Motley Crue's Most UnMotley Moments

Lately, I’ve been listening to a lot of Motley Crue. There’s no explanation for it. It’s similar to the Ratt phase that I went through last summer and I’m sure there are other questionable rock acts that I’ve fixated on for far too long.
You have permission to kill me if next year I start listening to a lot of Firehouse.
But I haven’t forgotten those things about Motley Crue that bring their integrity into question. They market themselves as the bad boys of metal, and to be sure there are moments in their fabled past that would qualify them for that distinction. But for every indiscretion, there seems to be a calculated, exaggerated, or retarded moment that puts the band back at square one, leaving much to be desired in terms of their reputation.

Here’s a baker’s dozen of Motley Moments that make them the schmucks of Los Angeles:

13.) Vince Neil beating up a prostitute
For real: in 2003, Neil was charged with battery after grabbing a prostitute at the Moonlite Bunny Ranch by the throat and throwing her against the wall. Frequenting is more sad than metal while kicking the shit out of them is about as hardcore as admitting Pretty Woman is one of your favorite movies of all time. Seriously, a metal legend of Vince Neil’s stature should have no trouble finding a fatty to bang for free, particularly if we’re to believe the prowess of Neil in the pages of The Dirt.
12.) Mick Mars has an arthritic condition...just like your Grandma
It’s not Mars’ fault for having a physical ailment that essentially fuses his bones together…but it’s certainly not very metal either. Mick always seemed to be levelheaded enough to understand how fortunate he is. After all, the dude slugged it out in bands for nearly a decade before he rechristened himself with the metal moniker and teamed up with a bunch of ragtag young’ens and formed the Crue. He had the condition then and watched it worsen, addressing it only with alcohol consumption. That’s right, instead of addressing the condition, which could hinder his money ticket, he chose to self-medicate. He later let it become so bad that he looked like a frail little man that could barely move, prompting many to wonder if he had a prop holding his old ass up during the duration of the “Red White and Crue” tour.
11.) Generation Swine
Apparently, a new Crue album was ready to be delivered when someone on the payroll got tired of not making any money with replacement vocalist John Corabi at the helm. The managers put a carrot at the end of a fishing pole and got Vince Neil to meet with the rest of the band under the pretense that everyone’s egos would be checked at the door. In a display of complete contempt, they got Neil to sing the songs originally penned while Corabi was on board while catering to Elektra Record’s demands. The rock thing to do would be to say “Fuck you” to the label (hell, even the Grateful Dead did that) and carry on. But no, the lure of money was so great that the band did check their egos long enough for the check to clear. Months later, Neil punched Lee in the face (metal!) causing Lee to quit and thereby causing this first reunion attempt to implode.
10.) Tommy Lee’s ridiculous attempts at upstaging
It started with the silly things that his drum set would do during some of the band’s tours from the 80’s. At the same time, it was a drum solo…everybody except for drummers hates that…so kudos for trying to keep the audience in the seats during a concert’s obligatory beer run break. But then Lee started to get a tad more presumptuous. I’d like to say that it’s merely gotten to a point where his bass drum is now so ungodly larger that fans can barely see Lee behind it. But no: there’s more. He kicked that chick from Baywatch while she was holding their baby. Classy! He also starred in a totally retarded reality show that put Lee in a fucking marching band. A few years ago, he thought that his success in the Crue was enough to jumpstart a career in the rap-metal-cumfart outfit called Method of Mayhem…or something like that, I forget….and so did everyone else. Less than a year ago, he said that he was leaving the Crue because he liked “DJing” more. Priceless! More recently, he started painting his face during the “Carnival Of Sins” tour like he was a member of the Insane Clown Posse. The smartest thing the guy could’ve have done is realize that his wiener was bigger than most of the male population and been content with reminding us of this fact during every subsequent interview afterwards.
9.) “Brandon”
Check out this jem from poet Tommy Lee:
You bring those tears into my eyes so well
I've been waiting for this day so long
Brandon I love you
You are the one
Brandon my son
You run around
And chase the clouds
I only want you to be yourself
Forget me not
You're all I've got
As you can see
You are the One
Brandon my son
Your mother gave birth to you
With love inside
She had candlelight
And songs of life
Brandon I love you
I love her
She is your mom
True love is ours
Nobody else
I only want you to be yourself
And when I'm gone
Don't cry for me
We'll always be one
You are my son
You are the one
You are the one
The one who wrecked
Pam's vajayjay coming out
8.) Vince Neil Appears In Court Wearing A Suit
Killing the drummer from Hanoi Rocks while going on a beer run? Metal! Naming your box set Music To Crash Your Car To about the event. Metal!. Feathering your hair back and donning an ugly suit while trying to get the judge to be lenient on your drunk ass? Pussy! The proper thing to do is to stroll into court with your codpiece in tact and advise the judge that you needed to drive drunk because you were out of Lowenbrau. The maximum that Neil was set to do was about eighteen months…he served two fucking weeks. Note to upstarts: jail time makes you credible. Vince Neil skated out of minimum-security prison thanks to a big time attorney and a fucking suit. Razzle deserved better.
7.) Using Larry King Live as your venue to televise announcements
Not once, but twice. They announced their “first,” second reunion on Larry fucking King live for no good reason. King had obviously no idea who they were, continually mistaking Nikki for Mick Mars. A few years after this utterly uncomfortable event, the band’s management books them on the show again. Do they really thing the typical Crue fan kicks back and watches Larry King Live? They couldn’t find a better venue for their announcements? Oh wait…
6.) The Greta Van Susteren show
On June 23, 2008, Greta Van Susteren interviewed Motley Crue on her Fox News television show. Susteren typically does investigative pieces about notable crime cases, but during an apparent slow night, booked the Crue for a pointless interview that went nowhere and revealed nothing. One would have thought the logical thing would be to fire whoever was responsible for this fiasco on the following day, but no apparent pink slips were given to any of the band’s current management team for this potentially detrimental choice in media outlets.
5.) Lip Synching
Using taped backing vocals during your live show I’m sorry, there ain’t no way that the backing vocals to “Dr. Feelgood” or “Girls Girls Girls” are being performed live. If they are, then Tommy, Mick, and Nikki have developed a pitch-perfect vocal technique that hasn’t changed a bit since the songs were originally recorded. With Mick needed every bit of breath to stay alive, Nikki prancing around like a junkie rooster and Tommy drumming, everything sounds too perfect for these ears. Bad boys don’t lip-synch. They take pride in their shitty vocal abilities (like Keith Richards) and they sucker punch anyone who dares to make fun of it.
4.) Shitty Choices In Cover versions
Jailhouse Rock? Anarchy In the U.K.? Helter Skelter? The Crue scored a gimmie with “Smokin’ In the Boys Room,” but there’s nothing revelatory about it other than giving noobs a chance to learn the band members’ names. I hope they gave a gold record to that weird looking dude from One Flew Over The Cuckoos Nest, because it’s a tepid version, salvaged only by an awesome video. Then there’s the rest of them, currently residing in the “What were they thinking?” category. Note to every band in existence: don’t choose cover material that you can’t come close to, completely rework, or totally annihilate while performing. In each of the cover versions they’ve chosen (including Cub Koda’s classic), Motley Crue merely play it by the book and sound like one of those shitty hard rock cover bands that’s in every single town across America.
3.) Vince Neil holding the microphone out to the audience on nearly every song of their live set
Seriously dude, sing the fucking song. The audience has paid a nice admission to see you perform. This kind of stage presence is tolerable to an extent…maybe during the first few lines of “Home Sweet Home” or the “Shout!” part on “Shout At The Devil.” But you seem to resort to this trick on every fucking song…even the lame ones like “Don’t Go Away Mad (Just Go Away)” and you do it during moments that don’t really need audience participation. It’s almost like you’re forgetting the fucking words and need that drunk 38 year old in row 8 to help out. Earn your money. Sing the damn song.
2.) Nikki Sixx and the paramedic story
If you’re the last person in rock that hasn’t heard it, the story goes like this. Sixx overdosed on heroin. He died. A paramedic on hand was a Motley Crue fan and, after others had written Nikki off, continued the attempts to revive him, thereby saving his life. Nikki didn’t necessarily learn his lesson and repeated using heroin, but it is this story that he continues to tell. It’s become such a common story that you wonder if he enjoyed repeating it more than than learning from it. As metal as the story may be, it loses its edge with every single telling. And why haven’t we heard from this supposed Crue-fan paramedic?
1.) Theatre Of Pain
It was the first Crue record that I noticed chicks owning. It contained the first true hit single, “Home Sweet Home,” which lasted ad-infinite on MTV’s most requested video show. For those of you too young to remember: MTV had this show strategically placed after school in which you could call in to their toll-free number and request your favorite video. Forever and a day, that video was “Home Sweet Home.” It got to the point where MTV actually changed the rules of the show a bit so that videos essentially had a “shelf-life” before they became ineligible for consideration. “Home Sweet Home” was a first for the Crue: it was a power-ballad that set its sights on Top 40 radio while Theatre Of Pain was a blatant polishing of the Crue’s rougher edge so that they could transcend the metal community in favor of mainstream success and all of those aforementioned chicks. If you’re looking for the album where Motley Crue took a turn for the worst, here it is.