It’s Got What It Takes: Rhino Expands ‘5150,’ Van Halen’s First Album with Sammy Hagar, for 40th Anniversary

Four decades ago, Van Halen entered a surprising new era of rock and roll – and they’re exploring it with a new deluxe edition from Rhino. 5150, the band’s first album with vocalist Sammy Hagar at the fore, will be released in several formats on March 27. The centerpiece is a 3CD/Blu-ray/LP version featuring the original remastered album (overseen by the band’s longtime engineer Donn Landee in 2023 for The Collection II box set), a disc of rare non-LP edits and mixes, and the premiere release of audio from the band’s bestselling…

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That’s What Makes Us Humans Being: Van Halen’s ‘Balance’ Set for Deluxe Edition

Van Halen’s catalogue is attaining further Balance with an expanded edition of the band’s final album recorded with second lead singer Sammy Hagar. The band’s 10th studio album, released in 1995, will be reissued August 15 as a 2CD/2LP/Blu-ray set offering the remaster featured in 2023 box set The Collection II, three studio rarities, eight unreleased live tracks and a half-dozen music videos (including another live performance from the vault). Standalone 2CD and 2LP editions will be available as well; all vinyl features the complete album spread across three sides with an etching on…

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Right Now, You’re Reading About a Van Halen Reissue

For the first time ever, Rhino is expanding a Van Halen studio album. On July 12, the label will release a 2CD/2LP/Blu-ray edition of For Unlawful Carnal Knowledge, the group’s ninth album and penultimate with lead singer Sammy Hagar, who’d taken over from David Lee Roth in 1985. As a major upstart rock act of the late ’70s and one of the biggest of the ’80s, Van Halen had something to prove on their first disc of the ’90s – and this set delivers some intriguing bonus material from the era. Paired with…

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Right Now: Van Halen’s Second Phase Gets Remastered for New Box Set

Van Halen fans were on pins and needles in the spring of 1986, when the California rockers replaced iconoclastic vocalist David Lee Roth with former Montrose frontman/rhythm guitarist Sammy Hagar. This unexpected partnership will be examined in full on a box set offering the first ever remastered editions of the group’s Hagar-led albums on vinyl and CD – plus some bonus material, to boot. The Collection II, released October 6, is a sequel to Warner/Rhino’s 2015 box containing new remasters of the Roth-led material, released from 1978 to 1984. (Each has been…

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Rock Candy Records To Launch American Label with Sammy Hagar, The Nymphs, More

Rock Candy Records, the brainchild of former music journalist and A&R man Derek Oliver, has just announced the birth of a U.S. arm.  The American operation for Rock Candy will launch this Friday, November 18, with four titles from Sammy Hagar, The Nymphs, Salty Dog, and Tyketto. Amazon U.S. will have the Hagar and Salty Dog titles in stock on December 2. For the past eight years, the London-based label has celebrated rock and its various strains on a variety of reissues from the 1970s-1990s by artists including Toto, R.E.O. Speedwagon, Kansas,…

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Chickenfoot’s Debut Gets New Legs on Double-Disc Set

It only saw release a few years back, but hard-rock supergroup Chickenfoot is reissuing their out-of-print debut album with a nice amount of extra tracks. The incredible pedigree of the band – featuring former Van Halen members Sammy Hagar and Michael Anthony on vocals and bass, respectively, along with guitarist Joe Satriani and Red Hot Chili Peppers drummer Chad Smith – earned a heavy amount of media attention upon first release, particularly as Hagar and Anthony’s former bandmates in Van Halen re-recruited David Lee Roth to join them on tour. Don’t expect…

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