Sammy Hagar Van Halen Albums Ranked

Photo: bella lago from USA, CC BY-SA 2.0 <https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0>, via Wikimedia Commons

Our Sammy Hagar Van Halen Albums Ranked list looks at the Van Halen albums released with Sammy Hagar as the band’s lead singer. It’s tough to rank Van Halen albums when combining the David Lee Roth and Sammy Hagar eras. Van Halen was a completely different-sounding band with Sammy Hagar on lead vocals than with David Lee Roth as their frontman. It’s interesting how Van Halen fans are divided into two camps. Some prefer the David Lee Roth albums, and some feel the Sammy Hagar albums were better. If you were a fan from the start, it’s tough not to love the David Lee Roth albums more. If you came into the band late, you’re probably a bigger fan of the Sammy Hagar recordings.

Of course, many of us enjoy both lineups equally. Even some Van Halen fans with the band from the beginning were blown away by Sammy Hagar’s vocal ability. Of course, there are also the long-time Sammy Hagar fans who followed the red rocker before he joined Van Halen. Those fans will forever argue that Van Halen was a better band with Sammy Hagar.

If you have been listening to Sammy Hagar’s solo albums for the past twenty years, you can hear that the man could still sing in 2024 and well as he did when he first recorded with Van Halen. However, with Eddie Van Halen’s passing, we will never get to hear what that would have sounded like. We did hear what David Lee Roth sounded like on the recent tour. We will leave it at that.

Nonetheless, these are our picks for our favorite Sammy Hagar Van Halen albums ranked. In the end, it’s all for fun, but we think it may help the younger fans just starting to discover the Van Halen magic.

# 5 – Live: Right Here, Right Now

We placed this album on the list of studio albums, even though it’s a live album, for one particular reason. It’s not a live album. Eddie Van Halen’s guitar parts had to be redone because his guitar was out of tune on the recordings. So when Eddie Van Halen redid his parts in tune in the studio, it made Sammy Hagar’s vocals sound out of tune. In turn, Sammy Hagar had to enter the studio and sing all new vocals to the live recording. So, in essence, only Michael Anthony and Alex Van Halen are playing live while Sammy Hagar and Eddie Van Halen were recorded in the studio.

# 4 – Balance

Two years after the live album was released, Van Halen issued their tenth album, Balance. It was also the band’s fourth studio album release with Sammy Hagar. This is probably the weakest of the Sammy Hagar Van Halen albums, but it’s still a hard-rocking affair that was pretty much heads above everything else that was being released in 1995. I played this one constantly on CD in my car and enjoyed every minute. Standout tracks on Balance included “The Seventh Seal,” “Amsterdam,” and the LP’s single “Can’t Stop Loving You.”

# 3 – OU812

There are some significant cuts on Van Halen’s OU812 album. This record has more of a soul groove than any previous Van Halen albums. You can hear it in the guitar grooves to songs like “Finish What Ya Started,” which has an Eddie Van Halen grooving riff to die for. “Black and Blue” is a driving force of rock and roll bliss that was a perfect album opener and featured fabulous backup vocals by Michael Anthony. “Mine All Mine” is the album’s masterpiece. The song merges the old Van Halen with the new Van Halen. OU812 was the second Sammy Hagar Van Halen album. The record was released in 1988.

# 2 – For Unlawful Carnal Knowledge

Van Halen’s ninth studio album, entitled For Unlawful Carnal Knowledge, stands as one of the band’s best. It’s a hard-rocking album in the style of the band’s best album, Fair Warning. The album was released in 1991 in the middle of Nirvana mania. But that didn’t stop Van Halen from reaching the number one spot on the Billboard Rock Album Charts with For Unlawful Carnal Knowledge. The album opened up with the hard-driving song “Poundcake,” which was also released as the album’s first single. “Poundcake” also hit number one on the Billboard Rock Songs charts. The album spawned seven singles, with three hitting number one on the Billboard Rock Songs charts.

The album also included one of Sammy Hagar’s best vocals of his career on the song “Man On A Mission.” Of course, we can’t fail to mention the fact that the For Unlawful Carnal Knowledge album featured the return of legendary producer Ted Templeman in producing his first Sammy Hagar Van Halen album. Yet, it was not the first meeting between Ted Templeman and Sammy Hagar, as the legendary producer had produced Sammy Hagar’s VOA album in 1984. The same year Ted Templeman produced the David Lee Roth Van Halen album 1984.

# 1 – 5150

We saved the number one spot on our Sammy Hagar Van Halen albums ranked list for the band’s debut with Sammy Hagar entitled 5150. This was one of the most highly anticipated albums in rock and roll. The band had been interviewed in Musician magazine just before the album was released. The band sounded so incredibly excited about the album as Eddie Van Halen raved about Sammy Hagar’s vocal ability and how he was opening himself up to write more melodic melodies. It sure did fill this album. Some didn’t care for the more pop-oriented sounding songs like Why Can’t This Be Love,” “Dreams,” or Love Walks In.” But the fact was those were incredibly well-written and flawlessly performed songs.

The album was not just filled with pop hits. There were some scorching rockers on the album, including “Good Enough,” “Get Up,” and “Best Of Both Worlds.” On the album’s closing track, “Inside,” Eddie Van Halen lets loose, turning up the heat and delivering one of his greatest performances on record. This was, and still is a great Van Halen Album.

Updated February 16, 2024

Professional Sources, research, experience, and citations

Charting information used in the analysis and research of the commercial success of these songs comes from Billboard Magazine Charts

https://www.billboard.com/charts/

The Story Of Classic Rock

Other sources for important factual information include the band’s website

http://www.van-halen.com/

Further analysis and original thoughts are provided by the writer Brian Kachejian’s experience as a professional musician and music collector for over 50 years and his experience as a New York State certified music and history educator and professional music journalist with the New York Press.

These articles are updated regularly.