Motely Crue Sixx Things You Must Know About!

Motely Crue Sixx Things You Must Know About!

John Kordosh

(The Windy City was indeed full of gusts when talkative Nikki Sixx, Motley Crue’s inimitable songwriter, met with METAL’S equally-gabby J. Kordosh for a recent interview. The two discussed many of the burning metal issues of the day—Ratt versus Motley Crue, the U.S. Senate versus Motley Crue, Motley Crue versus Motley Crue—and came up with some amazing observations. So sit back and simply enjoy this Q & A with one of music's most controversial figures... and sneer at those unfortunate enough to have actually missed this event of the interview season.—Ed.)

I guess I'd like to know if there has been any change in your attitude, and Motley Crue's attitude.

Same old band, y’know?

What about the alcohol disclaimer on the album?

We don’t represent sobriety, we just don’t want to see somebody have so much fun they kill themselves. I mean, y’know,

I got a shattered right shoulder when we were recording Shout At The Devil, Tommy rolled a 280Z up a freeway seven times. And Vince—being the least fucked up of any of us, at least when it comes to alcohol, hit a wet spot in the middle of the road which threw him into another car. And, y’know, Razzle died from it. And we just said, “Wait a minute. What are we doing?” We don’t want to have so much fun that someone dies, and someone died. All we’re saying is: get fucked up, do anything you wanna do with your life—that’s fine, y’know.. .just don’t get behind a wheel when you do it.

The one thing that struck me is we got a press release—it was about your video. And it was stressed in the press release that "Smokin' In The Boys Room" was not about smoking—it was about playing-type "smokin’."

Yeah, well that was the basic idea, y’know?

Isn 't this going too far to appease your critics?

No, that really wasn’t the idea behind it. There was like a double meaning is all that they’re saying. It could have to do with fuckin’ smokin’ heroin, I don’t know. It’s just a great song.

When you guys played Ann Arbor—did you know Cub Koda’s from Ann Arbor?

Yeah! Yeah, we played New Haven, Connecticut, at the beginning of the tour—he was in town. We got together at the hotel, had some drinks and stuff and got to rappin’ and stuff. We said, “Well, why don’t you come onstage?” So he came onstage and jammed with us. It was great—good guy.

I guess it makes some people ask if Sixx has lost the songwriting touch.

Why, because we did a cover song that was successful?

Well, because the cover song was the first single and a big hit.

I don’t think so. The album’s great—I think our songwriting’s better than it’s been on any other album.

Why do you think that?

I think that as a lyricist, writing melodies, everything—it’s just progressed. It's gotten better, there’s more depth to it.

What’s your personal favorite?

On the album?

Well, on the album or ever.

Of my music? I like “Too Young To Fall In Love” a lot, there’s a lot of nice changes in it. Lyrically, I probably like “Danger” off the second album and “On With The Show” off the first album.

All around, I think I’ve had a lot of musical favorites. This album I can, like, put ’em together—like “City Boy Blues,”

I think, is a great all-around song. “Fight For Your Rights" is a great all-around song. “Keep Your Eye On The Money,” same thing, I think they’re more evenly— it’s not just lyrics or just music, it’s all. It’s more of a “song.”

It’s funny, y’know, if someone says we’re mellowing out, musically, I go: " ‘Fight For Your Rights’ is mellowing out? Or ‘Louder Than Hell?’ ” I mean, that’s some serious hard rock ’n’ roll.

Maybe they're talking about “Home Sweet Home, ” keyboards—they're afraid. Dangerous keyboards.

Dangers of keyboards? Fine. I played keyboards on every single album.

Where are they hidden?

Huh?

Where are they hidden?

They’re hidden behind “Looks That Kill,” we played the James Bond theme behind “Looks That Kill”—a synthesizer. There’s bass pedals, there’s grand piano all through “Too Young To Fall In Love."

Are you playing or is that Tommy?

Tommy played some, I played some.

That hasn’t been well-publicized.

Y’know, it’s just another instrument, man. And we used strings on “Danger,” y’know. Used—God—it’s like the only reason it was even noticed was because it was so out-front. I mean, God, there’s acoustic guitar and piano—uh, acoustic guitar and strings—all through “Danger.” It’s a balance; you want to soften it up a little bit. So you’ll bring an instrument more forward. The Scorpions put one rocker on an album, y’know, and the rest are all ballads (chuckles).

I think, maybe, some are worried you aren't hard-core enough.

They don’t have nothing to worry about with us, y’know. Next album we’ll probably experiment with some other kind of weird instrument—you may not hear a piano up-front—

You’re gonna put a sitar on your next album!

Hey, you never know. We’ve got garbage cans on “Knock ’Em Dead,” (laughs) on the second album. It’s just, I think, that if you're gonna pursue music for your career, you can’t just play guitar, bass and drums. You’ve got to try to add different tones and different sounds to the music, even if it’s underlying or it’s a pad to the music, to give it a different feeling, y’know?

How good a piano player are you?

Not very good. Tommy’s a better piano player than I am. I play strings, more or less mess around, synthesizers—but the only reason I play synthesizers is to trigger my bass pedal. So if I wanna use wind, I’ll program up wind and then program my bass pedals and just hit it with my foot. We could start a song with wind.

It just adds punch to it. By no means is this a synthesizer band or a piano band.

Let me ask you about the PMRC—

That boring subject.

Boring to me, too. I talked to Tipper Gore, who’s the wife of the famous senator from Tennessee-

Hot famous for long when the kids vote the fucker out of office.

You think? Well, I talked to her, and she told me about "Livewire ” and “Too Young To Fall In Love. ” In fact, she even started reading me the lyrics over the phone.

Isn’t she the one who said that “Livewire” had something to do with murdering a woman?!!

More or less.

What?!! Fuck.

Well, I don't know if you heard this one, but it’s kind of intriguing—she’s also interested in rating concerts. Let’s say 14-yearold Suzie wants to go hear Motley Crue tonight. She wants Suzie’s parents to know what to expect. And then she read me this: “Here’s what Motley Crue said from the stage. . . ‘Oh, we’re so glad to be in Albuquerque. Our only regret is we can’t eat all the pussy we see here tonight.’ ” Urn . . . how do you respond?

(Laughs). You know what I say? I say fuck ’em. It’s freedom of speech; First Amendment.

They’re talking about their kids, though.

They must’ve had an awful sterile youth.

Yeah, but they’re gonna say, “Mr. Sixx, a 21-year-old can deal with the concept of .eating all the pussy here tonight, but a 14-year-old cannot. ”

Hey, if they wanna hide their heads in the sand and think that it’s just beautiful and the yellow brick road’s out there, the joke’s on them. They send their kids to school and right off the bat they learn about drugs, illegal weapons, racism, everything that’s negative out there. I’m not saying they don’t learn about love and good education and other things, too, but it is not a beautiful world out there, especially in some places it’s really nasty. And all I’m saying—what we’re saying—is nothin’ they’ve never heard before. And for that hour-and-a-half Motley Crue's onstage, it's more like a fantasy to those kids—it's like a great release. And I say, hey, they should actually thank us for playing rock ’n’ roll because (we’re) keeping the kids off the street, man. They’ve got something they can look forward to and live—not necessarily live for—but stand up for. They’re rock 'n' roll instead of out there robbin’, you know, stores or gettin’ involved with bad drugs, joining gangs and stuff. I mean, it’s a very healthy outlet, in my opinion.

Whatever happened to “Mississippi Queen," which I heard you were recording?

Mick wanted to try that and he said it in the press before we even got a chance to try it. We never even got a chance to work it out. It’s a great song, I mean, we really like our blues, y’know? Mick is very, very versatile in that—he’s been playing guitar longer than any of us, he’s a little older and he’s really a very talented musician. He’s played every style of music; he’s influenced my life musically a lot. He’s fantastic, and I’ll tell you, there’s not another guitar player I’d be happier to play with. He’s fantastic—

Beck, Clapton, Hendrix, Mars. ..

Well, it’s a different—a whole different—it’s a whole different style. Mick is a man that complements the music. He writes melody in that music; when we do chord changes against the grain and he— instead of how fast he can play—you can actually remember his guitar solos. We’re really very much into—when the solo comes in—he may whip out some fast leads, y’know and stuff, but he’ll always wind it up, begin it or have the middle part that’s very rememberable, very neat and very unique. And each song has that little—that Mick Mars stamp on it.

Does he improvise from night to night?

No. What he writes he sticks with, pretty much. Because he really believes it’s important, as a melody line, that people remember that.

Isn’t there a danger here of Mick Mars going solo, if he’s so good?

I don’t think there’s a danger of anybody going solo at this time. If anybody were to do anything solo in this group it would be something very different than Motley Crue. Like, say, Mick wanted to do something, he just might do like a real guitar player’s album. But I doubt if he’d have any intention of it selling or touring behind it. I mean, I have like a little studio in my house—just a four-track—and I’m gonna expand on it when I get home and find out about better equipment as time goes on. Learning more and more. But I try all kinds of things—see how this instrument sounds with that one, and that’s my contribution. And Mick’s always messing around with all kinds of different guitar tones, and that’s his contribution. Y’know what I mean? Musically, I think we all are kind of doing our solo album.

What bass players do you like?

There’s a lot of really good bass players. And a lot that critics—music critics— wouldn’t think are necessarily that good. I’m coming from a different school of rock ’n’ roll than thinking like Geddy Lee is the best bass player on earth.

He’s a very talented musician—by no means to say anything against the man— but I would prefer to listen to Pete Way, ex-UFOs, now in Waysted, who really will lay down a nice backbeat and then throw a nice little twist in here and there. Steve Harris is a fantastic bass player.

Not to be mean to Ratt, but you guys are hotter than them. Why do you think you’re doing better right now: do you think it’s more of a hard-core thing?

For me, it’s very difficult, so I won’t say I’m not gonna pussy-foot around this, but those are some of my best friends. Business-wise, I could say I think a lot of it has to do with—it sucks that they put us against each other, because we’re considered new rock, I don’t know. The new bands... that are basically coming out, as opposed to the Aerosmiths, the Van Halens—bands that have established themselves. We’re just really beginning to establish ourselves. Uh, gosh, I don’t know what to say—

Why do you think your album did better; why do you think you’re the hotter band?

To put it like this: last year, we had two singles, but neither one of them did very well, as far as radio airplay... or video exposure, “Looks That Kill” and "Fall In Love.” And then when “Smokin’ ” came out, it clicked. And they had “Round And Round,” like they were hotter last year. That single, in a sense, might have a lot to do with it—they really didn’t have a single that hit. And we’ve established ourselves over the last four-and-a-half, five years as really being a people’s band. And they’re just beginning to establish themselves; I think they were more known for “Round And Round.” And Motley Crue— you go, “Motley Crue, ‘Smokin’ In The Boys Room’,” and that even makes me nervous, because I think that people should just go, “Motley Crue.” And we can play our set—an hour-and-a-half, we’re almost playin’ to the kids all hits, where Ratt’s just starting to begin to get that. They’ve only got two records out, and having an extra record out and us being around a little longer has helped.

They’re a really good band—without saying nothing, because they’re my friends, I think they’re a really good band. I’ve seen a lot of growth in that band over the years.

It makes you wonder who has the staying power in this genre.

I don’t think Ratt’s gonna go away. By any means. I think they’re gonna be around for a long, long time.

Why don’t you tell me about your pals in Krokus, then?

Krokus??! I don’t know any of those guys, except I read that their lead singer said some shit about us or something.

Is it true that he stole your girlfriend?

I just read that yesterday. That’s hilarious. No, I was goin’, “Stole my girlfriend??” I used to go out with this chick and I dumped her and I guess she went out with him, from what I got out of the review. But, uh... if he thinks he stole her, joke’s on him. She’s fuckin’ rotten. Ha ha ha.

I think they sound a bit like AC/DC.

They are AC/DC.

I guess it’s no secret in this rock business.

Fuck no, man. They’ll admit it, too, man. Uh—that’s a band with some pretty good songs, though, y’know?

AC/DC?

Krokus.

You’re not totally damning them, then.

Oh, fuck no, man. I don’t damn anybody, they can really do what they wanna do. I just don’t like to be attacked—I don’t mind being attacked if they say something I can at least smile about. When they say something like “meaningless lyrics,” I have to go “Wait a minute. Fuck you, y’know? You’re not doing your homework.” Because that’s not right. That’s one of the few things that will piss me off.

What else would piss you off?

That’s just about it.

So you seem to be a pretty content guy, actually.

Yeah, I’m pretty happy, y’know? It doesn’t suck. I love it; I’m gettin’ to dohow many people can actually say that they love what they do for a living? And living is just getting by. And see, the money doesn’t matter. It doesn’t come into it; I’m just saying, how many people really love what they’re doing?

My grandfather is a mechanic, right? He loves that. The money doesn’t matter— he loves that. He gets up, man, he loves to go and fuckin’ do his job. And that’s like the kind of attitude I was brought up with. Whatever you want to do with your life, just love it. If you wanna fuckin’ wash cars all your life, just love it.

Speaking as a former phone salesman—which you were—

Yeah!

—what would you have done if the Crue had never got out of L.A. ?

I’d still be trying.

What’s your earliest memory along the lines of “Wow, this really knocks me out,

I want to play music, I want to be onstage’’?

I remember listening to the radio and hearing "Big Bad John” by Jimmy Dean and it just blew me away.

You were little then.

Yeah, I was quite little. And I used to sit there and call the radio stations and request that song. And then—the Beatles were obviously out already, but I really didn’t know about the Beatles. And I remember I ran across some Beatles' tapes—fucking wimpy. Except I kept listening to “Helter Skelter,” I remember that one, which we covered. I just wanted something more punchy. Then I found the Rolling Stones and I says, “This is getting better”—and it just kept getting better, you know? Gettin’ heavier. And I always liked that more punchy stuff. But it all started with that one song that had that big, baritone voice: you know, it sounded big! It sounded rough. I always liked that. You can’t say why you like it, you just do.

What do you listen to now?

Urn, I still love real good, punchy rock ’n’ roll.

Who do you think's playing it?

Urn, God, I mean, you know, there’s a lot of great albums out there.

Outside of the Thompson Twins—

You know, I think the Ratt album is very good.

I guess I think their first album was better.

It was more versatile. This one has a lot of the same tempo through it. But I like it, cause it’s punchy. I like Ozzy’s stuff and AC/DC’s just one of my favorites. Highway To Hell’s just gotta be like a classic. The Beatles’ White Album and Highway To Hell and Motley Crue’s Shout At The Devil. Ha ha ha ha. Aw, piss someone off with that one.

OK. Do you think Theatre Of Pain is really the better Crue album, though?

Yeah. I think it is and I think the next one will be even better.

Would you guys ever cop out and do a live album?

I wouldn’t think doing a live album’s a cop-out?

That was sort of a loaded question.

Urn, we want to put “Jailhouse Rock” on the next album, live. Urn, I think the exciting part of Motley Crue putting out a live album is there’s lots of relationships with the audience, lots of sing-alongs—and that makes a difference. ZZ Top had an album half-live an half-studio. We’d like to do something different.

But we’d like to grow gradually and not change drastically, because then you get a new audience. Bowie would, like, build up his following for a while and all of a sudden, “OK, I'll see you.” Then he’d have to build up another following. I like the change, but I think it can be gradual. That’s evolution.

Let's imagine when you’re 33 or 34. Can you see Motley Crue still existing?

Yeah! I really can. You bet.

Playing those wimpy ballads, or "Here’s another one from Shout At The Devil, by cracky. ”

Why not, man? Why not? Sure. We’re not fucking cartoon rock here. We’ll be around. What the fuck. We do a ballad and it becomes a little bit successful and everyone has to, you know, put, like cold towels on their foreheads ’cause they think we’re selling out. The funny thing is we had two ballads—an experimental ballad and one ballad—on Shout At The Devil, then we had two ballads on Too Fast For Love, one that was just like acoustic. And we just have one on Theatre Of Pain.

So you get—I think we’ve refined it. I look at "Home Sweet Home,” God, they keep talking about a fucking ballad. It’s like, so what? I think we have written our "Dream On” or our "Stairway To Heaven."

You're really into Aerosmith, aren't you?

I love Aerosmith. They’re my favorite band of all time.

I don't think "Home Sweet Home" is good as "Dream On."

"Dream On” is a fuckin’ brilliant tune. I’m just saying that we’ve written our "Dream On,” our "Stairway To Heaven,” our "Angie,” or whatever. I don’t really see us doing another one for quite a while, you know? Shit, I’ve had that song beating around since I was 17 years old. Nine years—that’s how long it took that song to come to life.

Did you guys play on the Hear 'N Aid thing?

Vince and Mick were there.

How do you feel about this musicians helping-Ethiopia thing?

I mean, I care, but what the fuck. Let’s clean up our own backyard here. Let’s have a benefit for America.

Farm Aid?

That was great. I mean, I’m not saying that’s bad for the Ethiopians, I’m just saying, God, man, let’s clean up some of the shit here, as well.