BRET MICHAELS Doesn't Know Why NIKKI SIXX Keeps Saying 'Negative Stuff' About POISON

Bret Michaels says that he doesn't understand why MTLEY CRE bassist Nikki Sixx continues to say "negative stuff" about the POISON singer and insists that the two bands could have "a great tour" if Sixx and his bandmates would just "put [their personal] feelings aside."

When asked by The Birmingham News if MTLEY CRE and POISON even like each other considering everything that has been said between the two camps in the past, Michaels said, "I want to make it very clear. I'm not a grudge guy, ever. They have said a lot of negative stuff about POISON. [MTLEY CRE singer] Vince [Neil] has toured with me and we've ridden motorcycles together. Nikki and [drummer] Tommy [Lee] have said a lot of negative things about a lot of people, and I was one of them.

"I don't know what the rhyme or reason is," Michaels continued. "I like some of their music. Fans want the [upcoming MTLEY CRE and POISON] tour [which is scheduled to kick off on June 7]. I think it could be a great tour for fans if we could just put our feelings aside. I think we can have a great time.

Michaels recently responded to Sixx's "trash-talking," insisting that the MTLEY CRE bassist did, in fact, apologize to the POISON singer for saying "a lot of bad crap" about Bret's band.

In an interview with The Arizona Republic, Michaels claimed that Sixx said he was "really sorry" about some negative comments his MTLEY CRE bandmates made about POISON. A few days later, Sixx took to his personal Twitter page in order to "clarify" that he never apologized to Bret for derogatory statements that MTLEY made about POISON, explaining that what he did say was "I personally never had anything against you guys as a people but MTLEY just sorta thought you sucked as band but let's give the fans what they want and go out and have a good time."

During an interview with Michaels on May 18, AOL's Noisecreep asked the rocker if he felt comfortable commenting on the recent Sixx mudslinging.

"No, I love it and I hope you can help me put this to rest," Michaels said. "I'm going to be very blunt and honest. When my career started, Nikki and I hung out and I remember telling him there were some CRE songs that I absolutely liked I took a positive approach to things. You can look back at old photos me and Nikki with our Harley's. We used to ride together because we had a house down the street from each other. At the time, both of our careers had just started and our records had hit. We would go out and party together, I would even join the CRE on stage and sing. Everything was great.

"Now at one point I think it was in the mid-'90s POISON and BON JOVI were playing the arenas. Our 'Native Tongue' album [1993] had sold a million copies and BON JOVI's album, 'Keep The Faith' [1992], was at about 1.5 million or something and at one point in the middle there, MTLEY CRE changed singers all this stuff."

"That's around the period when Nikki decided to brand his band differently," Michaels continued. "What confused me about that time period was when Nikki said that Vince [Neil, CRE singer] and I were kind of ridiculous. Now these are his words, 'You and Vince are kind of the same you don't really pick and choose your fans, you just kind of go out and play music.' Well, I thought that's what music was about. I didn't know I was supposed to decide which fan can like or not like my music.

"I did Nikki's radio show about two months ago and it was an absolutely great day. We talked about the tour and everything was cool. Now on the show he says to me, 'Bret, man, what's going on? Let's take a picture together,' and so on. We also did all of this television press for the tour in Los Angeles together and everything was great.

"He even apologized to me and said, 'I sort of said a lot of bad crap about you guys, but you're actually a relevant band,' and he went in and said some other good stuff about a month ago. I got a text from Nikki two weeks ago saying, 'Hey bro, excited to see you on the road!' But then all of a sudden, out of nowhere, I hear about him talking trash about us again. I can't keep up [laughts]!"

Read more of Noisecreep's interview with Michaels at this location.