Sammy Hagar sat down with the Rock Hall to talk about his speech during Foreigner’s 2024 Rock & Roll Hall of Fame induction. He revealed that he worked on his speech for three weeks and admitted to singing the lyrics wrong during his performance of ‘Hot Blooded.’
“I’ve been writing that speech for three weeks,” the Red Rocker admitted. “I changed the speech probably 20 times even right to when I was standing backstage to get ready to go on, [they say], ‘You have three minutes.’ I kept reading it over and over again, just take this part out. If you put it up, I might say it, I don’t wanna say it. So I re-edit it one more time.”
Hagar also talked about how much he wanted to do justice to the band with his performance: “I was a wreck. I really wanted to do them proud. When I got off the stage to sing Hot Blooded, I was like, ‘Yes! It’s what I do!'”
Hagar also explained why ‘Hot Blooded’ is more complex than it seems: “‘Hot Blooded’ sounds like such a simple song, but it’s tricky as hell. The lyrics go, ‘I’ve got a fever a 103, I’ve got a fever inside of me.’ That’s very subtle. Well, I sang the wrong verse, I said, ‘I’ve got a fever, a 103,’ I said, ‘I’ve got a fever burning inside of me.’ And I went, ‘Damn, I blew it already.’
Even after the mistake, Hagar felt proud of his performance because he received validation from a friend. “I’m very proud of what I did, and Lou [Gramm] gave me some love. That’s the validation I needed. Lou said, ‘You killed it.'”
Hagar and Foreigner’s bond goes beyond the Hall of Fame. Hagar and Mick Jones have been good friends since the early ’70s when Hagar’s band, Montrose, opened for Spooky Tooth.
“We must’ve done a while year, 150 shows with those guys,” Hagar told Classic Rock after his Rock Hall performance. “We just hit it off. I dug his guitar sound. I love Spooky Tooth; if you listen to Foreigner, you’ll hear Spooky Tooth in there. They always did the half-time choruses [sings a bit of Feels Like the First Tim’], so you hear a lot of Spooky Tooth in there, and I was a Spooky Tooth fan. When Mick quit, I kept in touch.”
Hagar mentioned joking with Jones about not inviting him to sing for Foreigner. “I’m going, ‘I sing a lot like (Lou Gramm). I’m broke off my ass, man!’ [Jones] said, ‘Me too. You were on the West Coast, I was on the East Coast. I couldn’t afford to fly you out for an audition.’ But that’s the kind of relationship Mick and I have always had.”
In addition to Hagar, Foreigner’s Rock Hall performance featured the current lineup of the band, along with guest appearances from Slash, Chad Smith of the Red Hot Chili Peppers, Demi Lovato, and Kelly Clarkson. Mick Jones missed the ceremony due to his ongoing battle with Parkinson’s disease, but Lou Gramm and other inducted members, Al Greenwood and Rick Wills, joined the band for ‘I Want to Know What Love Is.’
