Posted on 09/16/2008 8:46:30 PM PDT by My Favorite Headache
16-Sep-08
Eddie Van Halen Reaches Out To Sammy Hagar Over The GOP's Use Of Their Song "Right Now"
Rolling Stone magazine reports that days before Heart served the GOP campaign with a cease-and-desist letter for playing their 1977 hit "Barracuda" to introduce VP pick Sarah Palin (high school alias: Sarah Barracuda) at the August 31st Republican convention, Van Halen sounded off against McCain and Co. for blasting their tune "Right Now" at a rally in Dayton, Ohio. Permission was not sought or granted nor would it have been given [to use the song]," Alex and Eddie Van Halen said in a statement. But not every VH member agreed.
"I got goosebumps from it my fur went up," says the bands ex-frontman, Sammy Hagar, who co-wrote and sang the song and said hed be "just as happy" if Obama played it. "I was honored that a potential president of the United States used those words in a positive sense, like, 'We gotta act now!' "
Hagar, whos tight-lipped on his presidential endorsement ("I vote for the man, not the party," he says) heard that McCain used the tune via a deluge of phone calls. "I got calls from relatives, friends, doctors, lawyers everyone thought it was so cool," he says. "Then I started getting excited. Those words are an old Zen philosophy its totally cool that theyre timeless." Even former bandmate Eddie Van Halen rang Hagar up.
"I got a message on my cell phone and it was Eddies voice," Hagar recalls. "He goes, 'Sam? This dont sound like you. I got the wrong number.' And he hangs up! So I hit redial. He didnt answer, but I left a message: 'Ed, its me. If you would like to talk about the 'Right Now' situation I'd love to speak to you about it.'"
The two never connected, which raises some lingering questions. "Why didnt [Van Halen] say no when Pepsi Cola gave us a million dollars to use the song in a Pepsi Light commercial?" asks Hagar. "Thats when you say no. That isnt the message of this song." But when a potential future president is using it to bring a message to the world, he says, "Im going, 'Hell, yes!'"
"Right Now" is on Van Halen's 1991 album "For Unlawful Carnal Knowledge."
I don’t think they bothered to look into that to be honest.
There we go! Thank you! ;)
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