This Is Gonna Hurt: Music, Photography, and Life Through the Distorted Lens of Nikki Sixx

by Nikki Sixx

  He’s the tear in your eye

  Been tempted by his lie

  He’s the knife in your back

  He’s rage

  He’s the razor to the knife

  Oh, lonely is our lives

  My head’s spinnin’ round and round

  But in the seasons of wither

  We’ll stand and deliver

  Be strong and laugh and

  Shout at the Devil

  He’ll be the love in your eyes

  He’ll be the blood between your thighs

  And then have you cry for more

  He’ll put strength to the test

  He’ll put the thrill back in bed

  Sure you’ve heard it all before

  He’ll be the risk in the kiss

  Might be anger on your lips

  Might run scared for the door

  But in seasons of wither

  We’ll stand and deliver

  Be strong and laugh and

  Shout at the devil

  If Red Light Is Flashing…

  I remember being a teenager when, as I mentioned earlier, my grandmother Nona sent me a book, The Autobiography of a Yogi, and I drank it up. There was a fleeting moment after reading that book when a calmness came over me. Of course, it wouldn’t stick, but that doesn’t mean that on a cellular level I didn’t take some of it in.

  I think every day that there is something positive to learn, and the experience is usually right in front of our eyes. I don’t think it’s a one-shot deal, more like a repetitive action. You have to force yourself to get into the game every morning. It builds us up spiritually and emotionally. It’s like going to the gym, it doesn’t happen overnight, but one day you wake up and see a change. Likewise, when you don’t go, it doesn’t take long to lose most of what you have worked for.

  I have days, bad fucking days, depressing days. Days when my band is busting my balls so hard I just wanna call it quits. There are days when as a parent, as a boyfriend, and as a partner in so many exciting ventures, all hell breaks loose. Those are the days I get to measure, “How much of a man am I?”

  I was in an elevator in Calgary, Canada, while on tour with Mötley. As much as I love touring, I hate leaving my family. It was a day off, which to me means a wasted day of my life. It was fifteen below outside, and I wasn’t about to grab my camera and hit the local skid row. Katherine and I were on the skids, and to be honest, I wasn’t fucking happy to be there. So I decided to go to the hotel gym and work off some of my self-pity and pull the stick out of my ass. When I got into the elevator and pushed the button for gym, I saw a sign that said, “If red light is flashing, help is on the way.” I pushed the cancel button, went straight back to my room, and wrote a riff that I sent to James over my iPhone. Magic happened once I got out of my own way, stopped sitting in my own shit, and left my room. All those years of therapy, self-help books, and rehab meetings—and maybe that book from Nona—paid off at that moment. I sat down and wrote music and lyrics and jammed with James.

  When I hung up, I looked out over the frozen tundra of Canada and thought, yeah…help is on the way, always.

  AMY IN WONDERLAND fig.wl9.1

  ST. GODDESS BUNNIE fig.sgb2.1

  What the Fuck Did You Say?

  I heard her clear as a bell but I couldn’t believe my ears. Mouth slung open, gaping, I said to my therapist, “What the fuck did you say?”

  So, as she has had to do a million times in our sessions, she repeated the words to me slowly so I could take it all in. Like I am some kind of idiot or something. Politely she repeated herself, “Just because she’s your mom doesn’t mean you have to love her.” I looked at her, then out the window, then back at her, and said, “Thank you.” I finally got it. It had been more than forty years and billions of miles, tears, fistfights, outbursts, overdoses, crashed cars, smashed hotel rooms etc., etc. Not to mention two divorces and over $10 million in legal fees and I finally fucking got it. Man, maybe I am an idiot.

  So if I don’t have to love her, then I don’t have to love my fucking father, either? Oh shit, that means I don’t have to be angry and resentful? I don’t have to seek and destroy, rape and pillage, pine to kill, seethe, pout, and stomp my feet anymore either?

  Oh shit, now what am I supposed to do with all this spare time?

  But for real, what am I supposed to do with this bag of shit I’ve been carrying around with me all these years? It fucking stinks, and to be honest I think the bottom was about to fall out of it anyway.

  I sat up (I must have lost track of time), then stood erect and hugged the hell out of my therapist. I went to my car and drove home zombielike. I was probably smiling like a man who lost his mind and found his soul all at the same time. I went straight to bed and slept sixteen hours that night. That was the end of the beginning for me. That was truly the beginning of forgiveness for me too.

  Quickie Life Lesson: Don’t Judge Me by the Color of My Skin

  Walking along the pier in San Francisco I heard someone say, “Hey, Tattoo Man.” I looked over my shoulder to a black man, very large in stature but worn down by life.

  He looked as though a killer he was and soon a victim he will be.

  He was obviously homeless and suffering with some serious health issues.

  After the multicolored racial slur of “Tattoo Man” came the next question, “You have any money?”

  I walked over to him and said, “I’ll do you a favor if you do me one.” He jumped at the opportunity and said, “OK.”

  I said, “I’ll give you some money to help you out if you help me out, too.”

  He said, “Anything.”

  I said, “Don’t judge me by the color of my skin, OK?”

  He just said, “Wow, I am sorry.”

  I smiled and said, “It’s OK. Happens all the time.”

  To which he replied, “Yeah, me too.”

  From Hell to Transcendental Meditation

  As I rumbled down the street with music blasting from my ’32 Ford, it would have been obvious to anybody that I was a man in shambles. Too much information being shoved down my throat with the helping hand of managers, agents, divorce lawyers…Things were not 100 percent with my girlfriend, Katherine, and I felt like my heart was stuck in a meat grinder. Alcohol was no longer an option to kill the pain. I was fifty years old and had the world by the balls, but on that day and the days and months building up to it, life felt more like a kick in the balls.

  Katherine had suggested that I meet Nancy. Somebody else had advised the same for Katherine. People like Nancy de Herrera are not in the phone book. It’s word of mouth, or maybe word of heart. Today as I sit here writing, I am grateful the good news found its way to me.

  It was a quaint little home in the hills off Laurel Canyon in Beverly Hills. Even though her house was nestled in a neighborhood on a public street, it still felt like solitude as I pulled up. I had only spoken on the phone to her one time. She gave me directions and told me, “Simply bring seven flowers and three pieces of fruit.” I scratched my head, shrugged, and did as directed.

  When Nancy opened the door, I felt like I was going to be catapulted somewhere. Her positive energy was overpowering. She looked at me with blue eyes and shouted, “Nikki, I have been waiting to see you.” Then she looked deeper into my eyes and said, “Please come in; let’s have some tea.”

  As she poured she said, “I feel like I know you. You remind me of someone but I can’t put a finger on who.” I was anxious and excited to learn what she had taught so many before me. In the 1960s she had traveled to India with John Lennon, Paul McCartney, Eric Clapton, Donovan, and a handful of others to meet with the Maharishi Mahesh Yogi. She was there when the ’60s erupted, led by the Beatles and their message of love. To be honest, it was the Maharishi Yogi’s message and the Beatles were the carriers to the rest of the world. That made it theirs and that made it ours…All great messages should be so blessed.

  MEDICAL ROOM, FUNNY FARM fig.mff93


  All you need is love, indeed.

  But for me, on that day, I didn’t know what I needed. I sat there and started to cry into my tea. I told her I was about to break, and I couldn’t stop the slow painful cracking before the final snap. She looked at me kindly, absorbed my words like a Mother Teresa, or maybe Mother Nature. She told me when the Maharishi was sitting in my very spot, sipping from that very cup, he said, “Life is not always perfect.”

  That day Nancy taught me transcendental meditation (TM).

  I can tell you how important that day was a hundred thousand times over, but unless you experience what I’m about to explain, it won’t make complete sense. So I will simplify.

  You have noise, it’s in your head, and your system is breaking down from it. I see it as poison darts stabbing into your nervous system. They feed on your anxiety, they thrive on your inability to sit still, and they get fat like rats on your rotting soul.

  To “simplify” your life into a mantra is to call in the noise patrol. Meditation is simple. We think our lives cannot be. They can if you call on the noise patrol.

  Simply said, simplify.

  It’s so easy to get overwhelmed daily. I don’t need to tell you about your daily overdose of traffic, cell phones, e-mails, kids, texting overload, work, bills, and the five, six, seven, eight, and nine o’clock news. And somewhere, sometime, maybe a doctor screams out to the patient (you and me), “Give that guy some Zoloft. Better yet, a double shot of Wellbutrin with a Prozac back.”

  Western medicine has its place. I use it (I was on Prozac and then Zoloft for years, too), but this is for your soul and there is no medical procedure for your soul that I know of.

  Since that day I use TM daily. Like a meditation junkie I need my fix. (Man, life sure is a roller coaster of changes, isn’t it?) Unbelievably, it both rests and reignites you at the same time. You will feel like you have slept a full night with just twenty minutes of meditation. You will not be required to sit in a Buddha-like position, arms extended, om sounds coming from your chest. I’m not making fun of this. I am only trying to explain to you that transcendental meditation is different. You can do it anywhere, anytime. I have done it on planes, dressing rooms, backstage, in the middle of recording and photo sessions, and even in a crowded, crazy subway station.

  I won’t go on and on about TM (like I usually do). I only share this because of how important it has been in all aspects of my life. I notice a closer relationship to my family and friends thanks to TM. I see a difference in how I handle all the crazy-makers and emotional terrorists who come with the life I have chosen.

  Nancy called me today and asked if I would pop over for some tea. I smiled and simply said, “Yes.”

  The Devil Goes to Washington, D.C. (Goddamnation)

  A day doesn’t go by that someone doesn’t curse me to hell. Damn me, so to speak. The dictionary tells me that if I am damned, then I am doomed.

  And so it begins, another day being condemned by my neighbors for living life out loud and damned by the international metal community for not making Shout at the Devil eight times in a row. Or cursed and thrown under the nearest bus for selling too many albums of Dr. Feelgood. Thrashed for having too many tattoos, then ragged on ’cause I’ve become conservative based on the success of Heroin Diaries. I am a sellout for standing in front of Congress in Washington, D.C., and a has-been for even being. Such is life.

  Oh, did I forget to tell you about the time I was sitting with Patrick Kennedy in the halls of Congress?

  Doe-eyed and smart as a fox, he actually considered my proposal, I believe, as I sit here today. He also considered his job, his family’s reputation, and our country. I sat there patiently, straight razor in boot, impatiently praying, “Dear God, if I may have just one kill, one free pass, can it be this one?”

  As usual, God takes his dear sweet time. With my foot tapping in time with my escalating heartbeat, and my eyes darting back and forth, I tried to keep my focus. Watching his eyes, his mouth, even listening to his breath for some kind of sign. I knew it was a long shot, a Hail Mary pass. Behind his head was a wonderful picture of his uncle, John F. Kennedy, being sworn in as our president, Jackie Kennedy by his side, and the most beautiful American flag tilting toward us from behind his desk. It’s like the flag was in on the decision and, to be honest, I am sure it was. I had an agenda to get something done for Americans, and I’m sure, like the number of stars and stripes, there were different ways to see what my plan would or wouldn’t do for our great country.

  Just as the problem with gun laws aren’t the guns, it’s the people who do stupid shit with guns…

  DEPRESSION fig.d631

  …the problem with letting a rock star into Congress is, well…You get the point and so did Patrick Kennedy.

  Intuition was slowing my heart rate. He reached for my book and like a great man, looking me square in the eye, he said, “You know, Nikki, you’re 100 percent right, but my job is not this job. We agree with you, but we can’t help you. If you go on this journey, you must go it alone.”

  I knew he was right. I knew it all along. He has other jobs in Washington to do, people to motivate, bills to pass.

  This whole thing started as a meeting for us to work together to pass something called the Parity Bill, which would have forced health insurance companies to recognize mental illness and addiction in a similar way as physical illness. Until then, people wouldn’t be able to get coverage from their insurance companies for a wide variety of mental health services and/or rehab, and this legislation sought to rectify that.

  The meeting somehow turned into me wanting to call the president of the United States of America an alcoholic. Wow, some days I even surprise myself at the sheer size of my own balls.

  Of course, the answer was no and rightfully so. But goddamn it…this is my goddamn nation, too.

  Too Fast for Love?

  We were young and we didn’t know what we were doing.

  We wanted it all, but we didn’t know what it all was.

  The good and the bad and the price tag that came with it would take us years to understand.

  We had been blessed with resilience. We were the cockroaches that wouldn’t die.

  But we weren’t Too Fast for Love because we were in love, or at least in love with anarchy.

  Too Fast to Settle for Mediocrity wouldn’t have sounded nearly as good as the actual title of Mötley Crüe’s first album, Too Fast for Love, so there you have it.

  What I do know is that back then I used to hang around a prop house in Hollywood. I was intrigued by how sets were built and even more by the small pyrotechnics division in back. I wanted to steal the props, but I was scared if they caught me I couldn’t come back.

  From time to time they would shout out, “Hey, kid, come over here; wanna see something cool?”

  I was on a mission to learn how to blow up a stage, and I needed weapons. In my life, I always put education first, of course.

  That day they showed me multicolored pyro powders.

  I asked if I could hold some as it burned, and they laughed. They said if I put it into something and cupped it in my hand, I could. So I did. The smoke filled the air for as far as I could see. I was amazed and knew I had to get my hands on some of this for a photo shoot for the album.

  Looking back on the Too Fast for Love photo sessions with me holding that pyro powder, smoke billowing from my outstretched hand, I laugh. We were loving living fast—too fast. And the moment passed, but history reminds me as I remind you:

  Live in the moment. Moments make history.

  I Was a Homeless Teenage Arsonist (Sorta)

  Somewhere else in this book I told you about the time I accidentally burned down the house where I was living in L.A. I was a self-indulgent teenage arsonist or, more accurately, an irresponsible, candle-loving pyromaniac, and thanks to that, basically without a place to live.

  I guess we are all just one blazing curtain away from being homeless. Sometimes mishaps flatten us an
d, with no backup plan, you land on the street.

  I didn’t end up homeless that day, but I was on a slippery slope. After running away from my mother’s home in Seattle, I did sleep in the park and in abandoned cars. I was spared a permanent residence on the streets only by friends and eventually by my grandparents, who sent me a Greyhound ticket to Idaho.

  That little taste of homelessness was a bitter enough flavor to stick with me till this day.

  I know there are different scenarios on how kids become homeless. But once they end up on the street, they usually fall prey to prostitution, drug addiction, gangs, violence, and the slow, torturous, downward spiral into hell. I remember being in Boston years ago and looking down a long alley, seeing two kids maybe nine and twelve years old digging through an overstuffed Dumpster. I looked around for parents and there wasn’t a soul in sight. I walked down and asked what they were doing, to which they replied, “Looking for something to eat.” I gave them some money and asked where their parents were. They told me, “In jail,” and nothing more.

  Eventually the younger homeless kids will get picked up by authorities and placed into some kind of system, maybe juvenile detention or foster care. As much as that seems like a blessing, it’s only a Band-Aid, as they have to address the bigger problems they developed early in their lives. After foster care, the system really breaks down, as these poorly prepared and helpless kids age out and end up on their own. They are released (if they last that long) when they are eighteen with little education, no job skills, and no family support.

  When I was writing Heroin Diaries, I wanted someplace to send the proceeds. We checked into a lot of programs, but Covenant House completely blew me away.

  The organization not only houses kids with no place to go, it has a system in place to help better them. There are many pieces to a puzzle, and Covenant House figured that out. Its staff has organized a way to put Humpty Dumpty back together again.