Jason Bonham was forced to leave Sammy Hagar‘s “The Best Of All Worlds” tour due to an unspecified family issue. The drummer was replaced at Hagar‘s concert on Tuesday night (August 27) at Riverbend Music Center in Cincinnati, Ohio by Kenny Aronoff, who had previously played with Hagar, bassist Michael Anthony and guitarist Joe Satriani in CHICKENFOOT.
“Tonight I’m going to dedicate this to the Bonham family in England,” Hagar said while introducing the song “Eagles Fly”. “Hope everything works out okay over there, and to our brother Jason.”
At the end of the show, Hagar gave a special shout-out to “the man who saved the day, Kenny f*cking Aronoff.”
Aronoff replaced Chad Smith in CHICKENFOOT‘s touring lineup from 2011 to 2012. Smith was forced to step away from CHICKENFOOT‘s touring activities due to his commitments with the RED HOT CHILI PEPPERS.
CHICKENFOOT recorded two albums between 2009 and 2011 and toured across America but never performed any VAN HALEN material. More recently, Hagar and Anthony have played some of the VAN HALEN catalog with guitarist Vic Johnson and Bonham in SAMMY HAGAR AND THE CIRCLE.