It’s official: greed has indeed been crowned the new king. How do I know this? It has nothing to do with the recent spate of liquor-store robberies, which of course I have nothing to do with. No, I can tell because Motley Crue has saddled up and is preparing to head out on a much-ballyhoo’ed reunion/farewell tour. Nikki Sixx, as usual, claims it’s “for the fans.” But we in the Fizzbunker know better, don’t we?
Don’t get me wrong. I like Motley Crue. Their first two albums are excellent and essential, and they have a sizable fistful of good and great songs afterward. But this band has been as much about hype and tabloid misadventures as it has been about music for a long time now. The arrests, the marriages, the divorces, the overdoses, the tell-all books, the weight problems--they all overshadow the band’s not inconsiderable musical legacy.
Plus, at this point, most people can see through Nikki’s hyperbole. The man is a consummate bullshit artist: he says what he thinks people want to hear, no matter how preposterous it is. For instance, he recently said that recording sessions were going great. The ever-insightful Tommy Lee added, “My diaper’s full!” It soon became clear that he wasn’t shitting himself with happiness though. He told another newspaper that this whole reunion thing was “kinda wack.” He added that having to look at Vince Neil’s “bloated, disrespectful ass” wasn’t one of the perks of the job. Happy bands don’t need separate tour buses for each member. It’s nice to be able to afford them, but they don’t exactly point to much camaraderie within the band.
We all saw this coming, of course. We knew it from the very minute Tommy left, at the end of an underperforming 1998 tour. After all, it already happened once, when Vince returned in ’97. Remember that? They performed at the American Music Awards. Nikki said then that of course they played live, but later admitted, yeah, they played to a tape after all.
I figure Nikki decided to borrow another page from his buddy Gene Simmons’s book, and milk every last cent out of the Motley machine as he possibly can. Action figures! A movie! A book! Another greatest-hits CD, this one a double (and I’ve seen the track listing, and it leaves much to be desired, just like the other Crue compilations). And a reunion/farewell tour with no end! All for the fans? My ass! Just the other day, he told a reporter, “I’d do this shit for free!” which is what people say when they know they don’t have to.
It’s not like the fans don’t deserve some kind of reward though. I mean, we’ve been subjected to Vince Neil, for starters. He has long been a caricature, a bad ’80’s-rock punchline, what with his shabby performances, run-ins with the law, and continued battle with the bulge. We won’t even get into his appearances on various third-rate reality shows!
Speaking of reality shows, does anybody really want to see Tommy
Lee pretending to be a student at the University of Nebraska?
About the same number of people who were interested in his rap
career, or who would let their kids go to a birthday party at his
house. Not too damn many, in other words.
And then there’s Nikki. He talked Tracii Guns into leaving L.A. Guns two months after that band had released their best album in a decade, to form a new band that put out a turd of a record, and now Nikki ditches them to go back to the Crue. Tracii is dumb enough to be surprised.
Notice I didn’t pick on Mick Mars. That would be pretty low. He can’t help it that he’s 87 years old. After all, he’s kept his ass out of jail, and that’s more than some can say.
So all you diehard Crue fans who are expecting to see a show like 1984, I hate to pop your bubble, but you ain’t gonna get it. Too much has happened for this tour to live up to all the hype. It saddens me to say it, but it’s true: you really CAN’T go back.
That doesn’t mean there won’t be plenty of entertainment, though. Hell no! This is going to be lots of fun to watch from the sidelines. The first leg of the tour begins in February and is supposed to run for two months and change. Whether it’ll actually last that long is up for debate. Here are my predictions:
2/14, San Juan, PR: The Red, White and Crue tour officially kicks off, but Vince and Tommy are late to soundcheck. Tommy was filming a special Valentine’s Day movie with two girls he met on the beach. Vince muttered something about the hubcaps on his tour bus, but the vapors from both ends of him hint at beans. The venue fills 31% of its seats.
2/17, Fort Lauderdale, FL: Okay, this is where the tour REALLY starts. Mick Mars collapses onstage, and Vince storms off, yelling, “Fuck you, ya fuckin’ gimp!” Mars is rushed to the hospital, where he is diagnosed with a severe case of gallstones, requiring immediate surgery. Nikki refuses to cancel any shows, proclaiming, “We owe it to the kids!” He immediately sets about finding a replacement for Mick. The venue is 57% full.
2/18, Tampa, FL: Nikki calls up his buddy Tracii Guns to fill Mick’s soes. Tracii readily agrees, having nothing better to do since no one will book the Brides of Destruction for any gigs without Nikki. Tracii’s one condition is that the band plays one B.O.D. song every night. Percentage of seats filled: 49.
2/20, Greenville, SC: On a pre-show trip to McDonald’s, Vince learns the tragic news: they don’t supersize anymore. Thoroughly disillusioned, he orders half a dozen Big Macs and retreats to his bus, where he washes them down with his entire “emergency” bottle of Old Crow. But the show must go on, and go on it does, although Vince is completely incoherent onstage, and local reviewers note Tommy spinning his sticks a bit more aggressively than usual. Seats filled: 38%.
2/22, Cleveland, OH: Tracii Guns tells a local radio station that he’ll “suck a monkey’s uncle if I’ll play that gay-ass new song,” referring to the aging-rock-star ballad, “If I Die Tomorrow.” Nikki decides that Tracii will no longer be allowed to give interviews. Seats filled: 71%.
2/23, Toronto, ON: Vince is in high spirits. He LOVES Canada, because there’s a Tim Horton’s doughnut shop on almost every corner. Unfortunately, he spends too much time communing with the crullers and not enough studying his lyric sheet. Consequently, he draws a blank on “Shout At the Devil,” and just gibbers his way through the song. Which isn’t news, but on “Looks That Kill?” Some observant concertgoers mistake the powdered sugar on his upper lip for cocaine, igniting a firestorm of Internet speculation. Seats filled: 84%. “What can I tell ya?” asked one fan. “There’s no hockey.”
2/25, Detroit, MI: Kid Rock joins the band onstage, in a move that Nikki says will be sure to get them on MTV News. And it does, when Rock and Vince get into a fistfight over a groupie. Kid Rock tells Kurt Loder, “It was off da hook!” It’s unclear whether he’s referring to the altercation, or his self-praising raps on “Primal Scream.” Seats filled: 83%.
2/27, Ottawa, ON: Tracii Guns, using Mick Mars’s tour bus, takes Nikki aside before the show and asks, “Hey bro, what are those funky-ass handlebars on the toilet in there?” Later, in an interview with Canada’s Brave Words and Bloody Knuckles, Guns tells Mitch Lafon, “Yeah, Tommy and Vince are fighting big-time! Tooth and nail man, all the time!” Were it not for that statement, Tommy’s spinning drumstick somehow hitting Vince in the head MIGHT have been viewed as an accident. Seats filled: 44%.
2/28, Hartford, CT: Nikki goes into damage-control mode, telling BW&BK that Vince and Tommy are like brothers, and that everything is “hunky-dory” in the Motley Crue camp. He also arranges to have Tracii locked in his bus whenever journalists are around. Seats filled; 51%.
3/1, Boston, MA: When it comes time for the nightly Brides of Destruction song, Tommy announces to the crowd that he would like to dedicate “Shut the Fuck Up” to Vince. Vince hurls his mic stand at Tommy and storms off. Tracii pours oil on the fire by laughing. The crowd riots, resulting in seven injuries and two dozen arrests, which Nikki describes to the press as “more punk-rock than punk-rock!” He then corners Tracii and fires him, telling him, “This is all your fault, you little bitch!” Tommy gloats, “I didn’t want him here anyway.” Seats filled: 57%.
3/3, New York, NY: Tracii posts a statement on his website, which reads in part: “I’am glad to be free of that bunch of fucksticks. Its time 2 get back 2 da reel gig BRIDES OF DESTRUCTION!!!!! Fuck Nikki and his ass-monkey friends. The kidz know whats real.” Meanwhile, replacing Tracii and Mick on guitar is Sunset Strip reject Keri Kelli. Although he performs adequately, none of the Big Apple magazine types at the show can spell his name correctly. The situation isn’t helped by Vince Neil’s introducing him as “Kelli Keri ……… uh, Kerry King ……… I dunno, some fuckin’ dude we got to play guitar with us, whatever.” Rolling Stone pans the show, calling it a “sad spectacle of bad-boy buffoonery.” The next morning, Howard Stern reports seeing both Vince and Tommy at Scores, occupying separate corners and occasionally glaring at each other. Seats filled: 62%.
3/4, Philadelphia, PA: Tommy tells WYSP’s Cousin Ed, “Touring is really hard, man,” and that he’s “under a lot of stress.” When asked to elaborate, he complains that “Vince is dissin’ me, bro, and Nikki doesn’t seem to care about my feelings. I feel really alone right now.” The segment is heard by Vince, who is holding down a stool at Genno’s, but his only reaction is to order another cheesesteak. “Extra cheese this time.” Nikki threatens to muzzle Tommy if he doesn’t “get onboard this PR machine.” Tommy sighs, “See? I knew you didn’t care about my feelings. I wanna go home.” Nikki takes him to a strip club to cheer him up before the show. Seats filled: 58%.
3/5, off-day, somewhere in Pennsylvania: Nikki hasn’t slept well, due to a string of heavy-breathing phone calls from Tracii Guns the previous night. The band stops at a smorgasbord in Amish country, per Vince’s suggestion, which Tommy immediately shoots down as “fuckin’ lame, man.” Violence ensues when Tommy takes the last piece of fried chicken. Vince shouts, “I saw it first, fuckwad!” Tommy wails, “But you already had six pieces!” Tables are overturned, food is spilled and the air is turned blue with creative obscenities before the two combatants are separated and hurled out the door by four husky Amish farm boys. “And the rest of you rabble can go with ’em!” says one. A weeping Tommy tells Nikki, “Why don’t you ever fuckin’ LISTEN to me? I’m so sick of being shit on!” Nikki takes him to a strip club to cheer him up.
3/6, Washington, DC: “If the Dixie Chicks can do it, so can we!” Nikki tells the band. And so, Vince proceeds to dedicate “Bastard” to George W. Bush. The Secret Service gets involved because of the potentially inflammatory nature of the song (“Consider that bastard dead!”), and the show is cut short. Fans riot while Nikki goes on an anti-Bush tirade from the stage, inviting the crowd to “throw shit” on the White House lawn. “Hey, it got me on MTV News again,” he tells the band upon his release from jail. Checking his cell phone, he finds Bush isn’t the only one targeted with death and flying feces. Tracii guns has left a series of rambling, vaguely threatening messages on his voice-mail. Seats filled: 44%.
3/8, Columbus, OH: Nikki notices that Keri Kelli’s bus has dropped out of the convoy. Calling Keri’s cell, he locates him at the airport in Pittsburgh. “I’m leaving the bus in long-term parking, man,” Keri says. “You canpick it up when you get a chance.” He tells Nikki that he has a prior tour planned with Steven Adler’s band. ‘I thought this was just for a few gigs!” he says defensively. He is replaced on guitar by the late Dimebag Darrell, in a move that, amazingly, Nikki does NOT find tasteless or insensitive. “A guy with bulletholes! How punk-rock is that?!” Nikki asks. The fans in Columbus, and the music community in general, are not amused. Seats filled: 53%.
3/10, Chicago, IL: En route to the Windy City, Nikki fires the late Dimebag Darrell and tells Vince to “just steal a Ronald McDonald dummy” on his next burger run. “We’ll put a guitar in his hands and run a backup tape. It’ll be great! The kids’ll love it, you’ll see!” But Vince forgets. “I told you this fat fuck can’t do anything right,” Tommy snipes. He and Vince mix it up, and the next morning, Chicago radio personality Mancow Muller asks about Vince’s black eye. Says Nikki, “He fell.” For that night’s gig, Nikki taps Billy Corgan, who happened to be in the neighborhood. Corgan stares at the floor throughout the gig, and can be heard muttering “This is really dumb, and it’s beneath me. What the fuck am I doing here?” Vince introduces him as “Uncle Fester,” prompting Corgan to throw down his guitar and walk off. But the show continues, with Vince attempting to accompany himself on guitar. Nikki tells a crowd of reporters, “This is really turning out to be a great arrangement. We’re a power trio, like Rush or Green Day.” Seats filled: 73%.
3/11, Moline IL: The show is two hours late, because the band missed Moline twice before finally locating it. Vince finds it hard to play guitar and sing complicated lyircs like “When she’s hot, well, damn, she’s hot!” at the same time, but the crowd just thinks he’s drunk. Which he is, which also doesn’t help matters. Afterward, Tommy complains to Nikki that “Vince is getting too much attention.” “Shut up, bitch,” Nikki says, “or I’ll take away your drum solo!” Later that night, Vince learns via voice-mail that his wife of two months, lia Geraldini, is divorcing him, because, as she put it, “you’re a fat, lying sack of shit and you smell bad!” Attendance at the show was initially 56%, but by the time the band finally arrived, it had dwindled to 34%.
3/12, Milwaukee, WI: Vince Neil and the home of Miller Brewing do not mix well, or perhaps a bit too well. Vince uses his impending divorce as an exucse to try and drink every drop of beer in town, stopping only for some good kielbasa in the city’s Polish districts. Consequently, he arrives at the show entirely trashed, and the only song he can think to sing is “The Beer Barrel Polka.” Tommy throws down his sticks and walks off, telling Nikki, “Fuck this shit, man, I’m going home.” Nikki attempts to replace him with the late Rzzle, but is unsuccessful due to a problem with a work visa. He is forced to scrap the rest of the tour, telling reporters, “It was just doomed from the start.”
On with the show!
Today’s inspirational song lyrics are brought to us by Motley Crue:
“I try like hell, but I’m out of control. All in the name of, all in the name of rock ’n’ roll!”
1/29/05
