Sammy Hagar
Dolby Live at Park MGM
Las Vegas, Nevada, United States
September 26, 2026

lineage: Sony ECM-717 (mic) / Sony PCM-M10 (recorder) > 24/96 (normalized, light trimming, downsampled from 24/96 to 16/44 using Audacity) > CD wav (track splitting) > FLAC (using Traders Little Helper) Level 8

01 Encore Thank You Goodnight
02 Why Can't This Be Love
03 Top Of The World
04 Bad Motor Scooter
05 Best Of Both Worlds
06 Mine All Mine
07 Humans Being
08 5150
09 Love Walks In
10 Right Now
11 Cabo Wabo
12 Mas Tequila
13 There's Only One Way To Rock
14 Ain't Talkin' Bout Love
15 Satch Boogie
16 Panama
17 Heavy Metal
18 I Can't Drive 55
19 Eagles Fly

Notes: My wife, her mom, our son and his new wife, and I all scheduled a trip out to Vegas back in May, with the idea that we'd have a chance to spend a little family time together. My wife and I also decided to search out who was playing in town while we were there, narrowing the options down to the Scorpions and Sammy Hagar - because we both are Van Halen fans, but had never seen them with Sammy, we decided to pick that show. Later, the Scorps ended up canceling their residency, so it turned out to be the right move. Additionally, in the time between scheduling our Vegas trip and actually going, Sammy and his band scheduled a show closer to home in Colorado Springs, so I took in that show as well, joined that time by a couple of my buddies.

Now, having seen Sammy twice in about 45 days, he did give a fun and energetic performance, and if it didn't turn me into a superfan of Van Hagar, it did remind me how much I like that era. The man clearly loves being a rock star, and is obviously appreciative of his fans. My wife - whose Van Halen preferences run closer to Sammy than Dave - really enjoyed the show and it also served as a nice date night for us, while the kids took grandma to dinner. This show was also the final one from his Vegas residency, and it was cool to see him perform a slightly different show than the one in CO - he played five different songs and added about 15 minutes to the show length, so I'm glad I got to see them both.

The Dolby Live is an excellent venue. Even though we were sitting in the 300 section, we had a nice eyeline to the stage, and the sound was quite good. It says here that the residency capacity is about 5200 people, and I'd guess it was about 90% full, so not a bad turnout. The crowd was respectful of Sammy and band, and overall, the recording reflects the favorable conditions.

The band did have an opening performance by comedian Dave Hill - he started about 10 minutes prior to the stated showtime and ran for about 30 minutes, though the crowd seemed to grow increasingly annoyed by his humor. I didn't realize there would be an opening act, and I don't think most of the crowd expected it either, but fortunately, he was literally removed from stage, and Sammy's opening video started immediately thereafter. My wife hated him, several of the people around us didn't seem to like him, but I thought he had a couple of semi-funny moments.

Since this is likely the last time I'll see Sammy - he is about to turn 79 in October - following are my thoughts about his Van Halen legacy: the songs and the music holds up and, even if it's not at the same level as the original Van Halen with David Lee Roth, it's part of the history of the band, and I'm glad he's still out there playing those songs. He says this is the end of the Van Halen focused shows - I personally think he has every right to play Van Halen focused shows and he has a good balance of those classics alongside his more notable solo material a Montrose song, and a new song (inspired by Van Halen), too. By my count, he played 19 songs and only 10 of them are Van Halen songs (though he did play several of the other songs with Van Halen, too). He gets a lot of criticism online for his reliance on the VH history (mainly from older VH fans), but if not him, who? I mean, he's got Michael Anthony with him (who also lead sings a song), plus Joe Satriani and Kenny Aronoff, so it's a stellar band. If you closed your eyes, it was 1991 all over again.

I've included 10 photos taken from our seats - they ain't art, but they give you an idea of the stage set-up and how the show looked from where we sat.

For what's it's worth: this is my own writing, no AI used in this message.

Finally: please don't sell the recording, but, otherwise, do with it what you wish. Share it and trade it, and remember: these and other greats will not be around forever, so, let's enjoy them while we have them. Best wishes to all of the fans out there and Namaste.

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