10 Musicians Who Came Back From Huge Band Breakups

Any hair metal band is only as good as the frontman they have onstage. You might be able to write some of the greatest riffs of your career, but if you don't have the right guy delivering the goods to the people night after night, it's anyone's guess as to whether it's actually going to hit the big time. And when you have one of the greatest frontmen of all time suddenly throw in the towel, Van Halen should have been read its last rights.

After a pretty nasty split with David Lee Roth following the tour for 1984, Van Halen were scrambling to find a new singer who would have to fill Diamond Dave's insane shoes every night. There was no chance of going with an unknown guy though, and it turned out Van Halen's main man was already a superstar, with Sammy Hagar getting a call to come down and jam with the guys. Even though Sammy had a much different presence than Dave, 5150 fit right in with Van Halen's nonstop energy, bringing more musical elements to the table and letting Eddie flex his muscles that weren't getting as much attention when Dave was in the band.

The most important change though had to be on the live stage, where Sammy delivered material from both eras of the band and related to the audience in a far more natural way, almost like an average joe being the MC of one big heavy metal party. This might have been the moment where Van Halen shifted more towards dad rock, but this is the kind of music that had a lot more substance behind it than something like Runnin With the Devil.