Tattoos & Tequila: To Hell and Back with One of Rock's Most Notorious Frontmen
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I think we’ll do great here. I know you talked about doing these interviews at my house. How it’s intimate there and all that. But believe me it’s not. My house, you know, I’ve got my mother-in-law there. That’s the thing. My dogs, my mother-in-law, my wife. It’s just… it’s too much. And if we did a hotel room—didn’t somebody say a hotel room? Somebody at 10th Street had said something about getting a suite at the Rio, where there’s a Vince Neil Ink. But if we get into one of those environments where I’m just, you know, like, walled up in some room… I would just feel like I wanted to get the fuck out of there, you know? You start walling me up, keeping me places… I don’t know. I don’t react well. I’d rather be here… you know what I mean? If this doesn’t work we could always go to the studio, which has rooms above it. I have to be there every afternoon anyway. We have to get cracking on that record, too. Two weeks is all we’ve got. You’re coming with me after this to the studio, right? This is gonna be a busy couple of weeks. You know we’re also filming the video next Wednesday and Thursday, right? That’ll be cool. We’ll just have to find the time to talk in between, I guess.
I love this place. Like I said, a lot of thought and care went into it. It’s pure rock ’n’ roll. It’s red lights and leopard skin, purple velvet, iron spiderwebs, button-tuck black leather banquettes. Hot little rock chicks waiting tables—suicide grrls in short skirts with lots of eyeliner. And the stage is great. Intimate. Perfect sound. But we can pack them in, too. We have national acts coming in now, which is pretty cool. One night a week my son DJs. His name is Neil Wharton; everybody calls him Neil Neil. My parents raised him for a lot of his life. We’re really just getting to know each other. He sings in a Mötley Crüe tribute band. He only recently moved to Vegas to live. I got him a job working with the clothing line and stuff that we sell.
With Feelgoods, it’s weird, ’cause like most of the bands that are playing in here are bands that we came up with. We got L.A. Guns, Ratt. The BulletBoys just played here. Slaughter will be here New Year’s Eve—that’s my guys who also play in the Vince Neil Band: Jeff Blando, Dana Strum, Zoltan Chaney. You’ll meet them today at the studio. My partner’s got his custom shop down there, too, Count’s Kustoms. He’s got all these restored cars in one warehouse. It’s like a fuckin’ museum. I got my ’32 Ford in there, too—the ultimate hot rod, the engine’s all chromed out, with flames painted on the sides. Speaking of which, tonight is bike and hot rod night at Feelgoods. The whole parking lot will be full of motorcycles. It gets packed in here; it’ll be jammed. And Wednesdays, Thursdays, Fridays, and Saturdays we’re usually kicking out the last people at six in the morning. This is Vegas, right? The people here know how to party.
And all I have to do is collect a check. I can sign for anything I want.
Sweet, right?
The other thing I like about this place is all the memorabilia. As you walk in there’s a glass case with my flame-proof racing suit from my Formula One racing days, pictures of me and my car. There’s my outfit from Crüe Fest 1, a whole bunch of platinum records, gold records, stuff like that. At this stage in life, my wife jokes that I need a warehouse. And I’m like, I do have a warehouse. It’s called my garage. I have tons of old clothes and memorabilia and stuff I’ve worn onstage. I have tons of guitars these people keep sending me. What are you going to do? Throw it all away? Not that I’m sentimental about stuff. Absolutely, absolutely not. It’s just, I don’t know. I don’t throw it away. Sometimes the Hard Rock buys your stuff from you and you actually make some money off the shit. Where do you think they get it? Like when you go into the Hard Rocks all around the country you see people’s stuff there. That shit is all out of somebody’s garage. They contact you and say, “Okay, we want such and such an outfit.” You know, they want whatever you were wearing at a certain historic concert or occasion or something. Like there’s a really cool outfit of mine at the new Hard Rock that just opened here on the Strip. I went to the grand opening and it’s in a big display case, this big long jacket and stuff I wore when us and Aerosmith were touring together—talk about a trip down memory lane. If only my pants could talk. Maybe they’d remember some of the stuff I don’t. (Remember the leather pants from the cover of Shout? They could tell a whole chapter by themselves.)
So we’ll meet here every day at noon. At least for now. The only thing that might change is if it affects my singing, you know? Because we’re recording this album and talking is the worst you can do for your voice. That’s what I’ve learned over the years: It’s not even singing that’s so bad for your voice; it’s talking. So we’ll see how it works out. We might have to end up changing things around. Like I might have to rehearse and record during the day and you can come to the studio later at night. Or in between sessions, you know. The studio’s not far. Just like five minutes from here, in these warehouses right behind the Strip. I could work for a few hours and then you could come there, talk for a couple hours. Whatever. We’ll get it figured out.
Another reason I like the idea of meeting here at Feelgoods is because I feel like today, as we’re writing this book, I’m a different person than the kid who started out thirty years ago. I’m not just a frontman, a singer, what have you, anymore. Today I’m a businessman as much as anything else. I like business. First of all, business is good because you don’t have to do anything except make decisions. I mean, it’s not heavy lifting. It’s not digging ditches. It’s not even memorizing lines. It’s like: Your money works for you while you sit on your ass. It’s a helluva lot easier than running back and forth across a stage for ninety minutes a night. You try it. I’ve been clocked doing twelve miles a show. Twelve miles back and forth across the stage! I remember back in Atlanta that time, I was what, in my mid-forties I guess, I think it was 2005. You think rock ’n’ roll isn’t a sport? Try this: I’m running across the stage, I’m high-stepping, moving at a fast clip from one side to the other, when all of a sudden, POW!—I feel this incredible pain in my calf. I thought I’d just been shot… or hit with a piece of metal. You take all kinds of shrapnel, bottles, bolts, what have you, when you’re up there onstage; it ain’t all panties (maybe a good subtitle for the book—It Ain’t All Panties). The tour manager was up there on the stage afterwards hunting for whatever hit me. But nobody could find anything. And my calf. Jesus H. It hurt like shit. It swelled up instantly like a balloon.
But it turned out nothing hit me. I tore the sucker. Just ripped it. I got to the hospital and I got the MRI and they confirmed it. Like some weekend warrior at a fucking company softball game ripping his hammie trying to stretch a double into a triple. Only I ripped the calf muscle. Yikes. I was in unbelievable pain; they had me all doped up on Demerol. But like two days later I was back on tour and finished it out. There was another time where I had a broken ankle and I had to go on tour but didn’t even have a walking cast. I ripped up an old tennis shoe and made my own walking cast. The show must go on, right?
War stories. War wounds. I know, I know…. Old rock stars fall hard. But I ain’t singing the blues. Here I sit in the VIP section of my own restaurant, at this cool custom set of guitar-shaped tables. I’m not just behind the velvet rope. I own the motherfucker. I’m forty-eight years old. I’m five foot nine, 170. The spandex is over. I’ve had three plastic surgeries. But who do you think gets laid more, me or you? Time changes a man. I ain’t twenty-one anymore. But I’m probably in better shape than I ever was. In the early eighties, we were skinny, but we weren’t very healthy. It’s a miracle we survived at all. We were not exactly treating our bodies very well in those days. A bottle of Jack Daniel’s and a package of stolen Hebrew National hot dogs do not make for a particularly well-balanced diet. (Looking back, I don’t think we even bothered to cook the damn things.) Later, when we all had money for the first time, we had a period in there when everybody in the band kind of blew up. Everybody was looking kind of green around the gills. Our problem? We could afford at that point to eat, drink, snort, swallow, or shoot up anyth
ing and everything we wanted. We were gluttons. We spoiled ourselves with any whim… and it showed. We are all very lucky we didn’t kill ourselves. It might look like we were trying to do that, but speaking for myself, death was never my intent. I just wanted to feel good, you know? I was just looking for that kick, that high, that superintense orgasm. Die young and leave a beautiful corpse? Not my style. I think I’d rather take the plastic surgery route.
These days, the debauchery is done. After years of unchecked drinking, I’m pretty straight now. I don’t do any drugs at all. Not anymore. And I stopped drinking three years ago. I’ve owned the tequila company for four years. And that’s what made me stop drinking—I was drinking too much tequila. But yeah, I haven’t, I haven’t even tasted my own tequila in three years.
I don’t miss getting high or drunk. I don’t miss it at all. I have so much more productive time now. I get so much more accomplished. I get up at 7:00 A.M. and make the coffee. Who’d ever thought I would be a morning person? I couldn’t have any of these businesses going if I was still that fucked up as I was for so long. Getting high never crosses my mind. Drugs are just… lame. Sobriety is cool. Well, I mean, I’ll have maybe a glass of champagne once in a while. That’s it, you know. But it’s nothing like it used to be. I have too much stuff going on. The tattoo shops, Vince Neil Ink. My solo record. Mötley Crüe. Feelgoods. Tres Rios. Vince Neil Aviation—I’m just getting things going with that right now, but you know what? My planes are tricked out—I’m talking flames on the sides, leopard-skin interior, full bar. If you want to fly like a rock ’n’ roller, you fly with me. It’s gonna be great.
Probably all of us watch our diets—especially when our wives are watching. How much chicken can you eat? The answer is: a shitload. Not to disappoint you, but I have been known to order a Chinese chicken salad and a Diet Coke for lunch. Some of us have weight issues and stuff when we’re off tour. But when you’re on tour, onstage, that’s different. When I’m on tour, I’m running for ninety minutes straight, sometimes longer. When I get offstage in between songs, it looks like I’ve been playing basketball. I am just dripping wet, drenched. And that’s every night, five days a week. I always keep a towel and a blow-dryer on the side of the stage, along with my other stuff. During a drum or guitar solo, I’ll towel off and blow-dry my hair. They call it Vince’s World—my area backstage right with all my shit. My towel, my blow-dryer, lots of water, my throat lozenges… here’s a trade secret—licorice lozenges. They really open up your throat. It used to be I kept a groupie or two waiting in Vince’s World, too. Now, being married for the fourth time and all… let’s just say that kind of stuff is in the past.
I read somewhere that an NBA player runs five miles in the course of a forty-eight-minute game. So there you have it. I do more than twice that five nights a week. Put me up against Kobe! He and I do have something in common: We both have four Lakers championship rings. Just like his, my rings have my initials in them, too. I’m actually waiting for my fourth one right now. It’s on order. I love the Lakers. I’m an LA boy, a huge fan. I grew up part of my life not far from the Forum, in Inglewood, where the Showtime Lakers used to play. The owner of the team, Jerry Buss, is a good friend of mine. When he gave me my first Laker ring he said he was doing it ’cause I “score more than any other Laker.” How cool was that, you know? If you wonder what I have in common with a guy like Dr. Jerry Buss, a seventy-six-year-old business mogul with a Ph.D. in physical chemistry, I’ll just say this: We both like beautiful women and drinking our alcohol out of the bottle. Strong friendships have been built from less.
As I’m telling you this, Dr. Buss is recovering from a stroke. I hope he’s doing okay. One thing Jerry and I always talked about was business. He would give me advice (whether I wanted it or not!). No, I’m joking. When he spoke I listened—at least before I blacked out. Because a lot of things he told me really did sink in. I think over the last several years, as I’ve been sober, I’ve been able to capitalize on some of the things he taught me. One thing he used to say: With business, you always know there’s going to be problems. You have supply and demand, employees, shipment problems, what have you. As a businessman, you have to learn to deal with it. You take care of problems, fix things, figure out how to make the business better. It’s never been like that with Mötley Crüe. With Mötley Crüe, there’s problems and nothing ever gets better. It’s very frustrating, I have to tell you. I’m at a point in my life where I just don’t want to fuck with it anymore. I’ve always said I’ll stop singing when it’s not fun anymore. Well, lemme tell you this. When it comes to Mötley Crüe, it’s getting to be not fun anymore. It might even be a little past that.
With Mötley Crüe, it’s always like the Greatest Hits album—I’m the last to know everything. I’ve always had the distinct impression that nobody in this band gives one shit about what I think. I mean, it’s weird. I get no respect in that band, and it’s fucked up. It’s old.
I know, I know. I was the last one to join the band. I’m just the singer. I’m the entertainer. I’m the person in the front; I’m not the one bringing the songs. But I don’t care about all that. I don’t mind if somebody else writes the songs. It’s my job to interpret the songs, to sell them, to sing the shit out of them. To perform them and make them memorable enough to sell 80 million copies. Who knows how many more times than that Mötley has been downloaded or sharewared or pirated or whatever? Do you think Mötley has suffered from my lack of songwriting? Or is it my singing that sells the songs? We all know what happened when they tried to replace me with John Corabi. They set up this whole fake meeting to try and get me to come back. I knew it was a fucking meeting. What do you think, I’m an idiot?
The thing is, I know my role in the band. I’ve never really needed to bring songs to Mötley Crüe because the songs they have are, you know, there have always been really good songs coming in. I’m not gonna say I haven’t made some good suggestions. It was me who suggested covering “Smokin’ in the Boy’s Room.” Everybody knows that song kind of saved our asses at the time. But I’m not a guy who says, you know, “If my name is not on the song, I’m not going to sing it.” Fuck no. I’m not that guy. I’m the opposite of that guy. I mean, my name’s been on plenty of the hits that we’ve had. That’s fine. But that’s not the biggest thing. The biggest thing is does the song sell? The biggest thing, right now, is eliminating all the bullshit in my life, number one, and number two, finding the business model for each part of my business life so that things work smoothly. ’Cause that’s what I want. The same as I’ve always wanted: I just want things to be easy. Like Saints of Los Angeles. The producer knew my voice so well he would sing the scratch vocals first; I would know going in what was expected of me, what would work, you know? So when I went in to sing the record it was like totally smooth. I did a song a day and I could’ve done more, because each song took me no more than two hours to lay down. To tell you the truth, it took me longer to drive to the studio and back to my hotel than it did to actually do the work on the album. That was Saints. And Saints was up for a Grammy last year. So how can you argue with that?
In the old days it was sooooo… fuckin’… hard… to put out a record. Everything was a struggle. Everything was heads beating against the wall. I hated it. You know, we would spend eight months in a studio grinding it out, arguing. Sometimes it would get really nasty. It was like a rock ’n’ roll cockfight, 24/7. Nikki would be in there telling me to sing a song one way and then another: “Try it this way. No, try it that way.” He was always trying to lord his power over me, whatever. To this day I feel like he’s pulling the strings over at the agency. And then you’d have the producer stepping in and he would tell me something different about how to sing the song… and I’d just go, you know, “What the fuck? What the fuckin’ fuck. Fuck all you-all, I’m gonna sing it like I’m going to sing it; we didn’t get this far with everybody second-guessing my voice. Remember, you were the ones who came to me and wanted me to sing for you.
”
I’m glad those days are gone. Today it’s more about business. I got a contract. We handle it like business. We don’t have to like each other. We just have to make music together. It’s like a friendly divorce with shared custody. We do it for the sake of the music. Because what we made together, something from nothing, was valuable and groundbreaking. Today it lives, like a child all grown.
I think one of the problems is that Nikki resents me. He has always seen this band as his baby. And I think he resents the fact that, since I’m the singer, the songs are identified more with me than with him. I mean, I can go out on the road solo and sing the Mötley catalog. And I do. And people love it. One thing everybody knows: You can change the band around and still maintain your sound. If you get good musicians, they can play whatever they need to play; they can imitate anybody. But you can’t imitate the singer—the front man is not interchangeable. He’s the face and the voice of the band. They learned that before when we broke up. I think that weighs on Nikki and Tommy both. Because Nikki wants to be known as the musical genius he is. And make no mistake, he’s fuckin’ awesome. And Tommy has just always wanted to be famous. So there you have it: Everybody resents me—except Mick, who’s this gnomish musical genius who’s always had enough of his own shit to worry about. It’s like, he was the older brother, living in the house, while we lived in the tree house out back, three younger brothers at each other’s throats.