Sammy Hagar praises Steven Tyler for retirement announcement

5 August, 2024

Steven Tyler and Sammy Hager

Sammy Hagar has praised Steven Tyler for his recent retirement announcement.

Last week, Aerosmith made the “heartbreaking” decision to retire from touring entirely due to Tyler’s ongoing vocal cord injury. This resulted in the cancellation of their ‘Peace Out’ farewell tour, which Hagar said recently was a “great fucking loss”.

While on the ‘Best of All Worlds’ tour alongside Jason Bonham, Michael Anthony and Joe Satriani, Hagar brought it up by telling fans: “We had some crazy news today.”

“We got here this afternoon sometime and we’re all sitting around backstage and a friend of ours that works for Aerosmith came and said, ‘Yeah, Aerosmith called retirement today. They quit. They stopped.’ God bless ’em. It’s a horrible thing. It’s a horrible thing. What a great fucking loss.”

He recalled his first encounter with Aerosmith while he had opened for them with his old band Montrose in 1973: “We didn’t know who they were, and they sold out Cobo, and I’m going, ‘Who the fuck are these guys?’ So, we did our show, we did an encore, and we played ‘Helter Skelter’ for our encore. And Aerosmith comes on and they opened with ‘Helter Skelter.’ Steven and I have been friends ever since.”

He added: “Long story short, we love those guys. We all grew up with those guys. You grew up with them, we grew up with them, Mike and I. They’ve been our competitors to Van Halen for fucking 10 years. You know what I’m saying? ‘Fuck those guys.’ No, no, no, but we really do like them. It’s just that we’re mad at them. But anyway, what a shame.”

He rounded-off by commenting: “It’s a sad thing, but honest to God, my hat goes off to one of the greatest rock and roll singers of all time, Mister Steven Tyler, for saying, ‘I can’t sing anymore. I quit.’ Fuck yes! Listen, that’s honourable – that’s fucking honourable. The day I can’t sing anymore, I will fucking do the same thing. And that’s what a lot of other motherfuckers should have did a long time ago.”

Aerosmith’s tour kicked off last year, but the band only played three shows and rescheduled the rest of the dates after frontman Tyler injured his larynx. On Friday (August 2), the band shared a lengthy post on social media announcing their official retirement from the road, citing Tyler’s vocal issues.

“It was 1970 when a spark of inspiration became Aerosmith,” the band wrote. “Thanks to you, our Blue Army, that spark caught flame and has been burning for over five decades. Some of you have been with us since the beginning and all of you are the reason we made rock ‘n’ roll history.

They continued: “Sadly, it is clear, that a full recovery from his vocal injury is not possible. We have made a heartbreaking and difficult, but necessary, decision – as a band of brothers – to retire from the touring stage.”

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