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Sammy Hagar addresses pain of Eddie Van Halen's death: 'I fell apart'

By Megan Armstrong | Last updated 4/16/21

Eddie Van Halen and Sammy Hagar had a rocky relationship, not speaking for years, but the former Van Halen guitarist and vocalist was still deeply affected by the band's namesake passing away from cancer last October.

"I fell apart," Hagar said in a teaser clip for 1st Look Presents: Celebrity Sleepover when host Johnny "Bananas" Devenanzio asked how he handled the news. "It just was such a miracle that him and I had hooked up about four months, five months before that—the first of the year—and we just ... went really into some soul, talking about doing something the next year and all that kind of stuff."

Hagar added: "The way I've swallowed this pill and have been able to say, 'You know what? We made 11 years of music together. We wrote some 40, 50-million selling records and some of the greatest songs in rock history.' I'm so fortunate to have that."

Just weeks after Van Halen died at 65 years old, the 73-year-old Hagar discussed how much reconciling with Van Halen he made it so he didn't struggle even more:

Listen to "Sammy Hagar Talks Birthday Bash, Eddie Van Halen, and More!" on Spreaker.

"I think that the word is pretty much out that Eddie and I buried the hatchet earlier on this year," Hagar said in the interview with Rock 105.5's Angi Taylor. "We didn’t go around talking about it. He asked me not to talk about it, and I did not talk about it. But now, looking back, if we wouldn’t have come to terms with that feud we were having after the reunion tour, I wouldn’t have been able to come to grips with it."

The full Celebrity Sleepover episode featuring Hagar will air April 17 after Saturday Night Live on NBC before hitting YouTube at 8 a.m. Monday, April 19.

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