‘You don’t write songs like that’: The complicated birth of Van Halen’s “Right Now”

Share this:

“Right Now,” which later earned three nods at the 1992 MTV Video Music Awards, actually began two different demos — and it took months for Sammy Hagar and Eddie Van Halen to decide they went together.

“I wrote the lyrics, and I had the melody,” Hagar tells Rachel Ray. “And Eddie Van Halen, he had this piano part. It took us seven months to realize that the piano part that he was trying to get me to write lyrics to, and the lyrics that I was trying to get him to write music to [actually would work as one joined track]. One day, in the studio, he was playing the piano and I was in the other room — and I go: ‘They fit!'”

Later, the track found a home on 1991’s For Unlawful Carnal Knowledge, was made into a celebrated high-concept video — though there was some intrigue involved with that process, as well.

“Right Now” became one of the Hagar era’s signature songs, going to No. 2 on Billboard mainstream rock charts, earning the band video of the year honors, and sticking forever in their former frontman’s mind: “We married them together in the song,” Hagar adds, “and it was the weirdest thing. Normally, you don’t write songs like that.”

[amazon_enhanced asin=”B002CNR1TQ” container=”” container_class=”” price=”All” background_color=”FFFFFF” link_color=”000000″ text_color=”0000FF” /] [amazon_enhanced asin=”B000021Y7K” container=”” container_class=”” price=”All” background_color=”FFFFFF” link_color=”000000″ text_color=”0000FF” /] [amazon_enhanced asin=”B00000I40M” container=”” container_class=”” price=”All” background_color=”FFFFFF” link_color=”000000″ text_color=”0000FF” /] [amazon_enhanced asin=”B000286S8S” container=”” container_class=”” price=”All” background_color=”FFFFFF” link_color=”000000″ text_color=”0000FF” /] [amazon_enhanced asin=”B000286S9C” container=”” container_class=”” price=”All” background_color=”FFFFFF” link_color=”000000″ text_color=”0000FF” /]

Something Else!