The Heroin Diaries

by Nikki Sixx

  Now I’m not complaining but after 12 months on the road that’s about $30,000 a month. Then deduct car, house, clothes and just living–you get the idea. We’re not fucking rich. There’s not enough to give it away to little fucking assholes with made-up lies just to gouge us.

  Why the rant? Because we’re getting sued by some fucker who said he lost his hearing at our concert a while back. I bet he could hear just fine if I asked him if he wanted a check for $25k to go away.

  Good night. Or good morning…

  P.S. I left Vanity in Minneapolis–maybe she can hook up with Dozen Roses Boy. God, I’m an asshole.

  4:30 p.m.

  Just woke up. Another day, another show, another hotel…nothing on TV, nothing on my mind, nothing to write about…

  Off to sound check. If it wasn’t for these pages I call my friend, I would surely have no escape for the demons in my head.

  JULY 17TH, 1987 DAY OFF

  Hotel, Chicago, 5:55 a.m.

  Just got back from the show and then a transvestite bar where we all drank vodka shots, ate caviar and laughed our asses off at all the characters of the night. We had these twins with us who were making out with each other for our entertainment. Fans were outside the club for hours and the police came in at one point. When they did we had these silver trays with silver lids with lines of coke on them. I felt like it was going down but a cop just said they love the band and if any cops bust our balls while we’re in Chicago just call them, and he gave us their numbers.

  I almost asked if they wanted a line, but thought, Why push my luck?

  Even with all that’s gone good I feel the boredom of the road has started to set in and bigger and badder versions of Mötley hedonism are waiting in the shadows. It’s lurking and whispering my name. Here’s the sick part–I’m proud to say I’m just doing pills, blow and drinking (a lot)–no heroin. Good night, my sleeping pills are calling.

  9:20 p.m.

  Damn it. Dark outside already and I just woke up. I unplugged the alarm clock so I can’t see its fucking glow. Now the big dilemma…what the hell to order from room service?

  JULY 18TH, 1987 MARKET SQUARE ARENA INDIANAPOLIS, IN

  Hotel, Chicago, 4 a.m.

  Went to some strip club with the band. I asked the Whitesnake guys to come with us (saw them in the bar downstairs) but one of them…Vivian I think his name is…said he was gonna stay in and practice. What the fuck? There’s too much world to destroy to be sitting in your room playing the same shit you played when you were 15. These guys put my ass to sleep. I can’t wait for Guns N’ Roses to come out with us. I gotta go, there’s a redhead in my bed passed out, and I gotta kick her out.

  Bored in Chicago, Sixx.

  DOUG THALER: During the Girls Girls Girls tour, Whitesnake was actually bigger than Mötley Crüe. Mötley had a Number 2 album, but Whitesnake had a Number 1. They were originally only going to play a few early dates, but after I increased their fee from $4,000 per night to $10,000, they ended up staying with us right until the end of October–and I was glad they did.

  On the jet, 2:30 p.m.

  Sitting on the jet hungover. I guess I drank more than I thought last night. Vince and Fred said I was smashed. I think the zombie dust gives me the illusion I’m keeping it together. Oh well, beats junk…four aspirin, please.

  We have a gig in Indy tonight then after the show we’re leaving for my favorite rock city in the world…Detroit. Two sold-out shows…badass.

  On the jet, 1 a.m.

  Tonight we shot a live video for Wild Side. What would people think if they knew they were singing a raped and dismantled version of the Lord’s Prayer…and knew how I came to write it? I wonder how Becky is now?

  WAYNE ISHAM: When we came to shoot the “Wild Side” video, Nikki said what he always said to me: “I don’t want the same old Bon Jovi shit.” So we decided to do a really mental over-the-top live video.

  I put cameras everywhere. Tommy had his revolving drum kit, so we put a camera on that. I wanted to put a camera on Nikki’s bass but he wouldn’t let me, so we put it on Mick’s guitar instead. Then there was a huge Plexiglass ball with a camera in it that we threw into the crowd to get some crazy shots from there. Of course, being Mötley fans, they ended up breaking it.

  The problem was Mötley had this thing called Double Bubble…they’d give you a bottle of Jack Daniel’s before the show and shout “Double Bubble,” which meant you had to drink straight from the bottle until the bubbles went up it–twice! So I was trying to work the main camera onstage, shit-faced, and Nikki came up behind me and bit me really hard on the arm. I suddenly had this searing pain and Nikki was standing in front of me, laughing his head off. He thought it was the funniest thing in the world.

  JULY 19TH, 1987 JOE LOUIS ARENA DETROIT, MI

  Hotel, Detroit, 5:25 p.m.

  Floating in depression. I can’t seem to find a footing in life. I don’t know why but some days I wish I was a kid back on the streets of Seattle, hanging out with other musicians who were bent on reinventing the music that drove us from insanity…Rob Hemphil, Rick Van Zandt and the others. School was a thing we did so we could do what it is we really want and need to do and that’s to dream.

  Now my dream is here and I don’t have the tools to undo the damage done to me as a child.

  Why am I so pissed?

  Why do kids relate to me?

  I got the second answer, but not the first. It’s easy, ’cause I’m fucked up like them. Not by our own actions either…others broke us…not that it’s hard to break a kid. Now us (the kids) are gonna break you.

  Fuck everything…somebody get me a doctor.

  JULY 20TH, 1987 JOE LOUIS ARENA DETROIT, MI

  Backstage, 11:45 p.m.

  I love it when the band is on fire. Great show, second one sold out here. We slithered through the set like a sidewinder, fangs exposed yet somehow charming at times. I smiled all the while, what a Cheshire cat I must have looked like. Swigging whisky, reeling in contentment…moments like these must be savored…

  JULY 21ST, 1987 DAY OFF

  Hotel, Detroit, 6 p.m.

  I’ve been going from very up and happy to feeling completely depressed lately and I don’t know why. No more or less drugs and booze than usual. Pills by the handful but nothing less than slightly out of control. I feel like something is gonna crash soon…it feels like impending doom.

  I’ll be at home this time next week. I don’t know if that’s good or bad…maybe both.

  DOUG THALER: In some ways Nikki didn’t seem so different on the Girls Girls Girls tour. The truth was that often you just couldn’t tell if he was on a coke high, or a Jack Daniel’s high, or whatever. All that we knew was that he was kind of shifty and we had to watch him like a hawk.

  JULY 22ND, 1987 DAY OFF

  Hotel, Detroit, 8:40 p.m.

  Lay in bed all day watching TV. Nothing too exciting except that Doug called and told me Too Fast for Love has gone platinum…not bad for a lil punk rock record.

  JULY 23TH, 1987 CINCINNATI GARDENS CINCINNATI, OH

  On jet to Cincinnati, 2 p.m.

  Vince can never sleep alone. He has a different girl every night. I can’t understand that, because I need to be alone. I’m always alone in a room full of people. I can never understand Vince holding hands with a girl that he’s just met. It blows me away. It’s not just getting laid–he has one flying in and one flying out every day. I’ve seen them pass in the hallway. He not only never gets caught, he has no remorse. Sometimes one is his old lady too.

  Vince is a sex addict, but I guess me calling him an addict is the pot calling the kettle black.

  FRED SAUNDERS: Vince Neil was very high-maintenance on the Girls tour. I think he thought he was Elvis Presley. When he got really drunk I would take all of his jewelry off him before he went out, because he was always getting robbed. The other thing he’d do was come in all the time boasting about exactly how many girls he’d slept with. Oh yes, he was a real piece of work a
ll right.

  JULY 24TH, 1987 THE COLISEUM RICHMOND, OH

  Hotel, Cleveland, 2 p.m.

  Woke up in Cleveland. These hotels are starting to look all the same. Another show tonight, I really need a day off. Thank God I’m home in three days. My hands are so bruised and cut up–my body is fucked up. I seem to do things to my body onstage that I don’t feel until the adrenaline wears off–or the alcohol…

  JULY 25TH, 1987 DAY OFF

  On the jet to Hebron, 4 p.m.

  Sometimes I just run out of juice. I hit a wall and I can’t move. It’s not the hangovers or the half-life from the pills…it’s something else. I don’t know what it is, but the only way through it is to put your head down and drive into the end zone. It’s like I have a chemical imbalance.

  I was reading a story in the newspaper recently about low blood sugar and alcohol. I wonder if I have low blood sugar.

  I can’t wait to get tomorrow out of the fucking way and get home.

  Anyway, I’m fucking bored and just rambling, so rather than bore you with my mundane scribbles, I’ll just put down the pen and pick up the guitar. There’s gotta be a song in there somewhere, just waiting to come out–I just gotta muster up the energy to pull it out…

  MICK MARS: By this stage of the tour I couldn’t tell if Nikki was high because I was normally high too. The shows were all pretty consistent: here comes the Jack Daniel’s bottle, who can drink the most, how many bubbles can you do with it. I would line up shots of vodka one after the other then go back to my room and order champagne and wine–it was pretty fucked. But I don’t think I ever realized quite how bad Nikki was getting.

  JULY 26TH, 1987 BUCKEYE LAKE MUSIC CENTER HEBRON, OH

  On the Mötley jet to LA, 2 a.m.

  There were 40,000 kids tonight…what a great show. The band was firing on all cylinders. We were on top of it–40,000 kids all with their fists in the air, shouting at the top of their lungs. Some days you just nail it like a machine. The band was so tight and I could just feel the electricity from the crowd. This is a really nice way to end. Now we have four days off. Should get in about 8:30–I can’t wait to sleep in my own bed. My clothes stink so bad. I need to change out my suitcase with new clothes.

  FRED SAUNDERS: Buckeye Lake was a huge outdoor show with Whitesnake and Anthrax. We had a small disaster that day. When Mötley played “Smokin’ in the Boys’ Room,” Vince was supposed to play a harmonica solo. Vince can’t even play the harmonica but I can, so we’d cut Vince’s mic off and he’d lip-synch and pretend to be playing, while the truth was that I was hidden at the side of the stage and playing into a mic. I used to watch him up there, posing and sucking in his cheeks. But at Buckeye Lake, I was practicing and the hidden mic was somehow on, so this “Smokin’ in the Boys’ Room” harp solo suddenly came blasting out of nowhere in the middle of a different song completely. Vince looked real pissed, as usual.

  JULY 27TH, 1987 AT HOME

  Van Nuys, 9 p.m.

  Home. Thank fuck. I washed my clothes, washed my car, checked my answering machine. I had 67 messages…erased them all. Went through the mail…I had a check for $650k sitting there. I keep telling the office to collect my mail and redirect it when I’m on tour. Come on, over half-a-million dollars sitting there in my mailbox on the street? That’s some crazy shit…

  JULY 28TH, 1987 AT HOME

  Van Nuys, 10:20 p.m.

  Slept all day.

  I just wrote a new song called A Is for Asshole.

  * * *

  A is for Asshole

  B is for Being Me

  * * *

  JULY 29TH, 1987 AT HOME

  Van Nuys, midnight

  I wish I missed someone as much as I miss smack. It haunts me like a lover I never got to say goodbye to.

  Can’t wait to get out of here. I feel like I’m hanging by a thread. I feel safer from junk on the road. I’ve been fending off the wolves who have come knocking at my door. They all know I’m home…

  God, please keep them away…

  JULY 30TH, 1987 AT HOME

  Van Nuys, 6:40 p.m.

  Today I’m laying in this bed and am so lonely–at the top? I feel trapped in my own destiny. On days like today, I understand suicide. I wonder if I will make it all the way to the end of my life? I wonder if I have the ability to love someone enough to make them feel safe?

  Days like these I hate to leave my house. I can muster up a fake smile and be cordial, but deep inside I feel nobody really likes me…and worse…nobody understands me.

  I feel like I am completely alone on this planet.

  NIKKI: In retrospect I can see now that depression was not just knocking at my door but had clearly kicked it in and made itself right at home in my head. Sometimes things are so close that you just can’t see them. I love the word “accumulative”…emotional problems are so often the end result of many things going on. It wasn’t just the drugs, the alcohol, the pills, the fame or the childhood. It was accumulative, and the list was growing and growing…and growing…

  JULY 31ST, 1987 CNC ARENA PITTSBURGH, PA

  On a flight from LAX to Cleveland, 11:45 a.m.

  My time at home went so quick, so now it’s another month on the road. I can’t count the miles, or remember the hotels. I don’t remember the cities and I can’t see the end in sight. If it wasn’t for the music and the fans this would be as close to Chinese water torture as you could get. Repetition…over and over and over…drip drip drip…

  Ya I’m whining. I guess I’m just tired. This flight left LA at 9 a.m. We land in Cleveland at 4 then catch another flight to Pittsburgh where we land at 6, then we have a show…it’s a good one. 16K, sold out. So I better get some sleep. I sorta forgot to go to sleep last night–I had some late-night visitors. Jason hasn’t changed…

  It’s good to be outta LA.

  * * *

  ORIGINAL SONG LYRIC NOBODY KNOWS WHAT I’TS LIKE TO BE LONELY

  I've got the power

  I've got the power

  I've got the power

  But it still hurts when you're all alone.

  * * *

  AUGUST 1987

  PRETTY GOOD SHOW CONSIDERING THE SQUIRRELS AND ICE CREAM TRUCKS

  AUGUST 1ST, 1987 THE COLISEUM RICHFIELD, OH

  Hotel, Cleveland, 2:15 a.m.

  I can’t wait to sleep. I’m over-tired. My ears are ringing. I think I’m getting sick…or maybe my visit home is still in my system.

  AUGUST 2ND, 1987 MEMORIAL AUDITORIUM BUFFALO, NY

  Noon

  Wow, I just woke up…I really needed that sleep. Thank God the phone rang, we’re supposed to be heading to the airport in an hour. It was a radio interview for our show tonight in Buffalo.

  Here we go into New York. NY is almost as bad as LA for me. I’m not sure which is worse…the record company, the drug dealers or the girls. Maybe they’re all the same person.

  AUGUST 3RD, 1987 DAY OFF

  Hotel, Philadelphia, 4 p.m.

  Why do I feel Mick has a gold digger on his hands? Mick Mars is the sweetest man alive, but he attracts dirt…he’s like a dirt magnet.

  CHICKS = TROUBLE.

  AUGUST 4TH, 1987 SPECTRUM PHILADELPHIA, PA

  Hotel, Philadelphia, 5 p.m.

  Went down to the hotel bar last night, pretty sedate evening. Just had a few cocktails and met some fans. Kind of a nice evening. I feel good today, but I did get a call from Sacha–he said he wanted to see me. Of course he does…he’s a heroin dealer.

  I tell you, the East Coast is bad for me…here come the wolves.

  I’m gonna change my rooming name so nobody can find me. How about some of these?

  Anita Bath?

  Al Coholic?

  Seymour Pussy?

  Or the best one of all…

  Si Cotic

  P.S. Now we’re off to the first of two sold-out Spectrum shows. Woo-hoo…later.

  AUGUST 5TH, 1987 SPECTRUM, PHILADELPHIA, PA

  Hotel, Philadelphia, 4 p.m. />
  The crowd was so loud last night, insane. Philly really loves their rock ’n’ roll.

  I met this mulatto girl last night who was so beautiful that I couldn’t believe it. She was really, really nice. She came back to my room and hung out. One thing led to another and afterwards when we were laying there (I was thinking, This one’s a keeper), she said that she had a kid and she needs money for rent and could I help her with her car payment…and school for her kid. She was really pouring it on.

  It went on forever…blah blah blah. Basically, would I pay her for her services? So I kicked her out. Damn it–maybe I’m the dirt magnet…

  P.S. Another Philly show tonight…

  * * *

  RANDOM THOUGHT

  IF YOU GO SHOPPING AT THE GARBAGE DUMP, YOU’RE GONNA BRING HOME TRASH

  * * *

  ROSS HALFIN: Nikki went off with girls on the Girls tour but they were never really his focus. He was far more into the drugs. We’d get drunk and do lots of krell and he’d want a girl, but essentially he was totally drug-oriented. Often he’d end up staying in his room on his own. We all knew that meant he had drugs and didn’t want to share them with anyone. Or he had a girl and wanted to do her on drugs.

  AUGUST 6TH, 1987 DAY OFF

  Hotel, Philadelphia, 3 p.m.

  Me and Tommy stole the limo last night. It was funny as hell. When we got back to the hotel and our driver got out of the car to open the door for us, we locked the doors, jumped over the seat and drove the car off. He was chasing us around the hotel parking lot and we accidentally crashed it through the hotel gate. The guy was so fucking pissed and then the hotel manager came out yelling, telling us to get the fuck out of his hotel. Fred Saunders had to talk him out of fucking calling the police. We said we were sorry (of course we’re not) and didn’t get kicked out the hotel. Maybe ’cause we’ve spent about $30,000 here so far.