JOHN 5 Is 'Super Excited' About Setlist For MÖTLEY CRÜE's Summer 2026 Tour

MÖTLEY CRÜE guitarist John 5 has revealed that he's a big fan of playing deep cuts while in rehearsal with the band, even going as far as namechecking tracks from the much maligned "Generation Swine". The shredder also doubled down on why he doesn't deviate from original guitar player Mick Mars's parts while performing with the band. He made his comments while chatting to Eonmusic about his May 2026 European solo tour.

Speaking about how important it is for him to play the MÖTLEY CRÜE songs exactly as they were recorded, John 5 said: "Yeah, it's our childhood, you know? Those solos are embedded in our brains, and I wanted to play them just like how they were written, just how Mick wrote those solos. I wanted to play them because they're perfect. You can't change them. It just is not right if you change them, because they're burned in my brain and your brain like that, so I just wanted to play them just like how they were written. It's just like if you see a piece of sheet music, and you're doing a session and you're reading, you're playing, and you're, like, 'That doesn't really work', and change this like that. No, you don't do that — you play how it was written. And yeah, those solos are perfect. So I love it, and it puts a smile on my face every time I walk on that stage."

On the possibility of new material from MÖTLEY CRÜE, John 5 said: "I don't know what's going to happen after the tour. I don't know what's planned. I have no idea, but I just love being a part of it. So they just let me know what's going to happen. But right now, there's nothing planned, unfortunately."

When asked by Eonmusic if he'd like to play songs from the 1994 John Corabi-fronted album, or 1997's "Generation Swine", he replied: "Every time at rehearsal, I'll play 'Red Hot', I'll play 'Ten Seconds Of Love', 'Bastard', 'Take Me To The Top', 'Louder Than Hell', 'Glitter', 'Generation Swine', anything. I'll play all these songs all the time, and it's so fun. I love it. I love it. Love it, love it, love it."

He also insinuated that MÖTLEY CRÜE's setlist might change for the band's upcoming tour, though was tight lipped on whether any of the above songs might make it into the set.

"We're going to hit the road this summer, and I don't want to reveal what the setlist is, but it's exciting, so I'm super excited," he said.

MÖTLEY CRÜE's upcoming "The Return Of Carnival Of Sins" tour will celebrate the 20th anniversary of CRÜE's groundbreaking 2005-2006 "Carnival Of Sins" tour and the 45th anniversary of the band. The 33-city Live Nation-produced trek will kick off on July 17, 2026 in Burgettstown, Pennsylvania at the Pavilion at Star Lake and will feature support acts EXTREME and TESLA.

In a recent interview with Jon Smith of the 103.5 The Arrow radio station, MÖTLEY CRÜE bassist Nikki Sixx stated a possible setlist for "The Return Of Carnival Of Sins": "Obviously, we know the fans wanna hear the hits. And I hate it when a band goes out and doesn't play their hits. I remember [David] Bowie doing that, and he was one of my favorite artists. I was, like, I don't wanna go hear a bunch of C and D tracks off of records that I love. I wanna hear those songs, like 'Rebel Rebel', and at that point he was, like, 'I'm so tired of playing the same songs.' We're not tired of playing those hits, but we are excited about getting into a setlist and diving into some songs that we maybe never played or haven't played in a long time and shaking it up. And those type of things, if you're playing a song like 'On With The Show' from the first album, that's gonna dictate a lot of what production looks like. So, for us it's this moving creative ball of energy. It's super exciting."

In a separate interview with WMMS, Sixx indicated that setlist changes for "The Return Of Carnival Of Sins" were possible.

"A big part of the conversation is like, you know, obviously the fans want to hear the hits," he said. "But also, what can we bring in there [that fans haven't heard as much]? Like, there's so many cool songs."

"At some point here, we're going to get an opportunity to ask the fans, actually, what they [are interested in hearing]," he added. "We can kind of pick and choose through that and salt and pepper our set with some, you know, [deeper] songs. We just did the Vegas residency, and we've been playing 'On With The Show' and it's such a fun song. Some of these songs are really fun that not everybody knows. You know, 'Live Wire' was a breakout off our first record. There's a lot of people [who] didn't get into MÖTLEY CRÜE until 'Girls, Girls, Girls' or 'Dr. Feelgood'. They might have heard a couple tracks [from the earlier years]. So when you play something like 'On With The Show' and 'Starry Eyes', [it makes an impression].

"We haven't figured out the setlist, because the setlist will also dictate some things that we do with the show," he explained. "[But] we're really excited. This is the fun part for us. There's two parts, the creation of something that we're really excited to do, and then [we can't wait] to get it out there and play it for the fans."

MÖTLEY CRÜE said that $1 from every ticket sold for "The Return Of Carnival Of Sins" will be donated to ASAP! (After School Arts Program) through the Mötley Crüe Giveback Initiative to fund hands-on arts programs for young people.

MÖTLEY CRÜE's Las Vegas residency launched on September 12, 2025 and at Dolby Live at Park MGM and ran through October 3, 2025. The shows had initially been set for spring 2025 but were rescheduled after frontman Vince Neil revealed he had suffered a stroke around Christmas 2024.

In September 2025, Vince revealed that he had actually had a series of strokes before he suffered the "big one" in his sleep 2024 Christmas night, rendering him unable to get out of bed when he woke up the next day.

When MÖTLEY CRÜE originally postponed the Las Vegas residency, the band said it was because Neil needed a "medical procedure," but offered no further details.