Nikki's last "Favorite Riff" video is with Slash (he's ending Sixx Sense) and of all the guitarists he's had on I think Slash is the only one who mentioned some Motley riffs . . . he asks about "Stick To Your Guns" and Nikki says he wrote it in 1979 for Blondie for $100!! Slash then remembers the "Too Fast For Love" riff, pretty cool. It's near the end of the video. Nikki also mentions that "City Boy Blues" was inspired by Aerosmith's "Last Child".
Still blows my mimnd that Bob Rock was originally gonna produce "SOLA" but we ended up with James Michaels
The only true Crue song on that album is the title track. The rest is Sixx A.M. with Vince on vox. I think I read that the drums were compiled from samples that Tommy provided. A giant cut and paste job. If their story about how they wrote "Going Out Swinging" is true, that would make a second genuine Crue song.
Thanks for posting that. I listened to that live and recorded it on cassette. I can still vividly remember sitting in my room and listening to it.
This was actually the first time I even heard this song! From 1989, gotta be one of the earliest examples of a band recording a Motley tune on their studio release. Can anybody think of any others? (discounting Motley tribute albums, of course)
Man, the only thing they used heavier than their make up was reverb!! That guitarist showed how good Mick really is. He tried changing the solo and ruined it. Mick's phrasing and composition is simple but catchy as hell. Always perfect for the song. I was lucky enough to buy a demo cassette of SATD and TFFL out of the classifieds in Circus magazine in 1985. So, I got to hear the Crue's version back then along with tons of other unreleased tunes. Of course, that took some of the surprise away in 1999 when Motley included most of these songs as bonus tracks on that first batch of reissues. The only thing new to me was "Tonight", "Rodeo", and the stuff on "Supersonic/Demonic". And no, I cannot think of anyone who has covered the Crue. They have such a stylized sound that the actual song is only about 60% of the appeal. Makes it hard for others to capture the right vibe.
Well put, the Crue are kinda "uncoverable"! I was a very young Cruehead, 1985-1992 I was approx. 9-16 yrs old! I was poor and in an out-of-way place to be collecting Crue. I would stare in wonder at the boots offered for sale by black market dealers in the back of Hit Parader and etc. Nonetheless, I racked up a pretty fun collection of Crue mags, posters, clippings, t-shirts, etc. I'm slowly sharing it all at my blog The Sleaze Patrol Files besides the solo that's a pretty spot-on cover of TOAST though, i'm surprised how true to the original it mostly is
I started my Crue collection in '84. I first heard them at the end of '83 or so. I have two big scrapbooks I made back then comprised of pinups and stuff from Circus, Hit Parader, Metal Edge, and a few others, but those three nags were the main ones. I have tour books for Shout through Feelgood and I have this other book that I bought at Musicland. It is mainly pictures and a fold out poster. I also have a couple of Helter Skelter picture discs, one has an unhung mint poster in it. I have a few other 4-page and 8-page magazine posters from the Shout and Theatre days. I love all my old Crue stuff. Like a time machine.
Nice! If I ever get my **** together and get some dough I think I will be searching out some Motley hay-day collectibles like your awesome tour books and the Helter Skelter pic disc and the books. I really want that first book that the Dante dude did (???) Yeah I have scrapbooks, carnival mirrors, pins, art from friends . . . I'm a hoarder and I kept everything but I very much enjoy the time-capsule quality of my collection. I'm wondering what the hell I'll be doing with this collection when I get older and pass . . . hope maybe a serious, younger Cruehead will be interested!
I have that book, "The First Five Years". Got it in March of '86. The Shout tour book is insanely awesome. I would like to get another one just to pull out a few pages and frame them. Really cool full page live shots of everyone. Great pics.
What are your thoughts on their cover of Tonight? I absolutely love it! I must say that recently I really got the real value of Stick To Your Guns, what an awesome track, and of course Toast Of The Town is great as well.
I love "Tonight". Vince's voice is perfect and Tommy's drum fills are killer. Great tune for them. The bonus tracks on TFFL are uniformly superb as is the main album.
COOL, yeah i think that's the second ever Crue publication . . . OK, so I want your collection!! If you ever get bored of it, let me know! TONIGHT is very well done, in my opinion. 1981 Motley is a really cool band and quite unlike what they became. They're essentially a 1970s power Pop Rock band and then became a 1980s-inspired Hard Rock-Metal band from there on in. I know there are people who have a stereotype idea of what the Crue were but I think their 1981 songs (including Leathur TOO FAST) are not typical Hard Rock, Metal fare.
I agree wholeheartedly. There is a power pop Cheap Trick vibe, combined with a punk/glam edge. The combination of vulgar energy and youthful romanticism made them instantly unique. No one, even the Crue themsleves, would ever recreate such a sound.
Glad this thread got bumped today. I am now in a real Crue Mood. Listening to "Stick To Your Guns" as I type this. Gonna listen to all the '81-'85 stuff I have tonight .
WOW I am amazed for the amount of love MC94 is getting on here. I actually know no one who even like it a little (except for the people on here). I remember this time frame very well because it was when I had given up on mostly all these bands and got into speed/thrash/death/black metal and most of my friends got into so called country music. Me and my friends were dissappointed with Dokken, MC and most other 80s bands new music. Just didn't like the direction they took. Vince made it clear he didn't like the new songs they were writing on more than one occasion and after I listened to 94 I agreed with him 100%. It is too much of a departure. As for sales, Aerosmith, Bon Jovi, Metallica did well enough with their new music, had MC kept Vince and changed their sound gradually maybe they would have found some bigger success. The 3 bands above went in a more poppy vein but wasn't a huge change based on their previous albums. Van halen changed singers at a good time and went more radio friendly that clicked with audiences and retained something of past HAlen, Corabi for me is not a good singer for MC. Didn't like him with Bruce Kulick either. Generation is almost as bad as MC94. They sound nothing like MC. For me 1. shout at the devil 2. too fast for love 3. dr feelgood 4. girls 5. theatre 6. sola 7. new tatoo (To be fair, I have not listened to sola and new tatoo in years though, nor 94 and Generation, will do this week just to see if my opinion has changed) They always kicked ass live every time I saw them, even with Vince's vocals shot towards the end. But this is just my opinion.
MC94 actually gets a lot of love, check youtube comments and other boards. Vince singing on some of those tunes, like Hooligan's Holiday, Poison Apples, Misunderstood and folks would be talking about how "mature" and advanced Motley became in the 1990s. I don't overly love MC94 because of a few songs and John's voice, but it would have been a much better selling album with Vinnie in there. Vince never wrote any songs and his solo "Hair Metal" music didn't make any slpash in the world either so using Vince as reinforcemnt why MC94 wasn't any good isn't overly convincing to me. PS and despite people's labelling of the album/sound change as "grunge"??? there isn't a single instance of "grunge" music on that album. slightly heavier, more progressive Hard Rock is how I categorize the album
More Nikki Sixx storage amazingness: He still has one of the skulls used in the Live Wire video!!! Instagram post by Nikki Sixx • Jan 12, 2018 at 9:00pm UTC
