Motley Crue drummer Tommy Lee believes the rockers are “closer now than we’ve ever been” after 45 years together.
The band – which formed in 1981 – is still going strong after more than four decades and Tommy has compared their lengthy relationship to a marriage because they’ve had their highs and lows and come out stronger than ever,
In an interview with YouTube star Bonnie Laufer, Tommy explained: “Well, like any good brotherhood or marriage or whatever you wanna call it, we have our moments, of course.
“The one thing that is very exciting for us is new guitarist] John 5. With all due respect to [original guitarist] Mick Mars, when [John 5] came in, he lit a fire under everybody.
“It was just this new energy, new fire. So I can tell you that that’s been really inspirational. And we feed off that- we all feed off that. So, we’re actually closer now than we’ve ever been.”
When asked how they have managed to stay together for 45 years, Tommy told the host: “I don’t know, sweetheart. I pinch myself on a daily basis. Truly.
“The fact that we’re all still here doing this, and our fans are so awesome. They’ve stuck with us. We’re all very fortunate and blessed because this doesn’t happen very often. It just doesn’t.”
Tommy went on to reveal he still tries to make their old hits sound different every time he plays them.
He explained: “If you’re out there and you’re rehearsing or, whatever, or you’re performing, I’m always looking for some way to update it. I would play it differently now than I did when we recorded it.
“So I’m always constantly pushing the band to, like: ‘Let’s do a new version of this,’ even though some people wanna hear the original version.
“But I don’t know, it inspires me to keep things fresh, because I don’t know if people understand.
“You got these guys that are playing these songs and then playing ’em the same way over and over and over and thousands and thousands of times, we as artists, we gotta keep it fresh too. There’s nothing worse than watching a band phone it in.”