Sammy Math 101...

[blueeyedmurder]

I sent this rant in to Metal Sludge a couple of months back. They had raked Sebastian Bach of Skid Row over the coals for "fudging" his record sales, and I had just read the interview with Sammy Hagar, and it pissed me off greatly!

Enjoy.

1/8/01

Hi Metal Sludge! I love your site, visit it regularly. You guys called Sebastian on his bullshit of selling a "gazillion" more records than he actually did, and I thought I'd fill you in on another "rocker" that recently done the same thing just to boost his own ego.

Sammy Hagar recently said in an interview when asked about bashing David Lee Roth/VH: (Link to interview can be found at www.vhnd.com)

Sammy: "...It's a fact, number one. The Van Halen part of it is the thing I'll never escape from. Other than both being singers in the same band, we have nothing in common. Other than both having a successful reign. We sold 42 million records, they sold 28 [with Roth]. I was in the band 11 years, he was 7. So stack it up. "Right Now" and all the No. 1 records were with me. They became a teenage phenomenon with him. But people grew up. It was more like 18-30 for me. Their wife and couples came to see us. The fact that I had a career before Van Halen was more important to me. David Lee Roth didn't have a career before and so he didn't have one after."

Ok little man, now lets get the numbers straight!!! These are the numbers of albums sold according to www.van-halen.com The Official Van Halen Web site, so I'll trust their account...

DLR era:
Van Halen - 10.3 million
Van Halen II - 5.7 million
Women and Children First - 4.3 million
Fair Warning - 3.4 million
Diver Down - 4 million
1984 - 10 million
______________________________
Total - 37.7 million

"Spammy" era:
5150 - 6.9 million
OU812 - 4.4 million
F.U.C.K. - 3.8 million
Right Here Right Now(Live) - 2.5 million
Balance - 2.9 million
______________________________
Total - 20.9 million

Now we can throw the "VH Best of Vol 1" in there at 2.4 million. And let's be honest. No one bought that to hear Slappy Hagar squeel like a cat being swung around by the tail!! We bought it to hear DLR back with VH. That's a difference of 16.8 million in favor of Diamond Dave, even if you don't give him the Best of sales! I know that all rock stars exagerate the numbers some but, He said he sold 42 million!!! That's 21 million difference!!! And he said that DLR only sold 28 million w/VH. He sold 37.7 million!! And Those albums are still selling!! No one will include the Sammy-era of VH in the all time classic Rock bands of all time, but the DLR era is and always will be counted in that elite group of great bands like: Led Zepplin, Rolling Stones, Aerosmith, etc.

But that's not all. There's this comment: "...I was in the band 11 years, he was 7." Lets see...Dave helped found the band in 1974. He left on 4/1/85. Now Spammy, that's 11 years. 11 years of helping to build one of the greatest Rock Bands of all time. Which you jumped into in '85 at the height of success and slowly ran into the ground with Pop ballads and every third song you wrote had to have the word "jive" or "love" in it!!!

Here's one more for the bullshit files: "...David Lee Roth didn't have a career before and so he didn't have one after."

He didn't have one before because he was helping to build the Van Halen machine. After...well while it was not comparable to his years with VH...He did have 3 platinum solo albums (CFTH, Eat'Em and Smile, Skyscraper) and he also sold out stadiums on WORLD tours through 1989. Now that hardly qualifies as no career!! Sammy could only sell 500 tickets to a damn outdoor amphitheater in my home town that held 5,000 on the Marching to Mars tour. That was right after he left VH, so he should have been at his most popular.

Sammy will always live in DLR's shadow!! No one will ever be able to mention Sammy Hagar without thinking of David Lee Roth!!

David Lee Roth left a perfectly tuned, sweet running Mercedes for Sammy to pilot in 1985...and he turned it into a damn spitting-sputtering Pinto with the hubcaps missing, and two different colored primered fenders.

If all the rumors are true, and Dave is back...He and Eddie are building that Mercedes once again!!!!

Thanks.

[MikeL]

You know, I've been waiting for someone to bring this up. There's a simple, accurate explanation for the apparent discrepancy in album sales.

Sammy is talking about the number of albums sold in his tenure, not just the 4 albums produced during his tenure.

[blueeyedmurder]

So Sammy's taking credit for the sales of Dave's albums while he was in Van Halen?

Yeah, that sounds about like something Sammy would do! Actually, that's probably not too far off. I know when I heard Van Hagar it made me miss the Real Van Halen and I went and re-purchased the first 6 again.

[MikeL]

Sammy was a part of selling the Dave-VH albums. Dave is happy to acknowledge that. He said something along the lines of "Sam Hagar is my bitch. Everytime he opens his mouth it sells more albums for me," on the Stern show.

And Sammy is likely proud of it too, which is reasonable. The selling a lot of albums part, I mean.
[img]smilies/wink.gif[/img]

[ April 20, 2001 at 09:57 AM: Message edited by: MikeL ]

[blueeyedmurder]

I doubt if Sammy's numbers recolection envolves the DAve era sales. Sammy would barely even acknowledge that there was a Dave era, and when he was forced to sing 3-4 of DLR's songs in concert, he botched them on purpose just to make his songs sound better.

[MikeL]

I'm willing to bet it's close. You can approximate the Dave albums sold during Sammy's tenure by using the certification dates on the official site. It should be close to what Sammy says.

[tap1966]

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by blueeyedmurder:
I doubt if Sammy's numbers recolection envolves the DAve era sales. Sammy would barely even acknowledge that there was a Dave era, and when he was forced to sing 3-4 of DLR's songs in concert, he botched them on purpose just to make his songs sound better.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

Probably someone told him the 1978-1984 figures and the 1985-??? figures and he just made a false assumption. No one ever accused Sammy of being smart [img]smilies/wink.gif[/img]

[blueeyedmurder]

You can justify it however you want to make yourself feel better about Sammy. It was a total slam on Dave. Not only the sales figures, but the years in the band, and the comment about no carrer before or after, shit. My answer to both proves him wrong and it just shows that he's just a bitter little man that knows he never could and never will fill DLR's shoes!! He hates being compared to Dave so he has to lie to make himself feel better.

[tap1966]

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by blueeyedmurder:
You can justify it however you want to make yourself feel better about Sammy. It was a total slam on Dave.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

I don't know who this was directed at. I'm certainly not defending Sammy or making myself feel better about him - I think Van Hagar sucked for the most part.

Your argument is he is a liar, mine is that he is stupid. Who cares - it's probably both. I don't care if he slammed Dave, and Dave certainly doesn't. He's irrelevant.

[Unchained Wolfie]

"Sammy is my bitch" LMAO! [img]smilies/biggrin.gif[/img]

[Glenn]

Blueeyed, I'm not sure why this surprises you so much. First off, Dave and Sammy HATE each other, so they'll always look to low blow each other. Second, they are both professional exaggerators. They constantly make things out to be bigger than they are. It's just the game.

I agree that Sammy inflates sales figures. But there's that clip of Dave when he gets asked point blank what the sales were of DLR Band and he gives a long soliloquey in which he never answers the question. These guys are professional spin doctors who just happen to sing for a living. [img]smilies/biggrin.gif[/img]

[MikeL]

Here are my guestimates of sales during the ten years Sammy was in the band, based on data from the official site. These numbers are rough, and are likely off by a bit.

VH: 4-5 million
VH2: ~2 million
WACF: ~1 million
FW: ~1 million
DD: 1+ million
1984: 4 million

So something like 14 million albums from the Dave era were sold during Sammy's years with the band. 37.7 million albums sold is the total for the Dave-era albums.

VH has sold more albums after 1985 than before.

Now, these numbers don't match what Sammy's numbers says. But he was mostly likely taking a guess based on what his management told him.

Overall, I think albums sales numbers aren't worth comparing. There are far too many variables beyond what any sample of individuals think is better.

One thing I've always wondered about is how many of VH's early sales were the result of repeat buyers over the years? Most fans who at one point purchased the albums on vinyl or tape have probably purchased them again on CD. There'd also be a number of resales due to loss, and the people purchasing the remasters.

If we had the breakdown of sales by media type, we might be able to construct something more meaningful. One could guess that most of the sales past '91 or so would be on CD, but I'm not confident enough in that assumption to run the numbers like I did above. Balance's sales probably wouldn't pale compared to the early albums if we stuck to the CD format.

[blueeyedmurder]

My comments were not directed at you Jonathan.

Glenn, I'm not surprised, just pointing out what a tool Sammy is.

Yes Dave is an exagerator. But as you pointed out...he zippity bee bopped around the question without answering it, in classic Dave fashion. At least he didn't say he sold more than twice as many as he really did!

[MikeL]

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by blueeyedmurder:
My answer to both proves him wrong and it just shows that he's just a bitter little man that knows he never could and never will fill DLR's shoes!! He hates being compared to Dave so he has to lie to make himself feel better.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

If Dave cared about what Sammy had to say, he'd have made an issue of it by now. You've been on this album sales thing for a long time now, as this isn't the first time you've brought this up. I'd say neither Sammy nor Dave is the bitter little man.

[blueeyedmurder]

Mike I didn't bring up the sales to prove that Dave was better. I brought up WHAT SAMMY SAID to make the point of him lying about HIS tenure with VH. And bashing Dave (again). I've always said that record sales don't matter. I've only pulled out the "numbers argument" when others have brought that argument.

Some of my favorite records are not best sellers...

DLRBand
Buckcherry
Marvelous 3
Jackyl

...Sales does not equal quality.