Sammy Hagar
Sammy Hagar & Friends

Sammy Hagar has gathered his friends and recorded an album, cleverly called 'Sammy Hagar & Friends'. Together this gang of friends has putted together a mix of some new, some old, some heavy, some slow, some soft and mostly something happy, but it's also some grievous things stuffed in to it.

This is the 16th solo album by Sammy Hagar, if you count the four he did with his house band The Waboritas and it's the first he does since joining Chickefoot after 'Cosmic Universal Fashion' five years ago. 'Sammy Hagar And Friends' have a couple of his Chickenfoot friends on it but there are many more of his friends than just them. There are a few from the Waribotas and Van Halen but also from other bands than the ones Sammy himself has been in. All in all he has 32 friends on this album and that's more than most albums I review.

Is it a good album then? Well, as with all music that's of course something depending on your musical taste but if you like this kind of music but if you don't like this kind of music then you might not like this album. Sammy Hagar and his friends have done their best to make an album of top notch quality, which ends up in an album that - for its genre - holds up really well. I wrote "for its genre" for a reason, but what genre is it? Honestly I can't really say which genre this is because it's a pretty mixed result with plenty of ingredients. There are some blues rock, some fusion, some hard rock, some classic rock and also a pinch of folk music. So for an album that's good for its genre - do I mean it's good for all these genres? Or only when it's mixed in to this particular kind of cocktail? Well, we'll get to that…

There is at least variation on this album with everything from Hawaii tunes in All We Need Is An Island to some real hard knockers in Knockdown Dragout as well as some moody blues in the opening track Winding Down. On the tracks Going Down (10), Personal Jesus (3) and already mentioned Knockdown Dragout (5) we hear the great guitar virtuosos Neal Schon (track 3 and 10) and Joe Satriani (track 5) doing their impressive guitar work and as two of the greatest guitarists on this planet it's given that these tracks rocks big time. Three of the tracks are covers, which are already mentioned Personal Jesus (Depeche Mode), Ramblin' Gamblin' Man (Bob Seger) and Margaritaville (Jimmy Buffet) but honestly I wouldn't have known unless I knew the songs since this album lacks a specific character and no tracks either sticks out or fits in and a few the tracks are also so different from their original that you really don't see them as cover immediately. Personal Jesus, for example, is now a bluesy gospel and Margaritaville that already sounds a bit latino and Caribbean in original is now a full blown beach track with palm trees meeting exotic Hawaii style. The cover that sounds closest to its original is Ramblin' Gamblin' Man, which is pretty similar to Bob Segers original, only a bit modernized.

Most of the songs on 'Sammy Hagar & Friends' feels positive with added choirs in choruses or at least a spicy backup song and only half of these songs have Sammy Hagar alone on lead vocals, the rest are shared with vocalists like Kid Rock, Toby Keith, Taj Mahal and so on. Personally I think the vocal side sounds very good but it's not only that who does - the instrumental and production side of it is also very good and I think Hagar have very little to feel ashamed of here. So what is there to complain about? Well, I only find one thing that's a bit off and it's the song writing because while the performance of everyone singing, playing and producing the album is top notch there are a few songs on this album that just don't cut it for me. However, I don't think there are any bad songs, any songs necessary to get rid of or anything like that - there's just a few that don't feel as good as the rest but on these 37 minutes that doesn't make too much different because there isn't much you could have changed for the better.

After listening to this album for some time I noticed the album didn't stay fresh in the long runs and that's the real reason why I don't think this album makes it to the top scores. For an album to make the top scores we want it to be revolutionizing, genre crossing or simply kicking ass! But when I hear 'Sammy Hagar & Friends' it doesn't feel like it's any of these, all though it's a solid performance that's good from start to finish. I think the album crosses some genres style wise and the material has a wide range of influences and that feels pretty inspiring - and to make it as good as Sammy does is even creditable but then we should remember he has a number of no 1 charted songs and albums, more than 40 million albums sold and a place in the Rock 'n' Roll Hall Of Fame so it's not like we're talking about a rookie here. And considering the great musicians that has joined Sammy on the album it's even less surpricing he manages to make such a good album. Honestly, I don't think anyone in their right state of mindd could be disappointed in getting such a good album, unless your an idiot and expect him to make a sequel of something from his past. I think this is one of the best albums released this fall in the musical direction we call adult rock and for a long time I did consider it to make a six. In the end though the doubble digit runs made it loose some of its first acquaintance magic and hence it makes a high five. I think this is a real treat from Sammy Hagar and his friends!

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