Mötley Crüe is an American heavy metal band formed in Hollywood, California in 1981[1][2][3] by bassist Nikki Sixx and drummer Tommy Lee with guitarist Mick Mars and lead vocalist Vince Neil joining right after. The band has sold over 100 million albums worldwide.[4][5][6] They have also achieved seven platinum or multi-platinum certifications, nine Top 10 albums on the Billboard 200 chart (including 1989's Dr. Feelgood, which is Mötley Crüe's only album to reach number one), twenty-two Top 40 mainstream rock hits, and six Top 20 pop singles.[7][8]
The members of Mötley Crüe have often been noted for their hedonistic lifestyles and the androgynous personae they maintained. Following the hard rock and heavy metal origins on the band's first two albums, Too Fast for Love (1981) and Shout at the Devil (1983), the release of its third album Theatre of Pain (1985) saw Mötley Crüe joining the first wave of glam metal.[9][10] The band is also known for their elaborate live performances, which feature flame thrower guitars, roller coaster drum kits, and heavy use of pyrotechnics such as fireworks and lighting Sixx on fire.[7][11] Mötley Crüe's most recent studio album, Saints of Los Angeles, was released on June 24, 2008. What was planned to be the band's final show took place on New Year's Eve, December 31, 2015. The concert was filmed for a theatrical and Blu-ray release in 2016.[12][13]
After two-and-a-half years of inactivity, Neil announced in September 2018 that Mötley Crüe had reunited and was working on new material.[14][15] On March 22, 2019, the band released four new songs on the soundtrack for its Netflix biopic The Dirt, based on the band's New York Times best-selling autobiography of the same name. The soundtrack went to number one on the iTunes All Genres Album Chart,[16] number 3 on the Billboard Top Album and Digital Album sales charts,[17] number 10 on the Billboard 200, and Top 10 worldwide.[18] The autobiography returned to the New York Times Best Seller list at number 6 on Nonfiction Print and number 8 on Nonfiction Combined Print & E-Book.[19] Mötley Crüe embarked on its first major tour in seven years in the summer and fall of 2022, co-headlining a North American tour with Def Leppard.[20]
The band has experienced several lineup changes over the years, leaving Sixx as the only constant member; these included the introduction of lead vocalist John Corabi (who was Neil's replacement from 1992 to 1996) and drummers Randy Castillo and Samantha Maloney, both of whom filled in for Lee following his departure from Mötley Crüe in 1999; he returned to the band in 2004. In October 2022, after 41 years of service, Mars announced his retirement from touring with the band, with former Marilyn Manson and Rob Zombie guitarist John 5 replacing him.
The nucleus of the group first came together in early 1981, when ex-Suite 19 guitarist/lead vocalist Greg Leon and drummer Tommy Lee decided to form a new band.[21] They attended the farewell gig of a popular local band called London, and Lee was already impressed by the image and stage presence of their bassist, Nikki Sixx. Even before meeting Sixx, Lee claims he had posters of London on his bedroom walls.[22] "Tommy just loved how Nikki looked", recalled Leon. "He was gung-ho about him, saying, 'This is the guy we should get'." Sixx auditioned twice but Leon felt he was "awful", telling Lee "He looks great. He's great on stage. But he can't play bass at all."[23]
Lee subsequently became friends with Sixx and went to his Hollywood home to listen to new material he was working on. The music had been rejected by his London bandmates for being too heavy, and Lee says he immediately began banging on the table in time with the music and "everything just seemed to mesh".[22] Lee subsequently hired Sixx for the new band, prompting guitarist/vocalist Leon to quit in protest. "I never played a show with Nikki Sixx. Tommy and I played together many times, but I was gone as soon as Nikki entered the picture. But they couldn't find a guitar player or singer initially, so they kept calling me. But I refused," Leon has said of his time in the band.[23] Sixx and Lee began a search for new members and soon met guitarists Robin Moore (Jeff Gill)[24] and Bob Deal, better known as Mick Mars, after answering an advertisement that he placed in The Recycler that read: "Loud, rude and aggressive guitar player available". Mars auditioned for Sixx, Moore and Lee, and was subsequently hired while Moore was fired at the same session according to the band's biography The Dirt.[25]
Although a lead vocalist named O'Dean Peterson was auditioned,[26][27] Lee had known Vince Neil from their high school days at Charter Oak High School in Covina, California,[28] and the two had performed in different bands on the garage band circuit. Upon seeing him perform with the band Rock Candy at the Starwood in Hollywood, California, Lee suggested they have Neil join the band. At first Neil refused the offer.
On the same day as Mars, lead vocalist Michael White, who previously played with Nikki Sixx in the band London, joined the band.[29] But White eventually ended up leaving also.
As the other members of Rock Candy started to think about moving in more of a New Wave direction and became involved in outside projects, Vince Neil grew anxious to try something else.[30] Lee asked again; Neil was hired on April 1, 1981, and the band played its first gig at the Starwood nightclub on April 24.[31]
I wanted a band that would be like David Bowie and the Sex Pistols thrown in a blender with Black Sabbath.
—Nikki Sixx[32]
The newly formed band did not yet have a name. Neil has said that he told his bandmates that he was "thinking about calling the band Christmas". The other members were not very receptive to that idea. Then, while trying to find a suitable name, Mars remembered an incident that occurred when he was playing with a band called White Horse, when one of the other band members called the group "a motley looking crew". He had remembered the phrase and later copied it down as 'Mottley Cru'. After slight modification of the spelling, "Mötley Crüe" was eventually selected as the band's name, with the stylistic decision suggested by Neil to add the two sets of metal umlauts, supposedly inspired by the German beer Löwenbräu, which the members were drinking at the time.[33] Other than the periods of February 1992 to September 1996 and of March 1999 to September 2004, and until October 2022, the lineup of Neil, Sixx, Lee, and Mars remained the same.[34]
The band soon met its first manager, Allan Coffman, the thirty-eight-year-old brother-in-law of a friend of Mars's driver.[35] The band's first release was the single "Stick to Your Guns/Toast of the Town", which was released on its own record label, Leathür Records, which had a pressing and distribution deal with Greenworld Distribution in Torrance, California. On November 10, 1981, its debut album Too Fast for Love was self-produced and released on Leathür, selling 20,000 copies. Coffman's assistant Eric Greif set up a tour of Canada,[36] while Coffman and Greif used Mötley Crüe's success in the Los Angeles club scene to negotiate with several record labels, eventually signing a recording contract with Elektra Records in early 1982. The debut album was then remixed by producer Roy Thomas Baker and re-released on August 20, 1982—two months after its Canadian Warner Music Group release using the original Leathür mixes—to coincide with the tour.[37]
Listening to Queen inspired Mötley Crüe to work with Roy Thomas Baker on Too Fast for Love. He would come in, "Hello Darlings ..." and listen for maybe thirty minutes or so and leave. And we're like, "What?! Where's he going?". But he produced Queen, so, man, we had to have him produce us, too.
—Tommy Lee[38]
During the "Crüesing Through Canada Tour '82", there were several widely publicized incidents. First, the band was arrested and then released at Edmonton International Airport for wearing their spiked stage wardrobe (considered "dangerous weapons") through customs, and for Neil arriving with a small carry-on filled with porn magazines (considered "indecent material"); both were staged PR stunts. Customs eventually had the confiscated items destroyed. Second, while playing Scandals Disco in Edmonton, a spurious "bomb threat" against the band made the front page of the Edmonton Journal[39] on June 9, 1982; Lee and assistant band manager Greif were interviewed by police as a result. This too ended up being a staged PR stunt perpetrated by Greif. Lastly, Lee threw a television set from an upper story window of the Sheraton Caravan Hotel. Canadian rock magazine Music Express noted that the band was "banned for life" from the city.[40] Despite the tour ending prematurely in financial disaster, it was the basis for the band's first international press.[41]
In 1983, the band changed management from Coffman to Doug Thaler and Doc McGhee. McGhee is best known for managing Bon Jovi and later Kiss, starting with their reunion tour in 1996. Greif subsequently sued all parties in a Los Angeles Superior Court action that dragged on for several years, and coincidentally later resurfaced as manager of Sixx's former band, London. Coffman himself was sued by several investors to whom he had sold "stock in the band", including Michigan-based Bill Larson. Coffman eventually declared bankruptcy, as he had mortgaged his home at least three times to cover band expenses.[42]