American hard rockers Motley Crue are justifiably both derided and respected. Their dubious antics and dysfunctional qualities were celebrated in their questionably embellished autobiography The Dirt which eventually encouraged the inevitable reunion of the classic Crue line-up. Having toured the world on the back of a greatest hits compilation album that only included three new songs, thus teasing fans, the Crue have finally put together an album of original material based on their somewhat colourful past, humbly called Saints of Los Angeles. It’s a return to form with a cracking snare sound, straight ahead hard blues rock riffs and blatantly base lyrics delivered with a dash of tongue in cheek humour.
This ninth studio release transpires a good decade since the original line-up cracked when drummer Tommy Lee clashed into fisticuffs one too many times with returned and previously estranged vocalist Vince Neil. But, the band now basks in the glow of substantial finances after milking the still grazing reunion cash cow. So with cooled heels, a few buried hatchets under several starlets beds and a subdued tolerance of Tommy’s reality television show appearances, it seems they are back on track to creating some good solid, raucous rock’n’roll. Somewhere during the middle of their OzzFest taunting concert festival idea known as Cruefest, featuring LA pop metal friendly fare, guitarist Mick Mars took time out to talk to Australian Guitar’s Paul Southwell via phone from the land of milk and honey. Being older than the rest of the band members, he comes across as the most down to earth component of a band with a notoriously self indulgent reputation.
Motley Crue riffs and rhythms are generally strong, which stems from the partnership of Mick and bassist Nikki Sixx maintaining the core of Motley’s song writing process. ‘A lot of the time I will come with a partial lick or a partial riff in a song and I’ll show it to Nikki. We’ll get together and do some work on them. On the majority of the songs we do that’, says Mick. Regarding the input of others, he reveals that ‘on this particular album we’ve had some outside help from [producer] James Michael, [guitarist] DJ Ashba and a couple of other people. Mostly Nikki and I would sit down and work something out. This time it was a little bit different as a couple of the guys had their own agendas and had to fulfil their obligations. So Nikki and I said, ‘well, we’ve got to do this’, so we did it.’
For the most part, Mick uses custom shop, re-issue Fender Stratocaster guitars. As he points out, ‘the ones I use are made for me as I’ve got the only ones.’ For the tunings, everything is one whole step down. ‘It makes the rhythms a lot fatter and bigger. I’ve been doing that for aeons. When we were first together it was like, ‘hey dudes, let’s drop down a full step’ and they went, ‘whoa, this is cool’. But, on ‘MF of the Year’ we dropped the D down to C to make it even bigger’, he says.
Talking on the specifics of the customised guitars such as intonation settings, Mick tends to go by feel more than anything else. He tells us set-ups were done at the finish custom shop. Yet, he says, once he has them, he tampers. ‘I like to tweak it to my specifications. Then my guitar tech, Bobby O, takes care and makes sure it is right for me and I let him know if, ‘no, this isn’t quite right’, but Fender get it pretty close.’
Similarly with guitar pick ups, Mick knows what sound he wants. He fires up, saying, ‘they sent me one for the white guitar with a Trembucker in it that I play most of the time and I hated it. It wasn’t what I was used to and usually a normal pickup will put out about 7.5 ohms but mine put out 16 ohms. It’s not like an overdriven sound, it is just more powerful and puts more signal into the front end of the [amplifier] head but not to distort it. So I just said to Fender to leave the back pickup out, I’ll put my own ones in. So that is what I did.’
It is then fair to ask if he is tampering with his old Kramers and Gibson Les Pauls these days. Mick comments that, ‘I have a couple Les Pauls at home but no more old ones.’ So, onto his collection of guitars. ‘I have two Paul Reed Smiths with one a double neck, which is one of seven, I think. I also have one Les Paul that is one of twelve. There are a few things like that but all of my Gibson ‘59s, ‘58s, ‘57s and ‘60s and all of those are unfortunately long gone,’ he sighs, still obviously stinging from filing for bankruptcy several years back. Happily, the re-issues are faithful to replicating old guitars, which alleviates some pain. ‘Yeah, there are some good ones,’ he says. Chirping up, he advises, ‘a tip for somebody that wants to buy a classic vintage guitar or a re-issue is to go in and plug it into a Fender Twin Reverb or something. Plug it into a very clean amplifier and listen to the tone on low volume. Listen to the tone instead of plugging into a Marshall and going all out, saying, ‘yeah, this is great, man’. It isn’t, really. There are all different but I’m a nut about tone.’
For his effects rig, there is s a Leslie simulator sound he says he obtains from an old multiple effects unit. He elaborates that his Alesis Quadraverb is, ‘a really old one from the 1980’s that I had lying around for a long time. I had it in my studio rack back in the tape days. I was just playing around one day and stumbled onto that and went, ‘whoa, this is cool’. So I put it into my live sound or my Bradshaw rack. It worked exactly the way that I wanted it to do,’ he reveals, whilst he laughs at his lucky experiments with guitar sounds.
Other older effects include the Yamaha SPX-1000 but it is the Eventide H3000 Harmonizer from around 1990 that he’s still quite proud to own. Mick recalls, ‘it is pretty much from the 1980’s. That H3000 I have is the first of three that were made. Myself, Steve Vai and somebody else got one. We’re the only three guys that had one for a long time.’ He agrees it could become a collector’s item so don’t expect to see it for sale anytime soon. For other older effects, the hit song ‘Kickstart My Heart’ brought the talk box back into the limelight briefly. But it proved to be problematic for Mick. He laments that after using talk boxes in the studio, live it was not so good. ‘I tried doing it live but if I was to cut out my sound on stage and just have the talk box going through it, it would sound really bad,’ he says with a good chuckle. ‘I tried it before with my backline and the talk box going, but the mix wasn’t right so I don’t play with the talk box live anymore. I just use the wah-wah pedal instead for those parts.’
A band like Motley Crue relies on bombast and, as you’d expect, it is Marshallamplifiers that deliver their pummelling volume in a live setting. Mick has played the JCM line of Marshalls for quite some time but there are variations. He clarifies, saying, ‘I’m using custom [amp heads] with tall tops and shorter bottoms.’ He continues talking about cabinets. ‘It’s the regular bottom but tall tops. I’m also using a couple of Hendrix tall bottoms and shorter tops. They are all Vintage 30s because otherwise they break.’
Indeed, they would have to be roadworthy to survive Motley Crue’s level of punishment. Asked about acceptable road stories for musical equipment getting trashed he laughs and says, ‘oh man, I’ve blown up so much stuff, it’s stupid.’ But the concept of regret seems absent. He pauses to then elaborate. ‘The speakers I was using were nothing rare, let’s say. I’ve still got all of my Celestion Greenbacks and even ones way back to the late 1950’s and early 1960’s. They were almost like and right after the Bulldog speakers. I’ve still got all of those 20 Watt speakers. I saved them. If I was going to blow something up it was going to be the newer re-issue Celestions 30s and that kind of thing’, Mick reveals, broadening the hidden truth that the decadence is somewhat tempered.
In today’s high tech day and age, it is curious to find out how Mick feels about newer producer James Michael compared to say hit machine makers such as Desmond Child and how today compares to the age of their massive selling album Dr. Feelgood. Aside from the ability to clean up their act in comparison to past efforts, Mick points out he feels less restraint with recording these days. ‘I got to do whatever I wanted with James producing. Pro-Tools gave me so much more freedom to do whatever I wanted to do. I could then sit with him and say, ‘okay, this part was cool’ on my solos and rhythms. You don’t have to go back and re-do the whole song again. It is quicker and he gave me a lot more freedom. He is in touch with today’s music sounds and he didn’t criticise. He would just say, ‘go’ and I did and he’d say, ‘amazing’, enthuses Mick, clearly relishing the freedom that a confident use of technology by a patient producer can bring to the recording process.
Given Mick has been playing for decades, he doesn’t feel he is caught in a rut stylistically despite that rough and ready Crue sound that is familiar to all. ‘My style has changed, I think because I am letting myself go a little bit more, instead of staying so regimented to the song. Instead of playing it note for note, I let it grow. After playing them for so many years, it’s just like, ‘I think I’ll just mess this part up a little bit’. I’ll want to do something whacky with it.’ Mick has been aware of the confines of playing hits live but to continue enjoying it he’s let his playing change the songs a bit. ‘I’ve become a little more free [in playing] and have let go of being stuck in this little box, trying to exactly imitate what I did in the studio. I tried for years and it made me sound like I was a constipated guitar player’, he says, with a dash of self deprecating humour.
Naturally, the lack of precision in favour of a strong riff is probably one of the successful charms behind Motley’s riffs. They, like Guns’n’Roses, have always had a Ted Nugent or Chuck Berry blues based, heavy rock centre to their songs, as opposed to the over-the-top guitar acrobats of the sometimes deservedly maligned 1980’s pop metal era. For Mick, that was thoroughly intentional back in the day, responding excitedly that ‘yes, yes, absolutely and a lot of people forget that. If you hear a Nugent song like ‘Cat Scratch Fever’, you’ll go out [from the show] humming the song. Now, nothing against Yngwie but if you go out of the hall having heard him play, can you remember what he played and the melodic guitar licks?’ Some of us would say unreservedly yes we can and dispute those comments but Mick remains adamant. ‘No, you can remember a lot of scales and arpeggios. It’s like, okay, great but where’s the soul, heart and the feel? Where is the hook or the memorable thing that I can hum when I go out of here?’, asks Mick, emphasising what he regards as the most notable aspects to a good live act. Accepting that he may have a point, Mick was probably easier for producers to cope with in terms of guitar noodling intricacies than his 1980’s shred-tastic contemporaries. Not missing a beat, Mick piped up, ‘Yeah, they all went to G.I.T., [whereas] the guys and I [in Motley] went to ‘me’. They all went to me’, he says, with a wry laugh. That is Motley Crue’s assured attitude, brimming with self confidence and still as subtle as a brick.
Returning from Orbit over the Wild Side
When it comes to milking the celebrity spotlight, abusing illicit substances, being objectionable both on and off stage and using groupies as a string of disposable toys, the soap opera of these Beverly Hills inhabiting rock stars is beyond the good taste of most family friendly publications. Even the comparatively unassuming guitarist had a substantial battle with alcohol before getting himself clean, years back. But, their undying self confidence was reinforced following the massive success of Dr. Feelgood. Of course that was a long time ago and when further along the track, the egos strained from the exhausting and self destructive touring lifestyles of Motley, most punters were looking to cash in their d.o.a. bets on the probable demise. But, it seems nothing can kill Motley Crue, even themselves.
Knowing rehab was ultimately only up to himself, Mick obtained a clearer state of mind on his own terms despite having ongoing problems with arthritis and associated painkillers. Asked about the latest album effectively being a soundtrack to The Dirt, Mick comments that it is ‘very loosely based on it.’ He continues, saying it refers to, ‘some of the things that all of us [in Motley Crue] have gone through, like banging some chick or something and waking up in the bed thinking, ‘well, who the hell is this?’ Ah, drinking too much and the excess of everything, so it is kind of loosely based on that. It gives the fans a little of going out and getting in trouble in Los Angeles in places like The Whiskey. Getting into fights and stuff like that.’
Obviously, most people cannot survive and function within a band unit daily if they continue to drink bottles of whiskey. ‘Hmmm, no, that don’t work’, he says, laughing. ‘Yeah, it got to having to stop to get down to business.’ Getting sober for Dr Feelgood was a massive success. A similar united approach to the latest album appears evident as Mick points out, ‘I think the majority of us are sober. One member was or is still drinking, maybe two. I can speak for myself and I don’t make accusations either but I don’t do anything like drinking or drugging whatsoever or huffing paint or anything like that. My new drug is my guitar. It is an old drug but my new drug because I’ve gotten more into it’, says Mick, chortling knowingly.
Some musicians are convinced their creativity is only available through drugs with inspiration coming through substance abuse. Others are smart enough to know being clean and sober finds a new creativity. Still, Mick offers a slight contention on that, though with no interest to returning to a drugged out path. ‘Sometimes, when I would get high, it definitely opened up things. This is going to sound weird and screwed up but when you drink or do drugs or use something else it definitely does open up a part of your brain that you wouldn’t think would think of a way to write a song or a part of creativity. But then being sober is the opposite because you can think of other stuff but I don’t know how to explain it. I prefer being sober so that I can remember what I am doing’, he comments, with substantial hindsight. Regardless of state of mind, a guitarist could break a string and come up with a bizarre riff if they keep playing. Mick responds enthused. ‘Ooh yeah, that’s exactly it and I do that a lot. Last tour I broke a couple of strings at a time and I just kept playing. Then, I knew where I was going and I knew what I was doing. Yeah, that attitude is definitely an advantage.’
Addendum: Check out Mick Mars’ single •Right Side of Wrong• (release December 2023)