the history of rock music. Over his career, Sammy has had 25 platinum albums and sales surpassing 60 million worldwide.
Along this journey, he has set the tone for some of the greatest rock anthems ever written with songs like I can't drive 55 right now and why can't this be love? Sammy won a Grammy Award in 1991 and in March 2007 He was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame as a member of Van Halen. And in addition to being a music icon, Sammy is an incredibly successful entrepreneur. He's the owner of Cabo Wabo cantina, a thriving and iconic lifestyle
brand. He's the founder of Cabo Wabo tequila, which he sold in 2008 for $91 million. He's the founder of Sandy's beach bar ROM and a co founder of Santo tequila as well as several restaurants. Sammy has also had incredible success in the worlds of publishing TV and radio, including five seasons of his hit TV show rock and roll road trip with Sammy Hagar, and his host of Sammy Hagar is tough
rock countdown. And if that wasn't enough, he's also a two time number one New York Times bestselling author for his books, read my uncensored life and rock and are we having fun yet? Sammy is also an incredibly dedicated and generous philanthropist who along with his wife, Carrie, have donated many millions of dollars to a wide range of charities. Sammy, Welcome to In Search of Excellence.
Wow. Well, that's a lot to live up to. I guess we got a lot of explaining to do. How did that guy do all that?
Exactly? Well, let's find out. All right. I always start with our family because from the moment we're born, our family helps shape our personalities, our value and our future. You grew up in Salinas, California, the youngest of four children. We're going to talk about both of your parents separately. But I want to start with your father Bobby, he served in World War Two and when he returned, he worked at the
Kaiser steel mill. Her dad was also abandoned Wade boxer who held the record for being knocked down 20 times in a single fight. He was also a disturbed alcoholic who often spent your family's rent money on booze, which meant you and your family were regularly evicted. You lived in nine different houses before you were
10 years old. In many of those moves, were to get away from your dad, in addition to being what you call the town drunk, and a complete alcoholic and Batman, your dad was also a wife beater and violent towards his kids. So much so that your mom Gladys would occasionally take you and your siblings to a nearby Orange Grove to sleep in the car. When you were 10 years old. Your mom said that's enough. And she left her dad for
good. So a lot. Can you share with us what it was like growing up poor moving around so much and having a dad who was a violent alcoholic? And how did all of this affect you as a child and then later on in life?
Wow, it's such a deep question. I never knew I was poor because I didn't know any better. And we always lived in poor neighborhoods lived in small town. And there really weren't rich people in Montana at that time. And if there were, I wasn't hanging out with him and go into their houses. So in some ways, being poor was kind of a really great adventure that I think really gave me a sense of appreciation. Every time I got somewhere in life. I would revert back to wow, this is
great. It's so much better than before I had that before. It's okay. But my mother made it good. The way my father was because she ran off with us. So we never got abused and my father never touched me. He never He only praised me. He would say you're going to be champion the world my father wanted me to be a fighter. So I grew up thinking I'm gonna be a boxing champion. I'll be the world champion. I'll be rich and famous. And I just had this
fantasy going on in my head. And my dad encouraged it hit put on the gloves with me show me how to box and my friends had come over the house and my dad to get a couple of drinks in him and say Come on, put on the gloves, son hit on my buddies if we go on this again, because I was pretty good. You know, I had a good job. I was fast and I knew how to punch even at a young age. My father taught me how to do that kind of stuff. So my dad was cool. I mean, I looked up to him, I thought he could beat
anybody up. I was proud of him. It wasn't until I started dating, I started getting involved with girls that I realized my dad was a town drunk, and her dad wouldn't let me come over to her house. And I thought, What's going on here, I was naive, and my dad helped make me that way. And my mom did too. She grabbed us and ran us out of the house and went camping. You know, when the weather was good, we went camping. So we weren't homeless, we would have been homeless, I've been sleeping in a car,
which we did many times. But my dad was, he just really had a drinking problem. Other than that, he had a good heart, he was a really sensitive guy. My dad used to look at this mountain that I used to always say that I could see that mountain in his eyes. And he would look at this mountain and go, isn't that beautiful? Or he'd look at some tree, or, you know, some flowers or something.
My dad was a badass. I mean, he had punch anybody in the face for just looking at him wrong, you know, at that Miss, it's tough, but he's really sensitive. So I kind of inherited that in a way, you know, I'd look at it and see, I want to see what my dad was seeing. And so I think my dad had a profound influence on me and made me want to be somebody and convinced me I was going to be somebody. So I never had any doubt.
What about being poor? Did you have any exposure in fontana? Well, we'll talk about some of the jobs you had in a minute and one of them how to influence in you. But you said you didn't know that you were poor growing up. There weren't different economic socio economic classes when you were in school?
No, no, I, in school, I was really good at math, I was really good at art. And I was good in gymnastics. So that's what I concentrated on, you know, I didn't pay attention. I didn't do well in English, which is funny that I'm a writer. My whole profession, but I wasn't really good at English, because I didn't. I hated history. I didn't want to know about what happened. I want to know what's going to happen
right now. So I decided to be in poor like, say, my friends are all poor, I'd go to their house. And they weren't much better off than me. But some of them were a little better off. But their dad worked at the same place my dad worked. And the reason we were poor, is because my dad would get drunk for like a month at a time and not go to work. So we had no income, and my mom would leave and she'd do earnings or
pick fruit or clean houses. We used to go do yard work and stuff like that, you know, we'd pull up to some house at the yard look trash and they looked like they might have had a little bit of money, my mom would go knock on door and say, hey, we'll clean your yard up and stuff for five bucks. And we'd do it the whole family would we jump out and pick berries, we'd go to the strawberry patches and potato fields. In Fontana. It was very agriculture around there, close
to the Coachella Valley. So you know, we could drive 20 minutes and go work in the fruit or in the vegetable fields. And we did it as a family is great. It felt like fun. I'd make my own money I get I'd have like $4 and I go man, I'm gonna go buy a new pair of Levi's pair of shoes and a T shirt with this. You know, in the early 50s.
Let's talk about your grandfather and the impact he had on your life. Can you tell us about the activo lounge Lord Fletcher's Frank Sinatra in the fourth presidents of the United States.
My grandpa by Oh my mother's father came from Italy. He was very deliberate, didn't speak English that well, I guess when he got here came when he's about eight or nine years old. On a boat. He worked in a restaurant industry. He was a great chef. But he was like a superstar in a family because he was the only guy. He worked at these great places in Palm Springs. And he served Frank Sinatra. And he would serve a president would come in and have a they'd have a big buffet and
he was part of that. And so we you know, grandpa, and he was a good bullshitter he was number one. He was a thief and a liar. Which I hate to call him that because he can't defend himself but he was we loved him. And I'm named after him. Sam ours in a SAM Roy. And that's Roy's my middle name. So but I dug him. He was always uptight. You couldn't mess around his car. He always had kind of a nice car. And it would be like, wow, you
know, get your feet up. You know, do get wipe your shoes off where you get this car he was he was like, Oh man, this guy's grumpy, you know, but, but he taught me how to fish taught me how to hunt taught me how to cook. And I just remember pulling up to he lived in a trailer because he was always on the run. He never never lived in a house. He lived from attempt to a trailer. I had a new car every three or four years and had a really nice Airstream
trailer. And he would pull that trailer all around different parts of the country and go fishing hunting. It can all of his goods he renaissance man, he made everything. So I learned how to make food from him how to cook well, and how to eat well. I knew what things tasted like like so if I went to a restaurant I just because a man I really want to go to you know, this Italian restaurant or whatever and you go there you go. Well, this ain't as good as crabfest you know? And my mom
was good cook too. So I learned what smells good and what tastes good in food, and how to prepare things. He showed me how to do America, the way his version of America, he would chop the onion, the carrots and the salary. And he would do and put them all in the same pan. He would do the carrots first. Then into a pot, little more olive oil. He did the onions into the pot. And he had I'd say why you do it like that, grandpa, he'd say, because it keeps all the
flavors separate. You don't want it just tastes like one thing. You want it to taste like carrot, celery and onion. And I thought, wow, I took that with me in my whole life. And it's same with a song. You're playing an instrument. You want the bass to sound like a bass one guitar Sonic guitar, you want to drum sound like drums. You don't want them sound like a big ball of mush. And he really had it together. But I learned a lot from my grandpa. Quality of life. There you go.
I want to go back for a second talk about your childhood. Early Childhood specifically, what were you like as a kid? Were you popular? Were you a leader?
As a kid, I was really popular. I was very small and we short, but I had big sisters that would comb my hair and had a duck tail when I was five years old. You know, and a big old Pompadour and I mean, Jelly Roll thing. You know, anything that was in fashion, way above my era, I was in. They had me wearing Levi's customized download button, small belt. You know, my sisters had me looking like Elvis, you know, at all times. And so the girls dug me in school and I was good dancer,
I love to dance. And I would be the first guy on the dance floor. Little short guy. So the big guys, I was kind of a little short, tough guy too. You know, I had an attitude. And so the big guys liked me because it's the ACC Am I yeah, let's take Sammy with us. You know, these older guys. 1617 year old I'm like 10 or 11. They take me around and, and it sounds stupid. But they would get me to go into a situation where they want to get in a fight, you know, go to the next town over
to a football game. They'd bring me and I would go around, you know, act like a tough guy and somebody would push me so much. Hey, man, you're picking on the little guy. I kind of thought I was invincible. Because I had these big, tough guys's friends and the girls liked me that night. I had it going on had everybody fooled because I would have a paper out I'd get up at four o'clock in the morning and go throw papers. I would go to school. I would after work. I would go watch dishes, I'd mow
lawns, I'd do anything. Because I wanted to dress nice. So my mom didn't have that money. And after my dad after they split it completely, you know, we were really poor. And I didn't have no allowance no nothing, no way of earning money. So I earned my own money. So I always looked like I was probably doing pretty good. But as I started getting in my, my early teens, and I was getting interesting girls going to dances. I wouldn't bring anybody home to my house
anymore, man. That was it. You know, I didn't want to buy see how I live. So I had kind of a big front going on in junior high and and I just had one Mexican friend guy who lived down the street from me who was poor than me, or just as poor, Henry Aguilar. And he's the only guy would look come my house, we'd walk from school with a bunch of guys, and then him and I would turn off and go down to side street. And then we didn't we'd go to our neighborhood. And we used to build model cars and
stuff together. So he was kind of like my homie to hang around with it's at home. I'm just remembering this stuff. This is crazy. I gotta tell you, and then but at school, I didn't hang around with a group of friends. I started hanging around with people. I mean, I could have been the president of the High School of junior high and stuff. I could be the city councilman or whatever. They used to have student councilman, but I didn't never want to do
those kinds of things. But I could have, you know, I was always in all the dances. But like I said, I finally went to one of my girlfriend's houses, and her dad was not he found out who I was. And he said, he put me in his car and drove me home. He said, Come on, get in the car. And he took me out of there. I was over at the house you know hanging out and and I guess my dad had beat him up in a bar had punched him out. Yeah, pretty embarrassing. That's when
I started realizing wave it. You carrying the luggage with you son. Your dad did a rough job around this town for you.
Every successful person I've ever met had a bunch of odd jobs growing up. We've talked about a bunch of years, talked about. I went door to door and neighborhoods around my house asking a stranger if I could pick their weeds I bagged groceries at Kroger in high school. I dug ditches one summer while they were building the weightwatchers world headquarters in Farmington Hills, Michigan. We've talked about you pick fruit you deliver
newspapers and mowed lawns. And all your family was dirt poor your aunt lived in Palm Springs and new some wealthy people. Your cousin clean pools for wealthy families when you were in when you were nine years old. You clean pools with them. Can you tell us about Danny Thomas the popsicle and the end fluences had on your future.
Yeah, when I saw real money, you know, when I went and clean those bulls I saw for Hitchcock's house and Danny Thomas's house, I never even dreamed of having a swimming pool. So I was happy to go clean him. And Danny Thomas comes out, it was like 124 degrees in the summer in Palm Springs. And I'm out there scrubbing on my hands and knees scrubbing the tile, you know, from the top. And he's going, Hey, jump in there, you know, and I went really well, right, you know, took off my
shirt. In my jeans, probably. I can't remember what I was dressed like, but I didn't have a bathing suit on I don't think. And I dove in the pool. And I thought man, I swam at Danny Thompson's pool. And I used to tell my friends that you know, and they would think whoa, and I said, I told him I saw Alfred Hitchcock in the window, like in his movies, where he'd always be looking out a window or something in that scene. And I don't believe I really saw
Alfred Hitchcock. But I claimed this pool with my cousin Chuck and my uncle. But Wow. See in the rich, the person that in Fontana when I lived there, my dad finally cleaned up for 11 months. And we actually rented a nice house, never owned a house. My mother didn't own a house or my parents didn't own house. So I bought her one. So I never owned houses, we always rented but we were written dumps most of the time, because my mom would think, well, we have to leave, we're gonna lose his
house anyway, you know. So my dad cleaned up for a long time, went to AAA meetings and got a real support system from his workers as far as Kaiser still workers. And we moved to a nice house and across the street was a guy that owned a sporting goods store. And he owned all kinds of real estate. He had a real estate company, the Petersons. And they had a young boy, that was about a year younger than me. And single kid, he didn't have any brothers and sisters. And they had a three
car garage. They had a Lincoln, a Cadillac, and a Chrysler Imperial man. I mean, just remember, I was a car guy in 1956. We had a 49 Ford. But we lived in same neighborhood, but they had this really nice house in that neighborhood wasn't really a neighborhood. It's kind of very rural. We had a lot of property, we just kind of fields. But he had a nice piece of property with her in law quarters, and they had a live in
maid and all these things. And this guy took a liking to me and my brother, because we play with his kid. Bobby would come over to the house. Hey, Sammy, can you come over? Oh, can I come over and play? I'd say no, let's go to your house. Because man, he had every toy in the world, his mom and make his grilled cheese sandwiches and give us ice cream and all this stuff. You know, they have one man, I really saw how rich people live for 11 months. They took me to
Disneyland with him. I saw at Disneyland for the first time. They took me to a country club. And they will get the Golf Country Club. They were going for lunch, you know, with Bobby and I'm sitting there gone, man, you know, this is like living. And that's where I really saw how it was so much what it would be like to be wealthy. I mean, you know, it was just I thought wow, I had never even dreamed
it. But I think that really elevated my brain to say, well, I want to live like that, you know, I'd rather I'm not gonna live like this anymore. I'm gonna someday I'm gonna live like that. I didn't know how I was going to do it. But I was. I certainly opened my eyes. And I think it's really important for young people to have an experience like that. And I had long enough to really say I know what this is about. Now this ain't just a one time fantasy. Oh, they must not live like this
every day. No, these people live like this every day. I really think it's eye opening. And it's enlightening. And it expands your consciousness at least to say there is a better life. Some people that just live in them get all their whole life and never get out. They don't know any difference. Like when I was young. I didn't know. I didn't know I was poor. I had no idea. Yet somebody asked me what I wanted to do. And I grew up oh, I want to be a boxer. I'm going to be world champion. Oh, what
are you going to do? You know? When are you going to do that? Well, I don't know. You know, it's like I don't know even know when I'm going to start you know, I just goof off with my dad or my friends with boxing gloves. But the truth of the matter is, is that I thought well, if I'll take a job at Kaiser co where my dad's working right now, you know man, he's making the you know, the 80 bucks a week. I wasn't thinking
big time at all. But tonight, I think the Petersons really, but that enlightenment and to me the Palm Springs thing was fantasy as a movie stars and stuff you know, those aren't real people.
Well, you know now that they are
well, some I know some people I know.
Very go. All right. At some point in our lives, there comes a point where we figure out what you want to do for some it comes very early in life. For some it comes later in life. Let's talk about when you discovered music. Tell us about the Sears catalog. The Fabulous steals and sneaking into swing of the auditorium when you were 17 years old.
Wow. I wasn't 17 I don't think I think I was younger than that. Because my friend when I snuck into the swing auditorium to see the Rolling Stones. There first American performance as 64 Maybe it was that when it was I don't remember but my friend had was driving I don't think I was driving
1964 The US debut of the Rolling Stones.
So is what I saw with that was what I really wanted to be that and see and Eric Clapton in the first cream performance at the Whisky a Go Go. I'm gonna play guitar like him. First I wanted to be Mick Jagger. Well, I wanted to be Elvis Presley. And then I wanted to be MC and then I said, No, I'm going to be Eric Clapton. He
plays and sing. So I'm going to be like, a Rod Stewart and Jeff Beck at the same time, I'm going to be Mick Jagger and Keith Richards at the same time that how I got that influence was, you know, I decided I was going to be both but I don't even play guitar yet. And I was just barely starting, I think is what really changed me up was I had a really crazy experience with my dad. He was really in bad shape. And he was going to take me into I got my car. I had a permit,
and he had a car. I was able to drive with him even though he didn't have a driver's license. We drove into LA to the Main Street gymnasium, and he said, I want you to train with John Bellefleur who had Jerry Quarry back in those days and Mondo Rama, some of those kind of people came out of the Main Street gym, and we went there. My dad told John Belfer, I want to get my son a professional and he's gonna go professional. He So has he any avenue even find
his whole life. So he said, Okay, it's gonna cost like X amount. My dad went down, gave blood and got the money to get the forms to for me to fill out to become a professional fighter. And I sparred with a real fighter, he hit me in the head. I was my head was ringing for a week. I thought, Man, I don't know if I really want to do this. But hey, I got to do this for my dad got back home. My mom saw me filling out the paper, she starts crying, says
you're not gonna do that. Look what it did to your father and blah, blah, blah, and I to the pavers in the trash. And that was the end of my boxing career. So that was an important moment because I gave up on one dream. I was lost for a while. But then I started getting into music. And I can tell you right now Music First my mom bought me that guitar from Sears and Roebuck 2995 with a guitar that's and if the case has got an amplifier in it, so you set it up, plug it in your one stop
shop. It was loud enough to sing to I got it say it's kind of perfect. So for that you could sing without a microphone. But the bottom line is, I just bought that guitar. Not that one. But I bought one on eBay recently, I found one for like 900 bucks, and I bought it because I thought that's my first guitar I need to have that I need. Even if it wasn't mine. That guitar changed my life. My mom made payments at 2995 My mom had to make friggin payments.
That's how poor we were. But you know, she told me if you learn to play Never on Sunday, on your friend's guitar, I'll buy you a guitar. So I sat down with him he taught me how to play Never unscented I'd added and added and I butchered it but but I got my guitar and I never played never on Sunday again. I started playing tic Dales, Mr. Liu and Rolling Stones a Beatle songs.
You had your first band in high school when you were 14 years old. You're an excellent student. But after you graduated high school you wanted to get out of Fontana as fast as you could you moved to nearby Riverside California managed a local music store and played in a handful of bands, local bands, including the Johnny fortune band, Big Bang, skinny dust, cloud, cotton, Jimmy the Justus brothers and manhole, then you got married and moved to San
Francisco. And at some point after moving there, two of your band members were arrested on drug charges, you are broke without a band. And after that you spent several months driving a dump truck for your father in law in New York as a means of supporting yourself until you could put a new band together. Here you are you dreamed of becoming a musician your whole life and now you're driving a dump truck on our path to excellence. All of us have to overcome any challenges and
obstacles along the way. We're going to talk about some of your other challenges a little later. But now can you take us back to the exact moment where you got that call? Your bandmates are in jail what you were feeling that day and on the flight back to New York. And while you were driving dump trucks were you depressed? And if so how did you get over that? And as part of that, tell us about the ship and the two creatures inside of the ship who visited you while you were laying awake one night,
man you just dumped a bunch of stuff in one bucket rather than living. First of all, just correct you. I never drove the dump truck. I didn't even drive it. I worked on the back of it. I was the guy who is out lifting up the stuff throwing it in the back. My wife's brother was driving her dad's truck. I was driving a truck he had the better job than
me. But to start with and also we didn't fly back to New York is what happened is when that what happened up in San Francisco, somebody gave my drummer acid and of course we're in San Francisco right playing music what he expected and these air in this era 67 around they're sick He went out and hit him. The bass player was a leader of the band and the drummer and a bass player room together and I had my little room and they had community
bathrooms. It wasn't even we didn't even have our own bathroom and we just rooms you know, like six bucks a night or something. And we were living above that club. We were playing that back in these oldie but goodie Aqsa coasters in the drifters and the Shirelles and these kind of oldie but goodie acts that were coming in, and we would play their songs because my bass player was an older dude, he knew it, but he was selling weed. They couldn't live
on what they were getting. I couldn't either, but I was making it because I was bored. They, I guess they might have had more money than me. But as Larry Taylor and Dave Arnold, Dave was selling weed, Larry took acid went out on the street, four o'clock in the morning, finds these two cops walking the beat in North Beach. And in the strip club area where we were playing. And he goes, Hey, you guys need to get high. And they said, Oh, really? He said, Yeah. He said, Well, where
can we get some swag. So you guys wants to want to get high? And he said, Yeah, he says, Come on. He's stoned on acid. He thinks he's going to turn these cops on to get high. He's like, Well, I'm gonna change the law. I've changed the world right here. I'm gonna turn these cops on to getting high. So of course, they go right with him up to the room, walk in a room, arrest the fuck out of them. They say go to jail. And I'm there with my wife, no money. So I went and the manager, the
manager of the club. I said man, he liked me and like the band, but he took a liking to me Don Pruitt, wonderful guy. A wonderful man, by the way, a person with that helps other people even if he's not in a great position. know these people need help. I'm gonna help him. And he said, Look, I live in this apartment there paint my apartment. You can you paint. And I said, Hell yeah. You know. So I painted, made some money, enough money to paint. I started went and worked with these guys.
I made some good friends doing that. There was a couple guys that were really cool guys. And I'm music. One was a musician too. So I kind of got myself in the San Francisco scene. I went back home and tried to get it together. But my and I said I'm moving to San Francisco someday. That's it. I'm gonna get my shit together. And I'm going to move to San Francisco. There's something up there. And this Don Pruitt guy said, Yeah, I'll try to help you out. You know, if you put a band together, bring
him here. I'll get you guys some work as a cool. So in the meantime, my wife gets pregnant. I get my draft notice. And her dad says, I'm sending you two bus tickets. My daughter's pregnant. You're coming back to New York and you're gonna live with us. I'm not going to have this baby out in the streets we live in like, like hippies and like bums. You know, because my mom didn't want to slip in there. She you know, say if you're not gonna get a job, you can't live here. It was pretty
hard times. But I gotta tell you when I think right now I'm gonna man I was desperate. I packed up my guitar and my amplifier. I put wood on the front of my amp. The amp farm weighed like 100 pounds. One suitcase between us. We got on a bus that stopped in every friggin town. It took three days to get to Rochester, New York. And I went to work on his garbage truck. He was tough. My father, who became one of my dearest people I've ever known in my life and later in life. He
was tough on me, man. He won't even look at me. He'd shake my hand like this. It turned his head. shake my hands. Four o'clock in the morning. Ready to go to work? Yep. Yeah, that was tough. Rochester, New York. When it starts snowing. My brother in law was a good mechanic and him and I bought this bullshit little van that had a blown up engine. We put a new engine and we rebuilt it. We come home from working on the garbage truck, you go to work at four in the morning, you're done at seven.
So we go eat breakfast, come back home, start working on this car. And then I worked in another place at night. I was making in a print shop. Because I was trying to make save some money. I was saving every penny. I'm living with my father in law now. They're cooking. I'm eating their food, not paying any rent and saving every penny. And I wanted to get back and moved to San Francisco. So there was a
lot of stops in between. But that was my goal was to get to San Francisco where I thought I could make it and I did that's where it happened. But my father in law finally started liking me because I had I wasn't a bum I got it. I rolled up my sleeves I could work. I knew how to do it had to be done. I wasn't like a lazy guy at all. Never was still ain't. But anyway, he helped us
with the car. The first day it snowed, we strapped my ex wife in the back and we strapped this cot we built in the back and so wouldn't roll around and tied it to the walls. Put her in the back in the caucus. She was pregnant about four or five months by them. And we drove nonstop taking turns overnight 56 hours from New York to Southern California. I rented a house with the money I had went on welfare, had the baby and moved to San Francisco. Long story short.
Can you tell us about the ship and the two creatures inside of the ship?
That happened during that time before I moved to San Francisco? Yes sir. I can tell you about that. Ship.
Let's see, we want to hear about it.
Well, first of all, at that stage in my life, I was like 20 years old. I didn't know anything about astronomy, astrology I didn't know about and look at the sky, just see stars and everything looked at the sky, I was looking at the ground looking for money or bottles or some cash in and make money off of trying to make a living, but just no belief in any UFOs I didn't you know, anything like nothing. And all of a sudden, I'm laying in bed and I have this dream that I was
being manipulated some way. And this is before wireless. This was before remote, even remote control things. And I saw this little ship, like a fizzle flying saucer, sorry to say 13 miles away sitting on this little hillside and Lao Creek knew right where the area was. And they were tapped into me with a wireless system. But to me, I see a wire I saw in my brain is all I could think of. They got me plugged in there plugged into my brain. And I don't know if they were
uploading or downloading now. I believe they were just downloading. They just trying to see what I had to offer. You know, who's this guy? It was random. I don't believe I'm special from that. I believe I'm special from the experience a little bit. But not they didn't pick me because I was special. And they weren't trying to make me something. I believe this now. So long story short, I'm kind of waking up and I'm seeing what's going on. Well, what the
hell is this? Two little guys way up their houses working, couldn't put it together, but didn't yell it out. Telepathy, I could hear them I could feel them. We were communicating somehow. And they had a numerical system. It was like not from our numerical system. It was like Randa dad the pedometer icon. And I was unplugged. And they went black. My room turned completely white in the middle of the night. It just turned so white, that it was like infinity. And then it
went pow. And I opened my eyes. And I thought my eyes are open and all these weird things that split second. I was shaking like a leaf. And it's in the middle of the night. I didn't know what to do. I don't even think I woke up my wife. I didn't want to scare. It was like scary as hell. But my brain said, What in the hell was that? And I started looking in the sky. And I start thinking, wow, I started reading astronomy books. When I got first money I ever bought anything with it was probably my
a telescope. I want it to look and I started studying the planets. I started studying the cosmos. I started reading Einstein's book theory of relativity. I started reading those Pinsky. It just sent me I got goosebumps in my arms right now just telling you this, I got them all over my legs. It set me on a quest, I'm going to find out what the hell that was. And I started believing in myself one of what's God? I mean, what are we here for? You know, I didn't think about reading the
Bible. I just went to church because my parents made me I wasn't interested. None of that. It opened my brain. And when your brain is open it you start absorbing other things. And everything started happening for me from that moment on cosmic shit. I decide, oh, I think I'll go back to San Francisco and see if that guy is still there. And you know, walking up knocking on the door and I meet some other guy that says, oh, yeah, you've got long hair bushy hair is is you're going to be contacted
with him. You have photos you I don't know if they've been calling them from flying saucers or alien beings, you know, you'll be contacted by alien beings. Guys would look at me and see that I had had that experience that they knew it was. I'm sound like a crazy person right now. But I would have thought people crazy to freaking happen. So that was the greatest thing that ever
happened to me. Otherwise, I'd just been living in that house probably playing that nightclub was trying to get the job at and making a living and having kids and family.
So you move back to California in the 70s 1983 rolls around. You're playing in a San Francisco cover band and a well known session guitarist named Ronnie Montrose learned about you, recruited you to join his new rock band. You appeared on the first and second albums, which included the first song you ever wrote bad motor scooter. And a couple years later, you and Ronnie had some conflicts and you are fired from
the band. We're going to talk about your solo career in a minute, but when you were the lead singer and got that job, did you at this point, thank you had made it.
Yeah, I didn't have any money yet. But I knew that was the farthest I could see at what was making it. I had an album out. I'd been on TV and I toured the world and hadn't made any money yet. You know, $150 a week is what we made $10 a day per diem to eat on my phone was shot off and home and, you know,
and all that kind of stuff. But I couldn't have been happier, you couldn't have gotten me to be bummed out, the only bummed out thing is when I got kicked out of the band, and it's because of my ambition, I'm a very ambitious person, if I'm in a room with somebody, and somebody says, Hey, how are we going to do this? Or how does that work? Or can we do this? And if nobody jumps up and takes the lead, boom, I'm the first guy say, here's how we do it. And here's what we're gonna do.
And I'd start going, I don't even I start leaving adjust trail. I'm completely knee jerk, spontaneous. Don't think no downside exists in my world. And I go for it. And that's why I've always been, and it scared the hell out of my any leaders eyes ever around, you know, if I had a boss, he had say, whoa, whoa, whoa, hold on. Kijun. So Ronnie thought I was trying to take over the band, because I was always coming up with these ideas and writing all the songs. And so his insecurity threw me
out in the band. But it's really unfortunate that we never could communicate. I was naive. I didn't know what an eagle was, he had an eagle, I had never seen an eagle I didn't know and told me that there's people that will do the wrong thing. Just because of their pride. I never knew anybody like that, and that nobody would do that. Right?
Why, you know, being naive and being poor going back to catch us up here, again, the poor side of it, and the naivety, then, of the whole thing, I think was really important to get me through the hard times. So nothing seemed like a hard time to me. Hell, I'd already slept in a car and I already been
hungry. I already had nothing. I had work and fields at four o'clock in the morning picking fruit, you know, my mom did and then get up and go to school, and then drop me off at school and come back should work the rest of the day. So anything that happened to us like is no big deal. So Montrose, we were living it up. I was living in a hotel room. My drummers my bandmate, my roommate, you know, we had to double up we drove our own car had a station wagon, we drove ourselves from gig to gig.
I remember a time in Montrose getting stuck in a hotel, because we Ronnie Montrose is using his credit card because he had been in Edgar Winter man, I thought he was rich, but he really wasn't. He had made some money, he had a credit card, and his credit card was maxed, they went Let us vote.
So after that, you started what would become a very successful solo career, you had your first platinum records standing Hampton, which has some great songs on it, including there's only one way to rock in 1983 rolls around your next album, three lockbox generated your first top 40 single Your love is driving me crazy, which had number 13 on the Billboard Hot 100. And at this point, you're on a roll your next album vo comes out and along with it
came your best known song. I can't drive 55 which is one of the greatest rock anthems of all time, and which pumps me up every time I listened to it. And at this point, you're headlining in the US and Europe. Three years later, you have your first number one hit with your song give to live, which came out
after you joined Van Halen. Can you walk us through all of that you get fired from Montrose, you're starting your own solo career, you have your first platinum album, you reached the Billboard Hot 100, you've got massive hit, I can't drive 55. And then you have the number one song in the United States. Is this the dream? And was each of these accomplishments on your bucket list? Did you have a
bucket list? And at this point, did you really think you really, really made it and you weren't gonna go any further than this?
Well, once I got one little taste of fame and fortune, it was the fortune that drove me on that after because, but once you're on TV as yourself, once you have a, you know, hit record and all that it's like, you think, Well, I can do this as long as I want. When you're in the middle of a success in your heart, you know, when I was hot in the 80s, I thought, well, this will never end number one. And number two, I can do whatever I want.
Because I'm, you know, I start my ego start thinking, Yeah, you know, I did all this, I'm worked hard and got everything I wanted, and I know how to do it, and I can keep doing it. But money is what woke me up to the fact that there it you can have more, you know what I mean? It's like I have, I was living a pretty good life. But I thought, Man, if I retire, I ain't gonna be able to live like this, you know, I gotta keep working. So I thought I had to keep working.
So then I started thinking about well, maybe if I do the right thing with my money and all that, it could change things but you know, to where I wouldn't have to work if I didn't want to that was the only insecurity I had was being broke again in my life. So I started becoming driven by money, not where I would do anything for money. Not like that, but driven hey, if I can make that kind of money, go out and do that. I'll go do it. I'll work my ass off. I'm works
365 days a year. But it wasn't like, Oh, you want to go hit baby seals over the head with a hammer for a million dollars. No, no thanks. I don't need that kind of money. You know, I wasn't like that. But I would start becoming driven, really driven, but you know, the hits
and all those things. It was strange because my manager at that time said to me, you're the only artists he is this guy was the Beatles tour manager, The Rolling Stones agent, Petula Clark's manager and agent, the Osmond brothers, early manager, an agent and had a band called Sweet. And he took me on as my manager. And he said, You're the only artists I've ever known in my life, that success drives you, you get better, and you
work harder with success. Most artists, when they have a nerf successful, they feel, hey, I got a million dollars, or I've got plenty of money, they start losing their drive, and they start getting just distracted. And you've seen it again and again, how many people have hit the top and then just disappeared or ruin their life some way. I start working out more I start running every day I
start practicing more. I set my room and wrote songs I come after, after a show, I'd go to my room with the guitar and I'd write another song I was driven, driven, driven. He really expressed that he said, You know, I've never met anybody like you, this is great. You're really success makes you better. You get smarter. You tighten up your act, and all this and I think he was right. Because I wanted more. I didn't think I had enough. I know I had enough.
I knew I had made it. But I didn't the dream from then after 1982 The dream was was over. I accomplished much more than I ever thought I would ever accomplish. And I started dreaming a different dream. I can't explain it. But I just start thinking there's, there's something else that this can bring me. You know, being a rockstar is cool. But man, I'm 40 years old. And how long can I do this? You know, here, I'm 74 now going I'm still doing it.
But it does give me pleasure now again, but there was a time where I was just doing it and not for money. But I was saying no, I got it. I gotta keep doing this kind of for money. But until I find out what else I can do, everything goes wrong because well, but the dream was over. And 80 is not over. Like oh my god, I still had heart and passion. But I mean, I dreamt so much more than I ever thought I would have. This was beyond the dream. And it the dream wasn't
what I thought it was. So fame and fortune really didn't bring you anything. If you were still misery had a miserable marriage, you're still going to have that miserable marriage. If you were an alcoholic, you were still going to be an alcoholic, you know, if you were a bad guy, you're still gonna be a bad guy fame and fortune, no change none of that. All it does is keep you from having to work at something you might not want to do. I really got enlightened to fame
and fortune. And I thought that I'm no longer about fame and fortune. I'm about doing what I want to do. And this is going to lead me into something. I started thinking I might want to be into politics, I thought, you know, I could be president if I want to. Or maybe I want to run a big corporation, I would think like that because I had no education. I never finished high school. So I didn't have backing from a college with a degree and
all this stuff. So I started wanting to do things to show that I could do anything I was starting to flex my muscles say I'm smart is that I know how to run that company. I could do this. I could do that. And so I got really, really ambitious and creative in the sense where I would try anything. I was fearless.
Let's talk about Van Halen one of the greatest the most successful rock bands of all time. Van Halen, for those who don't know is a 19 best selling music group of all time is sold 56 million albums, the United States and other 29
million throughout the world. In 1978. You're playing in a music festival and Eddie Van Halen one of the Greatest Guitarists of All Time, if not, The Greatest Guitarists of All Time came up to you and told you that Montrose had been his favorite rock band, referring himself to himself as a Montrose freak, and told you that his own music was influenced by Montrose fast forward six years 1985 And your Ferrari bb 512 is in the shop for a tune up and as fate would have it, Eddie Van Halen also
happened to be at the shop that that day was admiring your Ferrari and when he asked your mechanic kados and poli about the car, Claudio said it belong to you. Tell us what happened next.
This is just one of those crazy things were the cosmic thing that happened to me, you know, back with the UFO, the little flying saucer dudes. Ever since then things like this would happen to me. And it just was just pure coincidence, but it just didn't get blown out the window. So Eddie Van Halen says to Claudio Oh, collio says, Oh, that car belonging Sammy Hagar, you should call him get him in your band. And Eddie goes, you got his phone number? Because his Yeah, and he sits right down
in the office. He calls me out of the blue. I just got home from a tour. Been home two days of VOA tour maybe 120 shows. The home was done. Happy to be home. in the best shape of my life though. You know, I didn't. Man I was like a chiseled. He says Hey, Dave quit. Why don't you come down and join our band. I said that Oh man, you know, hey, I'm just getting off the road, blah, blah, blah. And I, I said, Now, give me a couple of days. And he said, I like come down
like tomorrow. No. I said, When do you want to do this to come down tomorrow and go, Oh, no, no, you gotta give me a couple of days, man. I said, Man, I just got my head, shaved my head, cut all my hair off, because my hair was trashed and sweat, and every night and the lights, and as I got a haystack on top, my head, so I cut it all off after most tours. And I thought, Man, I ain't gonna go around with like this. And, and he goes, as once you come up here and what's trying to write
some songs. So he got he goes, Wow, I got I got some idea, you know, blah, blah, blah. So he talks me into it. I'm, I call my manager left. Are you going? I said, Man, I'd love to play with Eddie. But I said, Man, I don't want to be in that band. You know, thinking about their image because of the previous singer and, and I'm going I'm not that kind of guy, you know. So anyway, I went down and rest is history. Van Halen. Eddie and I hit it off, like, just on a creative level. He's gone. Whoa,
you can hit that note. I said, Sure. I can hit that and I hit higher and you can't hip ding because on the piano, and what would you see me this? He starts going why can this be too bad? And then I'm going to he's going Holy shit, man. And now it's gone. You know? Oh, man, we'll try this try that. They were like, using me like I was like they'd never heard anybody that could could sing. It's pretty funny.
So you joined Van Halen was too many becomes known as van Hagar and with you as a lead singer they produced for multi platinum number one billboard charting albums 5150 Are you a 12 for unlawful carnal knowledge and balance? During that time, the band has nine number one Mainstream Rock is with you as a lead singer. Your time with him had a lot of great moments and some that were not so great. You joined in 1985. You were fired from the band in 1996. Then you returned again,
from 2003 to 2005. And then either you are quit or were fired again. Can you tell us about those first 11 years were like your funding are the most popular and successful bands of all time. You're popping out multi platinum album sitting in front of sold out stadiums.
80,000 screaming fans, from there can you share with us when you are fired twice the medical issues this time involving your pregnant wife disagreements about their next album, Eddie's alcoholism, and him smashing his guitar on stage sending shrapnel into the crowd and almost hitting you.
Well, you hit on the good and the bad time. So let's start with a good time. So yeah, that band when I joined, and we released the first album, we all had our first number one record, straight to the Billboard top top of the charts. Number one, five weeks. I believe that's what it was. Anyway, and the first show the album wasn't even out and it's sold out in five minutes in Shreveport, Louisiana. And we came out we didn't even have a new album out yet. They haven't even released the first single
why can this be love. Everything got pushed back by but for some crazy reasons. And we started the tour anyway. And people tore down the barricade and the rest is history who is a band this band, the chemistry was just magic. So as what that being a Van Halen and having that kind of success, that even though I had success, it wasn't quite superstardom. See I bought there, I'm over it, I've done it all. I'm going to cut my hair off after view. I don't know
what I'm going to do. I don't know if I'll make another record for another year or two. And then I go right back in the fire, I'm thrown right back into fire. So like I said, I was in tip top shape. My voice was pretty much I've been singing for years. And really singing at the top of my game. I was on a this diet where it was a hostile weather. I didn't eat fat and I didn't need proteins. It was carbs. That actually without sugar, your the carbs would just eat fat right off your body. So
I had about 11% fat content. I could run 1215 miles without breaking sweat practically so I was a machine man. So when I joined Van Halen This machine was like, Hey, let's go guys. And these guys are like drinking and doing drugs. And I'm going man, hey, come on, guys. This ain't working. And everybody kind of got on my routine. I became the leader of the band. Here we go again. Hey, nobody else knows how to do this. I'll tell you what you got to do. Let's go take over this fucking
world. And I got my manager and left her in there. So long story short, we had we took off on a carnival ride that got me back motivated as a rockstar. I said oh no, this is real. This is superstardom I saw the difference remember I told you I was kind of saying I don't why I'm why I'm doing this don't know what I really want to do it. The dream is kind of over the dream. woke the fuck up real fast and Van Halen and walking out on stage given it we were great. We were the greatest band
in the world at that time. I don't care what anyone says are you with you about anybody out a dare anybody to follow Van Halen in those days in that first seven, eight years. Then that just started getting old you know the drugs and the alcohol really started kicking in I was doing quite a bit myself not not in a situation where I needed rehab or where I was hurting my body. You're my life but you guys party in pretty good I was
girls. Lead singer Van Halen the biggest rock band at Worlds handsome young man out there, you know, multimillionaire driving Ferraris. You bet I was taking advantage. While that is how myself time in my life, but it wasn't taken a toll on me physically. But it's taking a toll on my marriage. So it ruined my marriage. And then when my marriage, my wife got sick from it, she had a nervous breakdown. I got concerned, I thought I got it straightened
out here. And then when I started straightening out and not wanting to tour as much as I needed a break, it kind of broke the band up kind of, you know, not really, that particular. We were kind of going sideways. Anyway, Eddie was in and out of rehab. Alex had quit drinking, but he had gone through a couple divorces in that band. It and vow got divorced. And things went sideways. Absolutely. And like a marriage or anything else. I saw. This ain't working no more. I ain't happy in this
band. All the fame and fortune in the world isn't working for me. And I need to change and I met my now present wife had been together 30 years car and I and I fell in love. And when I fell in love, deep in love, you know, hadn't been in love for a long time. I've been partying so hard, and didn't even know what love was. And when you fall in love, if somebody can come up and say, Hey, man, somebody stole your car, and you go, I don't care. I'm in love. And you know, and so that's kind of the
weight. Van Halen was, it's like, it's watching the Beatles thing. The yoke the whole Yoko Ono thing as we Johnny fell in love. But unfortunately, Yoko was she jumped into it. She joined the Beatles were carried it and joined Van Halen. But I was alone. I just wanted to be with her. Anyway, so let's practice. I don't want to be home with my wife. I want to practice I want to do this, I'm gonna do that. I want to, you
know, let's go back on tour. And I say, Look, man, you know, I can't just work every day, all day every day and get nowhere because we just argue we started arguing about stuff because Edie just didn't want to finish anything. Because he didn't want to go back home as before. He split up vow so he, she had busted him for being drunk or for, for being on drugs. And he'd get in a fight when he went home. So he didn't want to do that. He didn't want to go home.
So he expect everybody just to sit in the studio with him all day, smoke cigarettes and drink and, and I'm going well, I can't do that. I want to be with my new love. I'm in love. I want to go home. I want to go dinner with her. And so we kind of fell apart. It was a tough split. I gotta tell you, when finally they call me up and threw me out after I had my first baby car and I got got married had a baby. And it was, wow, disheartening, just like Montrose. I thought, What am I
going to do now? I'm car Gibson. Hey, you wanted this? You know, you wanted to quit, but you didn't want to quit. So they just helped you out? And I thought, yeah, but wow, get Van Halen the biggest band? Well, man, you know, it's a nice launching pad. But how can I do better than that. And the only thing that drove me then was my ego. And my pride comes in, I can't, I can't get thrown out of a band and disappear. So I rolled up my sleeves went right back to work again. Here we go,
Sammy, can't take a break. No matter what he does, you know, the gods going on. Oh, you're not going to just lay around doing that. So I put together a new band made a record and went out with started a whole new, a whole new life, a whole new direction. A whole new image, I changed into a lifestyle thing. I just said I'll never work for fame and fortune, or just to make money or just, I'll never play with people I don't like again.
So we all have challenges, and sometimes our greatest disappointments turn into our best opportunities. And let's talk about your incredible success as a serial entrepreneur. There's too many to talk about on the podcast, but some want to focus on two of them. And I want to start with a People magazine spread in December of 1983, which showed pictures from Keith Richards wedding at the Finisterra hotel in Cabo San Lucas, Mexico, your worship Keith Richards, and you're back in SoCal. And you're
looking at these pictures. He's at the resort look pretty spectacular. What do you do next?
I told my wife let's go see that place. She looked it up his twin dolphins Hotel. That's no longer there. There's a montage resort there now and same property in Cabo. I say yeah, you know about that. And I said, I said, I want to go there. And I went and stayed at that resort. And I fell in love with that place. I said, this place is killing. And so I went down for my birthday in October, and I decided to make an annual thing. So every October I went down there. So I did that for
about three years. And then one time when I was there. I hadn't joined Van Halen yet actually, this was before Van Halen. This is 1983 8283 When I first went to Cabo, but when I was in Van Halen, I had already bought a condo, and I was living down there, but I said, I want to
build Cantina. I want to be till the tequila bar, when I bought my first condo, to put things in perspective, I went to my Mexican friends that I had met down there and, and the architect friend who, whose father had built the condos who lived there, too. I said, I want
to furnish my place. You know, let's go to Mexico cities and all, you know, we go to Guadalajara, um, and it's go to Guadalajara, that's where all the great art is, and all the great furniture makers and just a lot of great artists there, you know. So I said, Okay, so I had a little airplane. So we went to Guadalajara. And I while we were there, I said, you want to go to tequila? You know, I said, Yeah, let's go to tequila. That'd be cool. I liked tequila,
you know. And I hadn't really thought about making tequila yet. But so I tasted real tequila. And I said, Whoa, man, this is unbelievable. 100% agave tequila had not come to America yet. People were drinking tequila with the warmth in it back then at you know, 80 to 83. Before patrolling before Cabo Wabo who Don Julio I was before Don, julio de julio was down there, but not in America. So I tasted Don Julio, and I tasted a lot of other tequilas from from the town of tequila and Jalisco.
So I said, Man, I want to build a little cantina, a little club where I can play music when I'm down here and make my own tequila, bring my own tequila, you know, they have a cabo Wabo to get the name Cabo Wabo came from the guy walking down the street, and on a Sunday, people have all heard this before, I think. But the Van Halen guys when we wrote the song, Cabo Wabo, they had no idea what I was thinking, I'm going, I'm going to build it. I'm going to build the couple, we're going to
fit that song. I'm going to build a common wall, and I'm gonna have my own tequila called Cabo Wabo, tequila, but I didn't think about bringing it to America. I did not dream that dream. Everybody's so bad. You were smart. That was before tequila. You were right. In the beginning. No, I was not smart. I was lucky. My little spaceship guys, you know, intervention. Again, my brain has always really open from them that experience and so I was open to
making tequila. So I went down to a distillery, I said, Hey, we went to all these places. And these farmers, the Rivera family, they they said, Yeah, we have to bring his bottles, we make her tequila, we sell our Tequila, too. And we sell our Agave to the big tequila makers. They were farmers, but they had their own little private batch and make about 20 cases a year for the family. And I said, Well, can I have some of that? He said, Why don't you gotta
bring your own bottles. So I said, okay, so because I thought it was best to kill every taste in my life. And we tried 2030 different places, went and found out how to get the bottles went to my other Mexican friend and said, Hey, do you know where we can get bottles made? Sure I know, this guy hand blows a man and I'm gonna say, Okay, we want to order you know, 150 bottles, okay, and want to put him deliver him to this place. Take them down here. They're pouring it in there with siphon hoses.
They look like they're full. Okay, it's enough. Put a cork in it to the next one. I mean, it was that primitive. And I was not built to Cabo Wabo Van Halen was involved but they weren't involved. But you know, I mean, I was still doing it in my manager said, if you really want this to be successful, you better bring them guys in because they're not gonna. They're gonna torture you for doing this. Because they were what's he doing? What's he doing
in Mexico all the time. He you know, he's not showing up for we're trying to write songs. He's writing the lyrics in Mexico. And I'm going to Dan writes, When I'm inspired to write lyrics, I come to the studio walk in blow out my new songs my lyrics Boo boop. So you guys back down to Mexico, him on the plane. That kind of freaked him out a little bit. But we weren't getting into because we still had a great manager. But anyway, he just said Bring him in. So they they become partners
in Cabo Wabo. And when the thing when they threw me out that ended, but I know I went back to Van Halen, but I was in Van Halen when I started Cabo.
So let's just go back a second. Because there are some very interesting details here that I just want to go back to. You're down there, you decide you want to open up performance space. So we're not talking about a little bar like with a stage in the back like the Troubadour in LA, which was 500 people. We're talking about a 14,000 square foot venue with indoor outdoor seating for 1000 people. Your accountant loved it so much that he quit. She, she
quit. And then your awesome manager, Renata Ravina, who was awesome and helping me set this up, didn't love us so much either. So she convinced you to enlist, as you said the Van Halen.
No, not Renata. Renata took Sarah's job as my kind of bookkeeper at that time. She's become my personal business manager up for the office and so forth for 30 some years now, 40 years, whatever it's been. But no, Edie lefur was the manager of Van Halen. And he said, if you're going to do this, and you want to get empty, I wanted MTV to have a big party and film it, you know, the opening of the Cabo Wabo and he said it better be Van Halen
Scoble. Wabo. Otherwise, you're not going to get their support in there and the MTB is probably not going to support it sooner that he got them involved.
Okay, so you build that it's on the edge of the marina and downtown Cabo San Lucas, it's awesome. If you haven't been there. I've been there lots of times, primarily in college, by the way, where my life now with five kids is a little different than it was. No,
it's grown up now. You're welcome to show come.
By the way, I hope we can meet there when I in a couple of weeks when when we're down there
for the holiday. Absolutely. I'll let you know when I'm gonna be there. Yeah, cuz I'm going
Alright, awesome. So its motto is where the land ends and the party begins. It opens at 9090. And people made fun of you. They were mocking you the LA Times wrote an article that said, celebrities just can't resist opening a restaurant and at first it's bleeding money and lost money is first three years it was $300,000 in debt. We've already talked about what happened on the venue side. So Van Halen they you bought back what they had to put in? You're
an optimistic guy. Okay, then you leave Van Halen, a music manager named Shep Gordon came to visit you gave you some advice right around that time you also met your wife Carrie, who told you that you reminded her of somebody and urge you to meet him which you did? What did Shep tell you? Who did Carrie want you to meet? And as part of this tell us about Juan Eduardo Nunez the hands of hola SCO and the $5 gas cans.
When you are deep Brother, listen, rewriting my book now in my own voice now, you know, like something I refuse to do? Well, first of all, Shep Gordon, a brilliant guy. He saw he came to Cabo and he saw me down there saw me go on stage in a bathing suit, no shirt, and he's gone. Why don't you roll this to go? Why are you putting on leather pants to go on stage and then you're and going on tour? And what why wouldn't you just do this lifestyle thing goes this is he he turned me on to the word
lifestyle. And I'm going I don't know what lifestyle is. My wife says, you know, you need to go see Jimmy Buffett. You know, she goes you remind me Jimmy Buffett. I said Jimmy Buffett. Wow, that guy's he's still around. She goes, oh man is huge. I'm gonna get out of here, you know, because she came from Virginia, in the East Coast and down in Florida and all that, you know, Jimmy was like,
selling out. arenas, you know, and and amphitheaters and wasn't coming the west coast or it was just off my radar for some reason. Because he was off everybody's radar. He was doing his an underground lifestyle thing. So I go to see him. I say he's playing where I play souls 19,000 people packed can't get a ticket. I'm calling a promoter. I want to see Jimmy Buffett, can you give me some good seats or some? He's got you want to be in the audience and well, yeah, I want to see what this guy's
been. He's gonna man people are gonna wreck that. I said, nobody's gonna recognize me at it. Jimmy Buffett. Did they? Yes, they did. So anyway, long story short, Shep Gordon said, yeah, like Jimmy Buffett. And I, the light went on. And I just said, Boy, yeah, I can just go out there as myself. I mean, because I mean, I was living on the beach. I, I became a born to beach, you know, it's me. I'm all about the beach. And I thought, Yeah, after Van Halen,
I just started. I start doing it and Van Halen to be honest with you, but then when I got thrown out, I went 100% I did I don't think I wore long pants again. And you know, I go onstage barefoot, t shirt. The way I rolled into town. I just went on stage that way and I started casualized my show instead of trying to put on a show. I went out had waitresses bring me drinks and and stuffing it in drinkin Cabo Wabo tequila and making margaritas on stage that say, Hey, you know, you guys got
a minute here. I guess you know, we've been up here an hour and a half. I'm going you know, I guess we could take a break and come back played another hour for you. But why don't I just take a break right here. I'm gonna make myself a cocktail. I'm gonna show you how to do it. I did that kind of stuff. I built a brand without knowing what in the hell I was doing. It's like my favorite line is no I don't know what I'm doing but
I know how to do it. And that's kind of the way to Shep Gordon told me said Roll it roll it together man. No lifestyle brands sell you tequila builds your clubs all over the country and cobble wobbles, and he goes you got a brand brother and I'm going a brand. I mean, I don't even think of myself as a brand at that time. So chip really enlighten meet all that and Cory enlighten me to Jimmy Buffett and I rolled this stuff together
and here I am today. Walking brand I got tattoos a cabo Wabo tattoo, I got the new Santo tattoo. I got the beach bar cocktails I got but it's you know what's funny is I'm I know you don't want to jump ahead but here's what I want to say about all this is that it is all rolled together in one person and I own it all I don't endorse. So that's why I feel comfortable promoting my brands say no, I invented that. I made
these. I went and bought the bottles and took them down to the tequila place and help the guys pour it in They're, you know, then I put the name on it and said here, it's mine. It's my taste. It's my bottle. It's my everything. So I'm not endorsing, when you go out and promote an endorsement, you're
doing it for money. When you go and promote for yourself, you're doing it for a reason because you want to be successful at what you do and you believe in your product, and that it's the best product out there otherwise, I wouldn't be promoting it.
drinking tequila back then wasn't nearly as popular as that. Now it took you a while things eventually started to take off in 2002. Tequila sales in America were growing at an average rate of 6.2% a year he started making Cabo Wabo tequila 1996. You're growing slowly for the first three years at that point. You're producing around 2000 cases a year 9099 rolls around, you started to distribute it.
Seven years later, Cabo Wabo was selling 147,000 cases per year to become the second best selling to killing that estates pitch behind Jose Clairvaux. And at that point, he started to get some
M patroon and Patro show et Cie Jose Cueva was the biggest selling tequila PETRONAS biggest selling premium brand. And Cabo was a premium brand. I was number two premium band in the world.
And at that point, you started to get some buyout offers from huge beverage companies. First you thought I don't really need the money, what am I going to do, you're gonna pay some tax, put it in the bank. So you say no to $20 million, then $30 million. At this point, you're making around four to $5 million is a rock star, which is itself is a ton of money. But this is a different kind of money, what people refer to as fuck you money, putting yourself in a new
stratosphere of wealth. And then a company called gruppo Campari called and they upped the ante. How high did they up it? And who did you invite to that year is October birthday bash. And what happened then?
Well, I invited the owner and the attorneys and the CEO of Campari, Google compiler to come to Cabo. To talk. They offered me $67 million, which was 10 times earnings. I was making an average of $6.7 million profit from Cabo Wabo tequila. For the last three years, I was making a little more than that the last year because it was growing. But if you average the last three years, it averaged 6.7 million and they offered me 10 times
earnings. And I was flabbergasted. I was like, oh my god, I have a 20% partner in Mexico. And that's it. I own the rest, and I'm going to ma'am, then I start thinking, and it's making so much money. It's like, I didn't need money. I'm gonna what am I gonna do with that money? Then I got nervous. So I invited him down to talk. And I was thinking about doing the deal. And then I'd said, you know, it's not going to change my life. Why am I doing this here? I'm gonna lose my brand.
I'm, I'm in love with growing this brand is the most fun I've ever had outside of sex and rock'n'roll is growing this brand. Seeing it grow. It was it was just unbelievable. But Tron by then had taken off, and they were, they broke their, their deal with their spirits, partners, serums. And they've hired 40 people. And they spent, I heard like $10 million that year, and started their own really spirits company. I was associated with another company
that was partners. They were distributing and importing and all that stuff. I didn't have employees, I had four employees and nothing. It was really low operating expenses. I was making all profit. So long story short, I didn't want to do that. I said, I don't want to do a Petrona. But then they took off and they got to like, three 400,000 cases. And they really started taking off and everyone saw that. So gruppo Campari came to me and they wanted this bad.
They said, man, like I'm number two, they know that I'm under achieving. So I said no, I sat down with Luca Garrett voglia. The lawyer at that time was the guy named Stephen Oh, and Bob Kuhn see the CEO of Campari, and he was brand new, he had just come in than the old guy was the guy that done the deal with us, or was making the deal, and it's kind of complex. That's why I'm bringing this up because Bob, I don't think was a fan. I think he was saying, you guys a crazy
pen. It's got way too much glue. This guy is walking around in a bathing suit. You know, he's living on a beach. He's a bomb, you know what I mean? He's gonna run this company, right? I don't know if that what he was thinking. But in my head, I knew he didn't really relate to me like the other guys. Luca Gara. Voglio is when the greatest man I've ever met in my life, the owner of comparing and he is brilliant. And I'm still dear friends with him and I always will be the most I always signed
my emails. forever grateful Sammy, for what he did for me. But anyway, so I said, No, you know, guys, I got cold feet. I don't want to do it. I'm sure they thought I was negotiating but I wasn't. And my friends around me Shep Gordon are people that I'd been talking to about all this. Hey, they're going Have you lost your mind. I said know him making 7 million bucks. You make it three or four? Is it as the rock star? You know, I'm in my music? Why would I do that? What am I gonna do with
that money? Give me 60 billion bucks. I'm gonna go stick in a bank. Obviously that makes me It scares me to death. So but I said, No, I don't do it just doesn't change my life. And for the, you know, the right way, they said, Well, what would change your life? I said, What do you mean? What amount? And they said, Yeah, it's Kumari guys sitting, sitting at my table, right? My house and I'm going, I don't know, like, you know, like $100 million, or something like that. And they
looked at each other. Okay, and I fucking fell on the ground, rolling on the ground laugh and I couldn't control myself. Everybody's getting worried about me that he's going to have a aneurysm or something. He's gonna have a heart attack. He's going crazy. I couldn't stop laughing It was the funniest thing I've ever heard in my life. It was just funny, peculiar. Funny. Haha, every kind of funny. And these guys, you know, Giants. They're fun loving guys, you know that they
start laughing? Ah, you know, he's a very happy, you know, look at Sammy. He's a very happy, you know, and I did it. And it took a year to do the deal. Very interesting how, what happened to the brand after that, but it's still doing well. But it went way down. Because for a year, my distributors knew I was going to sell it my partners. And if you're going to sell it, what the hell are we going to put new money into? We're gonna pay attention to it.
Their new distributors, the enemy, the guys that have been saying, hey, what does he know about tequila, Sammy Hagar, Cabo wobbles garbage, you should buy ours. Those guys are now going to sell it, though. They're going in trying to sell it out, though. You said it was GARBAGE. Now you're trying to sell me, you know, it really went down. It got cut in half by the time the deal was made. But the deal was still the deal. And it was I tried to keep 20% of the product. So I sold ad, I got ad.
And then there was a $4 million in the pipeline that came through after sales that were money that was owed in this neck that came back to me. So when you say was 94 $93 million, it was really $100 billion deal. And I am such a stupid fuck that I said no, I want to keep 20% and sell it. You know, I thought oh, they're gonna they're gonna build it up on my 20% to be worth more than 100 billion, you know. And the truth of the matter is it went way down. And after five years, I wanted to
get rid of the non compete. So I sold the 20% back for 13 million. So I didn't make what I thought I was going to make. So I lost. I lost $7 million on the deal.
Yeah, but Santo Santo is coming soon. But let's I mean, Santo is right here. And right now it's doing phenomenally well. So congratulations on that. But I want to talk about some of the marketing things you did. You talked about the song Cabo Wabo you wrote when you were Van Halen was the fourth single on the UAE 12 albums. And as you said, the Cabo Wabo is really
the Cabo wobble. A guy is drinking too much walking home from the bar, but it was just a song 11 years later, before he sold the company, right this time master key law, which was an immediate hit, and when you played it, you'd bring people on stage, you bash a tequila bottle pin Yatta full of confetti, you would be the 20 foot tall replica of the blue glass Cabo Wabo bottle with your guitar, you would play a trumpet that shot fireworks out at the end of the song and then you've got
swim trunks. You got the shirt, the flip flops. But you talked about this that I mean, you hadn't spoken with Van Halen, and 10 years they told you you couldn't wear the Cabo Wabo t shirt on stage. So you get the Cabo Wabo tattoo on your arm and you're wearing short sleeve shirts in the van guy. The Van Halen guys hate you for that you drink tequila on the Jay Leno Show to promote what you're doing and you are criticizing
it. So who cares if you hadn't done all those things that probably wouldn't have been as successful. But what you did do is you became the OG you became a model for other celebrities to follow. There's actually an iPhone app called grape stars that tracks celebrity spirits and wines, and it's really a thing. There's 86 Right now, and you've got George Clooney, Randy Gerber started in 2013. Cost amigos five years later, it's a billion dollar sale Michael
Jordan, C Cora tequila $1,600. A bottle the rock Dwayne Johnson launched it tequila last year. It's one of the fastest growing spirits brand everywhere. And then of course, there's Kendall Jenner, who in February of this year announced to her 200 million Instagram followers, she was launching 818 Tequila was sold out in four hours, people from 80 countries and it's just crazy how you did this and I want to move that into passion.
Because I think you've got a real brand and then I think you've got something else going on with these other celebrities in terms of passion. Let's expand on it a bit. Can you achieve excellence if you don't have a passion for what you're doing? And as part of this, what are the three or five most ingredients to Our path to excellence.
Whoo. Well, passion, a great product, and hard work and determination. If it don't happen overnight, if you've got a great product and you really believe in it, then eventually you're going to make it happen, it's going to happen. It just got to be good. If it's not good, it'll come short on Yeah, if you don't have enough passion, you'll quit. Or people won't believe you. If you don't work hard enough, it ain't gonna
happen. So those three things hard work, passion and a great product, you got to have a great product if you're gonna stand behind it, so that's why I don't endorse, I make sure that products is up to my standards, but the way I promoted was so unique that I saved myself $40 million. Most people building a brand has been about $40 million. Nowadays, it's pretty much the it used to be 10 When I first started 10 was the patrol
model. And then you keep spending as you go, but I mean, you know the big number to get in the game is about 10 It's 40 Now there's no question about
it. The costume ego guys I have no idea what they spent but George and Randy mainly George did a ton of work like I did by going to meeting people throwing parties give written a big suite in Vegas and inviting all the influential people to drink their tequila and they got all the Senate to Christmas time everybody got a bottle you know and and people talking about it went to all the favors he could get in the movie industry you know for the Grammy Awards or bottle on every table or
certainly at the back bar when you went to get a drink that's all came this way I did it. I started out by went on tour about the Cabo while I was at age had a big bond like you said, had to waitresses coming out bring me to drinks. It was Cabo Wabo Cabo Wabo Cabo Wabo everything I did tattoo him arm Van Halen eventually I started promoting getting that in the venue's which was really tough.
Now, it's a piece of cake. You know, if I say, if I'm gonna play by play your venue, you got to put my booze in there, you put my Santonio put my beach bar rum, or the my cocktails, something, or else I'm not gonna play, you know, I don't play just for money anymore. You know, I played for to promote my brands and how my fans to be able to experience it, then they
go out. And they they're like, you have this little army of people, they walk into liquor stores or bars, or hey, I want a shot at Sato tequila, you know, or, Hey, I want this. I want that. That's how I promoted and it saved me $40 million, you know, you might say, and everybody's doing it. Now. I don't think everyone is passionate about it. I don't think everyone I think 90% of these people are doing it for money. Because he saw how much money I made how much money
Clooney made. You're probably looking at cleaning out half the people that I ran into his Oh, you make tequila. Well, you like George Clooney, or like, you're like, you know, and I'm going well, yeah. Okay, I guess you could put it like that.
Let's talk about the importance of being prepared. And its huge role that it plays in our success. One of the hallmarks of my own career has been to be the most prepared person in the room, it started in college, I go to the library at least three hours a day, when I had nothing going on. I'd study for finals more than a month before I had any way ahead of time, for at least eight hours a day, starting two weeks
before finals. And with very limited exceptions, there wasn't a test in college I took where I didn't know I was gonna get an A, I got one beat plus and all college I graduated top 1% of my class. And I went for a job interview with Eli Brode, who at the time, was one of only two people in the world who started to Fortune 500 companies from scratch, I went into that interview with the goal that I'd be the most prepared person ever to meet with them. I knew if I landed that job, it changed my
career and my life forever. I spent 40 hours 40 Preparing for that job interview. And I achieved my goal despite a horribly unsuccessful legal career who had three jobs in a team. And seven months after I graduated from law school, I was completely unqualified for the position. And they hired me at age 27, to be the assistant to the chairman. So now when I coach people looking for a job, or whatever they do, I tell them that preparing doesn't mean spending five minutes on a
couple of Google searches. It means studying and preparing for whatever you do like it's a final exam, or like your future depends on it, which is often does no matter what you're doing, being the most prepared person in the room has served me incredibly well. It's allowed me not only to achieve these results in a much, much faster way, but it's also allowed me to achieve results I never would have been able to do without it. How important was preparation to
you for your own success? And can you give us a couple of examples?
Well, so much different from yours. But same. Prep is the most important thing like you if you're not prepared. You're just not going to succeed, you know, unless you're some kind of magician. I prepped so much different as a musician. I picked up my guitar and I sat in my room, every second of my waking hours when I wasn't eating or doing something driving a car and somebody had to do. I had that guitar in my hand and I was proud Paying for.
Learn how to play them licks, learn how to understand what I'm doing, write a song, you know, writing songs, prepping for an album to me would be writing 28 songs for a 10 song album, I'd spend three months in the studio writing and writing and writing and writing. That was my style of of prep. It's so much different than what you had to do. I mean, what you have to do on a tour business thing. The thing I didn't prep for was my
tequila business. I didn't prep for that, but I did spend a lot of time they're drinking tequila, and I don't mean getting drunk. I just mean tasting and tasting and tasting until I had one that I said this is it. Don't distill it. Three times I like it better distilled
twice. I like it. When you cut the agave a little closer, lose product, it's going to be more expensive, but you're losing 30% Like what we do Asante when I did with Cabo Wabo towards the end, I said how are we going to make this better how we're going to make this better? That's the same thing. It's really just learning your craft and and being finding out what makes it the best, which is once again,
great product. And then my heart is in it when I tasted Santo Blanca when we got it right when we trim that Agave more and more and more, and said mamacare They see what's going to be expensive. I don't care. I don't need to make the same margin is as somebody like Casa Miko. They're making mediocre tequila. I'm sorry they are. And I'm not going to do that I'd really have the best tequila in the world than the biggest tequila in the
world. I'm not trying to make Jose quell bar Sauza I'm trying to make sammies Santo to kill our Samus Cabo Wabo Cabo uno, the last one I made the best tequila ever made the best one Yeah. However, on the planet, no one will ever make a better tequila. And it's because I just
don't cut corners. And so my prep was tasting and going back and saying, what else can we do using other people's knowledge to make the best product so that when I said, when I stand or talk to you and tell you that this is the best tequila where I can look you right in the eye, I can say, okay, buddy, blind tasting, poor mine and one glass, pour your favorite three over here and mix them up. And I'll tell you which one's mine.
And I can do that. And I can still do it right now with confidence, because I know what it tastes like, because that's the prep. That's the thing. And I'm a big believer, you got to do the homework, you don't just go down to there and find some guy that will put your name on it. Let you put your name on his shit. Like every one of these people are doing I'm sorry, some of its good. Some of it's better than others. Some of it's mediocre. Some of its crap, they probably don't even know what
good tequila is. But if you just go put your name on it, you ain't taking the ride, going down there and finding it and working with the guy. How can we make it better and you learn and you learn. And then you eat the food that they're feeding the pigs, they're feeding them the pulp, the pigs are eating that and in your roast one of them pigs, and you're drinking
tequila making tacos. I mean, come on, brother, if you miss all that by just go slapping your name on it down at the lawyer's office, you can make all the money you want ain't gonna make you happy like this. This makes me happy.
That scale is awesome. By the way your partner miles scaly is passing it out. like nobody's business, he sent me some bottles here I have it behind me, I encourage everyone to go and buy it is phenomenal.
It's the best tequila in the world. Straight up. I just told you why. And you can make it yourself too, if you want to. But most people are greedy. And they would rather make more money per bottle than have better product per money. But whatever. I'm getting areas arrogance got anything, you know, it'll bite you and it has eventually, people hate you, therefore hate your product.
You're confident and you have the track record and resume to say that I don't take it that way at all. And you may or may not be biased about your product is selling very well. People love it and the proof will be in the pudding. But it is really awesome. So congratulations on the launch of that brand. Let's switch gears, we have a few more topics to cover. Let's talk about our fear of failure in the insecurity
that nearly all of us have. I've had some success in my career and I failed a lot to and I still fear failure. Most people I do is one of our great motivators. You've told people that you've never felt secure about your music given all of your success. How on earth can that be and his failure one of your great motivators?
Well, I don't know what failure is because I think I told you in the first part of this interview that I'm fearless and I kind of feel like I never see a downside. It's if I've got a fault. It's I never see the downside because if I see the downside, I do get scared. If I think something can go wrong, I'm one of those guys. Oh shit. It's probably gonna go wrong, you know, because I'll get in one of those insecure moments at four o'clock in the morning when I wake up in the middle of the
night. And when I'm worried about something and I start worrying about everything and it's in 10 times magnified. And I'll ruin my my next day and I'll lose 12 hours of good hard work. I could have good, hard positive work I could have done. So I tried to stay away from fear. But I fear failing. Yes, I fear rejection. I hate to say it, but it's probably from my poor childhood. I don't want to be rejected. I don't want somebody to say, Oh, that guy. He's hate and he goes, Don't go
see that guy. His booze isn't a good man. He's a phony. Oh, I don't necessarily fear that. I hate that. But I don't like it. So I guess I'm fearful of it.
No one's saying any of those things about you.
I'm a fairly well liked guy. But I make friends, not enemies. I try to Anyway,
you've worked so hard to get where you are today and your immense success. It affords you a lot of freedom and to do things that you love to do. I think it's very important for us to reap the rewards of our hard work and have fun. You love your Ferraris. You love your birthday bash, and October, what else are you doing for fun?
Wow. At my age now, I'm really running out of things that really interests me. I've done I've got everything I've had it, I'm able to have anything I want. And that's a very interesting position to be in. I'm a little bit afraid of that of where this is going. And for the rest of my life. I'm not excited about a lot of things anymore. And it bothers me. And I don't know if it's my age, I'm where I'm at something I'm dealing with. And I've never said this to anyone. But I've
been thinking about it a lot. I wrote a new song, I made a new record with my band, the circle working with David Cobb, one of the greatest producers I've ever worked in my life, probably the greatest. And I've worked with the greatest producers of all time, David Cobb is just he brought things out of me that I can't tell you. I asked him to do I said, push me, get me back, make me do what it is be as great as I was when I wanted it so bad, I would kill myself to do it. And so he pushed me real
hard. And I wrote this line called when is the last time you did something for the first time. It's just a line in a song. And I'm starting to try to live that way. Now. I'm trying to say that maybe will make me happy if I do some go, wow, I was so afraid to do that. Or I never thought about doing that. And I did it and wow, that was a
blast. You know, it puts a smile on your face to do something that new at my age and you know, even with your wife and we've been together 30 years and you know, it's like, yeah, you know, let's try something new. You know what I mean? It's like, in a bedroom, wherever you know, the kitchen. I really think I really think it's important to push yourself like that. Because when you start losing as you get older, and you're in my position, I don't think
everyone's in my position. But anyone that's got enough money to do anything. And enough, not just money, it's the ability to do anything I want practically. And you're not excited by doing some of those things. It's kind of a bummer, man. As I'm sitting there going, what makes me happy. And I'll tell you one of the silliest things. I love planting a garden my wife and I, she's really got a green thumb. Shit grows, man, she puts it in
the ground, it grows. And we put in a garden, all of our homes everywhere has a garden. And if I could, I would have chickens too, because I love chickens and I love fresh eggs. And I like to get up in the morning and go get those fresh eggs and make breakfast make pancakes whenever I like doing creative things in the yard simple thing like walking out seeing my tomato garden and picking those tomatoes and going and making a fresh pasta, especially tomato sauce. And the basil from the
garden and everything. Oh Greg, Oh, honey, I need another onion go out and give me an onion. That makes me happy as fuck. Okay. I mean, that really makes me happy. And I found that simple things in life sometimes are really what it's all about jumping on my airplane and flying to New York to have dinner with somebody don't make me happy. You know, it's like, Fuck, I got it. I don't feel like going to New York, you know? I mean, it's like, Well,
you got your own plane. So what I don't feel like sitting on it, you know, I mean, I'd rather be in my on the beach here eat my tomatoes enema garden, you know. So it's kind of we're Samizdat today.
Thank you for sharing that. I'm honored. I'm glad that we're unique here and I'm happy that you told it here first. I also have a garden in my house. I love gardening. We grow apples, oranges, figs, tangerine, tomatoes, avocados, herb garden rose garden tomatoes. We have three different kinds of peppers that we grow. We grow our own pumpkins for Halloween. We squash watermelon and I love it. I'm not doing all the gardening
by itself. We have someone to help with that but I love going out there picking the fruit of the trees I have two very young kids five and one and a half and I mean we we just love it. We absolutely love it. You get out there and and we produce too much of it you know when when they all bloom at once you You can't eat it. So I'll give it away to friends who who love it what your neighbors are for. That's what this organic grid is
spraying anything on them. Let's talk about your incredible generosity and philanthropy since 2008. You and Carrie have donated more than $4 million to local communities with a special focus on funding food relief and children's causes, including helping terminally ill children, where their families run out of money. Can you tell us more about that? How important is giving back on our path to excellence? And what's your ultimate goal with your philanthropy?
Well, my ultimate goal is to have more businesses that I will give 100% of the proceeds. And I received like my Sami speech bar and grills and airports, that's where it started, a guy came up to me and said, before I had a foundation, I finally finally got a foundation makes it easier because you give $1 It goes there, you don't have to give 50% in the government of the government's not going to take care of these people and feed these people that I'm going to.
And that's my philosophy is that you do what you can and you do it in your community first, if you can afford to send money to Africa, God bless you, you know what I mean? But take care of, I believe in where you can see it. guy across the street, ran into some hard times, you know, help him out. You know, I mean, you help help your neighbors and community out in your family first. That's my philosophy, because I don't have enough. Even Warren Buffett can't take
care of everybody in here. You know, he's given half of it away, and he still can't take care of everybody. So anyway, so I focus on feeding people first. But when I started the Beach Boys and girls, a guy came up said, hey, you know you've been successful. Cabo Wabo. Do you have any other ideas? I run HMS host, which is concessions in airports, and we're wanting to put nicer restaurants and better food products. And now this is a long time ago. And I thought, Oh, that's awesome. Yeah. I
said, Yeah. What about sammies? beach bar? beach? Sand and grill are sometimes and I don't want to put sand in the foot about Samys beach bar and grill. Yeah, he said, sounds great. What? What kind of food would you have here? I'm sitting here looking at my window in Cabo on a phone and I'm looking at the oceans, I gotta get down to the beach, man, I gotta get off this phone call. And the guy say what kind of footage Oh, you know, like anything but but pizza or pasta,
you have to do that. Right? So, you know, like really good burgers and good salads. And let's say a mom and dad. And their two kids come in. And the dad says, Man, I just want to have a hamburger and a beard. And a mom says, Oh, I just want to have a salad. And then the kids are oh, I want some nachos and some and some french fries. And, okay, we're going to have all that and we're going to do it good. Do a good job. He said sounds great. I said, Okay. He said, Can you write up a menu, I
had grilled cheese. And I'd wrote up this menu, sent it to him. They opened in Maui, and it exploded. They did triple their business in the previous thing. And I give all that money to Maui. So then I thought, well, let's do more of these. Okay, let's do one to Cleveland. Okay, boom, oh, let's do one in Vegas. Okay, boom, and I give the money to those communities. I think it's important that you stay in the community. Like I said, these things spit out a couple $100,000 a year for the
community. And I give it to the community. But I can't spread that out too far. Especially when you're dealing with children that are my biggest. It's hard for me to even talk about I may stop. But terminally ill children. Can you imagine you have children? Yeah. Just imagine if one of them are terminally ill. And then imagine if you couldn't, I mean, you can't help them to begin with their to evidence terminal. And then what if you couldn't afford to even make your life as good
as you could? until it's over? That? I can't do it. And it's the most expensive one, because it's the medical system is so expensive. The government won't allow you to buy him a car to drive from for the treatments for a kid that maybe has to be on dialysis. So you can't buy him a car because in the government's out, they have income. He can't, you know, gotta cut this off here. I don't know what it is some weird laws. I don't want to change the law. And I'm not against the
government. I'm not anti government. I'm all for it. But for me, so I try to make transportation for them. And then I find hospitals that will tell me in Maui, the Maui hospital general, they give me their top 15 worst scenarios, and I can only do about one or two a year. And I do them. And I give them transportation. I fly the parents to the Honolulu with them to get better treatment sometimes when they anyway, it's something you don't brag about.
And it's something you just do out of the goodness of your heart. And I just believe the simplest one is feeding people if you can only afford $10 a year, give it to a food bank, your local food bank.
Yeah, that's amazing. I my two main things that I give to his foster carer, my grandmother is 103 She was raised in foster care and then you know sick children, kids with cancer. So I Yeah, we share that DNA. Before we finish today, I want to go ahead and ask a couple of open ended questions. I call this part of my podcast fill in the blank to excellence I ready to play
Oh, man you got my brain is scrambled right now. Playing sounds fun. Yeah, let's play something.
Let's have you been having fun so far having?
Oh, absolutely. But you really dug me in deep. I had no idea when I told you and when you ask, Oh, when I asked her your producer when I talked to him earlier before you came on, I said, What is this about? And he said, Oh, it's going to take you through your life. I'm going like from starting with the childhood, I'm going Holy shit, I should go back and read my book real quick and brush up. Because you know, it's going back and remembering things properly getting dates, right?
No, that's, it gets tough. You know? I'm done a lot. Okay, but let's play.
There we go. When I started my career, I wish I had known
I was gonna do it this long.
What would you have done differently? If you had known it was going to be this long?
I don't know. But I wish I'd have known. I don't know why. But I, I thought I would be done at 40 I might not have been in such a hurry. I may have taken more time on things. I don't know. Let's say hey, I got the rest of my life to work this out. I got the rest of my life to finish this record. Whatever. I always felt like I was desperate. I always felt like oh, I gotta get this done. Oh, man. Oh, man, next year, you know, I could be over next year.
Oh my god, I gotta gotta be 45 next year, you know, if I didn't know, and I was gonna still be doing this at 74 I wouldn't stress there you go. That's what I would have done different I would have been having, I would have had even more fun. How about that?
The biggest lesson I've learned in my life is
you never know what's gonna happen. Good or bad. You never know. Shit happens. COVID
you have four kids. The biggest lesson I've taught my kids is
don't lie. There's no reason to lie. It will bite you in the ass. You tell the truth at all times? The whole truth. You tell it. You don't have to say if you're not asked something. You don't have to say it. You know what I mean? You don't have to. That'll help you. Because it's hard not to lie. Sometimes you go man. But if somebody doesn't ask you, they don't have to tell them. But if you're asked, Tell the truth. Especially to me.
Going forward, my professional goal is
try to be better than ever at anything I do. Try to do. Try to elevate my expertise.
My biggest personal goal is
stay healthy, live to be 100. Stay out of a wheelchair, and bedridden and just live right. Right to the end like I am right now.
You would love my grandmother 103. I was in Detroit last week, right? Oh, using her still lives alone raised in foster care what a life she was telling me stories last week about buying her first car and I don't know it was $150 or something like that. And all the car she had. It was just it was so cool for me to see it for her to have that perspective. I mean, the radio came out the TV came out the phone was something
crazy. A computer was crazy to talk to someone on your phone plays in airplane airplane. Airplane, a first airplane ride filled with cigarette smoke everywhere. You causing everybody cancer on that plane. I mean, just crazy stuff. What's your biggest regret?
Oh, geez. Oh, my goodness. Oh, God. I'm not sure I have one. I can't regret it. But I wish I would have been able to help my father. But it's not my fault. He died before I made it. But if I would have made it and had the funds in the means I could have helped them. He died in the street. You know, he's not a pretty thing. So it's not a regret, but it's something I wish I could have done. It's kind of like a regret.
How proud is your mom? Have you
almost too proud because I hear all the time. My mother's past stupid. I hear all the time from people say Oh, I met your mom one time in she was like in laws. Oh, where'd you meet my mom. I met her in Las Vegas. Oh really? Like what was going to what she was gambling or something. And I was gambling next to her and she said, Hey, I'm sorry, a car's gone. And like, you know, I hear those kinds of stories all the time.
Like she would just tell anybody and everybody just go around saying I'm standing here as well as she's digging through a dumpster in the back of a grocery store. Because my mom and my stepfather they had a farm and I love it now but at the time when I was first kind of big ol rockstone I bought him their first house I bought him is really nice little farm and they had goats and pigs and a cow and nothing. They just had one or two of everything and chickens, you know, not like a
big lake. But long story short, they would go to the dumpsters in the back of grocery stores a pull out all the produce that they would throw away that was half rotten, and they'd be piling and stuff and put it in the trunk of their car and taking it back to their animals. They do it every night. And they loved it. My mom has a rummaging, she'd go to the dump and she'll find stuff and bring
it home still. After she had everything after I was able to spend millions of dollars on my mother, and but she would go as Oh, I'm Sammy Hagar. What an asshole that guy has managed to take better care of your mom i Sir. rummaging in a dumpster for food my mom was that mouse right? I would say to my mom, what do you want? Mom? I don't know. Anything. My What do you want anything? Oh, I got everything. I don't know. I like to go to Vegas get and have like $5,000 and I wouldn't have to
worry about losing. I'd go from them to my mom was too simple. She's wonderful.
My grandmother after our company had gone public. I said, you know, Nana, I'm gonna buy you a car. And you can buy any car you want. So you go to the dealership. You just tell me where you are. And I'll wire them the money that day. You just have to go before noon because I'm in Los Angeles. She lives in Detroit. I want to get the I wanted to wire to get the same day. Okay, so I'm pushing her a little bit Nana, what's up with the cars called me one day, Randy. I've got the car super
excited. I'm thinking like, Mercedes, I said, Nana, where were you? I'm at the Toyota dealership. I said, Great. I said, Well, what are we talking about? I said, I a Camry. I said Camry is a great car, I think is one of those popular cars in the country. But I said you know Nana, I'll buy you whatever car you want. Go to the Mercedes dealership, you go there, I just want you to have the best cup. Nope. Randy, this is this is what I want. So she sent me a picture of her in front of the
car at the red Toyota. And that summer I go there. It's such a hot day. I mean, I go there. Let's go for a drive Nana and I get in the car. And it's so hot. Turn on the AC. And I'm looking for the window. But now we're in I see the roller. Now what's what is up with this? She said, Well, the power windows was $600 more. I said all right, you know, we're not we're not doing that anymore. But I bought her three more cameras. And for me, it's been one of my greatest joys to support her for the last
20 years. You know, you work hard. I you know, buy some nice things. I have a nice house I we have a vacation home. And I like art a lot but but being able to help my grandmother who grew up you know, in poverty and had five husbands and, and has been one of the most enjoyable things in my life. That you know, period.
Oh, man, you bet. I love your grandmother. You realize this now like see, I want to meet her. You should I'm gonna What's your name?
Judy, either come to Detroit. Well, we'll find a Detroit.
Hey, Judy, my name is Sammy Hagar, you probably don't know me. And you might even like my music. I'm not sure but I just want to say I want to live your life. I want to be 103 and healthy. And I want to meet you someday. And if you'd like to drink tequila, I can help you. Send her. Send her that. Okay, I will give her the biggest hug she's ever had. I'll let her adopt me. She's gonna judge me what the hell?
Oh, God, that makes me terrible. Thank you for for doing that. Couple more. So my favorite musician in the world is
Oh, whoa, you're going back there. Oh, Paul McCartney.
Do you know him? No. That's my last question. The one musician in the world that I haven't met and want to meet is and don't say Paul McCartney. Let's go with somebody else.
No, it's not let me think who I haven't met that I would like to meet. You know, I'm dead. I've just met everybody. I mean, it's Geez I just Well, I mean, it would have to be dead or alive. It would have to be Elvis. So you know if that helps. If I was one guy would want to spend the afternoon singing and playing and shooting the shit with and eating peanut butter sandwiches. Deep fried would be Elvis Presley van that I think Elvis was the king. No one has ever
been bigger than Elvis. I don't care what they say the king of this a kingdom that he was the king. Okay. Crazy as he was read all the books. I know all that stuff. But, man, the Big Al was the man.
If President Biden were standing in front of me, I would tell him
we need a new president. I'm sorry. I love it. Sorry.
The person in the world that I admire the most is
Oh, I gotta say. Same thing old or new. I'd have to say somebody like Mahatma Gandhi. I just think he would just the most genuine. I read his book and just he just I don't know. God, I wish I could be there. It soulful and committed in an egotistical or whatever it was, I don't know,
if I had one wish it would be
that end, violence and greed on this planet, probably in greed and everything else to go away with it.
Sammy, that's a great place to finish. And as we do I want to give a huge shout out to my great friend Myles scaly who introduced us into your new tequila company Santo, where you're partners with miles and Guy theory. If you like
tequila, it's awesome. I also want to tell you, you've made a huge difference in the lives of hundreds of 1000s of people, music lovers, beginning and successful musicians, entrepreneurs, and perhaps most importantly, the 10s of 1000s of people who have been the recipients of your incredible generosity. Sammy, thanks for being here. Today. I'm in search of excellence.