Motley Crue Member Didn’t Play On Biggest Hits?

Producer Bob Rock recently confirmed that he’s recorded three new songs with Motley Crue & John 5 on lead guitars. He also shared an interesting bit of information about the band’s bassist Nikki Sixx.

Bob rock opens up on Nikki Sixx

News that Motley was entering the studio with Rock came last month, even as the back-and-forth caused by Mick Mars’s bombshell lawsuit went on and the status of John 5, who was originally brought in as a touring replacement following Mars’s retirement last October, was still unclear.

The addition of John 5 seems to have elevated the Crue’s spirits and got their creative juices flowing again, and Bob Rock tells Fozzy’s Chris Jericho in a recent interview on the latter’s “Talk is Jericho” podcast that the recording process went swimmingly (transcription via Blabbermouth):

“It was so amazing. It was just the best time — so easy. It was really easy.”

Of course, Rock is no stranger to working with the Crüe, as in addition to producing works of other rock greats such as Metallica and Bon Jovi, he also enjoys a long and fruitful relationship with Mötley Crüe that dates back to 1989’s “Dr. Feelgood”, on which he is also credited as the bass player on “Time for Change” and background vocalist on a number of other tracks.

Reflecting on one particular situation involving Nikki Sixx during the recording process behind “Dr. Feelgood”, Rock said:

“[While we were making 1989’s] ‘Dr. Feelgood’, [Nikki] says to me, ‘I don’t think I ever played on any of the Mötley Crüe records. I think somebody came in at night and replaced all my parts.’ He says, ‘So I don’t really know how to play bass.’

“And I said, ‘Too bad. You’re playing bass on it.’ So I worked with him through ‘Dr. Feelgood’, did a lot of edits and made him play every note.”

The iconic producer then went on to compare Sixx’s bass playing on the soundtrack for Mötley’s 2019 biopic “The Dirt”, which also saw contributions from John 5. He said:

“But when we did ‘The Dirt’ [soundtrack], the songs on ‘The Dirt’, I went to see him and we started working on the demos. He picked up the bass and started playing, and I said, ‘Woah, woah, woah. What’s going on here?’ He had been taking bass lessons for five years.

“All of a sudden he’s an amazing bass player. And I think that’s so cool, in that point of his career, he wanted to be better. I admire that. So now, on ‘The Dirt’, Nikki and Tommy [Lee] played live off the floor, both of them.”

Source: alternativenation.net