Stripped Show: Motley Crue forced to scale back theatrics for Hard Rock

Spencer Patterson

Friday, March 18, 2005 | 9:05 a.m.

Much as Vince Neil is looking forward to playing a hometown show this weekend, the Motley Crue vocalist wishes his band could unleash its full-stage circus for his local friends and fans.

"The Joint (at the Hard Rock Hotel) is a cool place to play, but we can't put our show in there," Neil, a full-time Las Vegas resident for the past three years, said in a phone interview from his tour bus outside Kansas City, Mo.

"We have high-wire trapeze artists, fire-breathing dwarves, stuff that comes up from the stage ... Tommy (Lee) flies from drum to drum. We ride our bikes onstage. And obviously, it's too small to do a lot of that there. I'm bummed because I want all my friends to see how cool this stuff is."

Instead, Neil said, the recently reunited hard-rock quartet will "just let the music do the talking" when they play The Joint at 8 p.m. Sunday and again on March 27. Both shows are sold out.

"Hopefully we'll come back and do an arena so everybody in Vegas can come and see the show," Neil said.

Actually, Motley Crue has already announced a return trip to Las Vegas, for shows Oct. 8 and 9.

The venue? The Joint, again.

"It kind of pisses me off, because I was like, 'Put a (expletive) show in, so we can show these people," Neil said. "But you know the casinos. They throw way too much (expletive) money at you and you gotta take it. This is a business, too."

Business has been extremely good for Neil, Lee, guitarist Mick Mars and bassist Nikki Sixx since the once-hard-partying L.A. band's original foursome got back together for the first time in six years last December.

Rapid arena sell-outs have been the norm throughout a tour that began on Valentine's Day in Puerto Rico and will eventually take the Crue throughout North America, Europe, Australia, Japan, Southeast Asia and back to the United States.

Last month's two-disc, best-of set, "Red, White & Crue" which includes three new tracks along with such hits as "Shout at the Devil," "Girls, Girls, Girls" and "Kickstart My Heart" debuted at No. 6 on the Billboard 200 and has already gone platinum (for sales exceeding 1 million).

Not bad for a group derailed by personal differences after its 1980s and early '90s heydey.

"It's like with brothers. You get in a fight and you get over it, but with us it's in public," said Neil, 44, whose strained relationship with Lee was frequently reported as the primary obstacle to a Motley Crue reunion.

"Me and Tommy go back 30 years. When I was 16, I was sleeping at his parents' house on the floor next to his bed. But we're getting along better than we ever have, and having fun. Everything's great."

Mars' health presented another potential impediment to Motley Crue's re-emergence. The 49-year-old guitarist suffers from chronic bone disease ankylosing spondylitis, and underwent hip replacement surgery last October.

"He's doing great. He's running around; he's actually getting in my way onstage," Neil said. "A lot of people had their doubts, but he's strong. Within three weeks he was walking on his own.

"Take a healthy guy like (Kiss vocalist) Paul Stanley ... he had a hip replacement, and four months later the guy's still got a cane."

Even though Motley Crue once soldiered on with vocalist John Corabi in place of Neil, and then later with Randy Castillo in Lee's drum seat, Neil said reuniting without Mars was never considered.

"We wouldn't have done it (without him), because you don't do Motley Cure if it's not the four band members," Neil said. "They tried that without me and we tried it without Tommy, and it ain't the same.

"With Motley Cure there's Vince Neil fans and Tommy Lee fans and Nikki Sixx fans and Mick Mars fans. It's almost like Kiss, where everybody had their favorite character."

Fans also have their favorite Motley Crue tales, from the backstage groupie legends to separate sex-tape scandals involving Neil and Lee (the latter recorded at Lake Mead with Pamela Anderson), all of which made for a classic episode of VH1's "Behind the Music" series.

In one account, according to Motley Crue legend, Sixx was even declared dead for about two minutes in 1987 after suffering a heroin overdose.

The band has also had its share of Vegas mishaps, namely Sixx's 1999 Mandalay Bay "breach of the peace" arrest (charges were later dropped) and a 1997 near-riot at the Aladdin during a Crue show.

Neil acknowledged that Motley Crue's fans have come to expect a certain level of hedonistic behavior.

"We kind of created a monster," he said. "We always try to top ourselves, and try to make it an experience.

"Most of the bands throughout the '90s and 2000s don't like to put a show on. They don't want to go the extra mile for the fan. We've always said, 'For a $20 ticket, let's give them a $100 show,' and we've always stuck to that."

That philosophy has drawn out plenty of longtime Crue fans for another round of live shows. But Neil said the crowd is far from stagnant.

"We've got lots of young kids, 14, 15, even younger. I think they're just curious about the myth of Motley Crue after hearing about it from their fathers or brothers," Neil said. "There are punk rockers standing next to stockbrokers. Lots of girls and boobs. It's a culture clash in our audience, and every seat is filled."

Given that support, what began as a reunion and farewell tour is now looking more like the next chapter for Motley Crue, according to Neil.

"This is working, and everybody's having a good time, so there's no reason not to keep it going," he said. "We're actually talking about putting another studio record out, and then doing another tour. So it doesn't look like Motley will be leaving anytime soon."

When Neil receives compliments like the one he got after a recent show in New York City, he wouldn't dream of stopping now.

"We played Madison Square Garden and this guy came up to me and said, 'You know, you're this generation's Rolling Stones,' " Neil said. "And you think about it that way and it's pretty (expletive) crazy. But we have been together 25 years and I don't see anything ending."