MIKKEY DEE: LEMMY Was 'Probably The Most Intelligent Guy' I Have Known

In a new interview with Get On The Bus, veteran Swedish hard rock and heavy metal drummer Mikkey Dee, who landed the job as the drummer for SCORPIONS in 2016 after spending almost 25 years as a member of MOTÖRHEAD, reflected on his time with the Ian "Lemmy" Kilmister-fronted outfit. He said (as transcribed by BLABBERMOUTH.NET): "[Lemmy was] probably the most intelligent guy I know or [have] known. Here's a man that I describe as my father, my grandfather, my younger brother, even my younger sister sometimes. He was so simple and so easy to deal with because you already know, which made it hard and easy. And I have to explain that because… I was very much involved with the band — we all were equally involved — but if I had something, I had to go… I was maybe more involved with the business. Business came to me. I went to the boys, and the boys came to me, 'Oh, can you talk to' whatever? So I was kind of in the middle a little bit. And I asked Lemmy something, and I already [knew] exactly what he would say. It was frustrating sometimes because if I thought he was wrong, because he was so simple in a way and he wouldn't compromise himself or the music or MOTÖRHEAD, and that's why we were what we were. But sometimes it was frustrating. We thought that we were right — sometimes we were right, sometimes we were wrong."

He continued: "I'll give you an idea. Long story short, we were in U.S. in full recording [mode], and we got offered to fly to Argentina for one show, and it was a very, very important show because it would've given us some really great festivals. And we got offered X amount of money, and we tried to scale [our production] down. We were gonna have drums supplied down there, Marshall stacks, fly [with] as little as we could and not bring in the full crew from all over the world. And I came to Lemmy and Lemmy said, 'Absolutely no.' And I go, 'Oh, come on. We can't afford to fly all our shit, bring in the whole crew. We're gonna lose hundreds of thousands of dollars here.' And I was on him and on him, and he got irritated about this, and I gave him reasons why we should do this. And he just gave me one reason, and he said, 'What's the fucking point, Mikkey, to go to Argentina and be MOTÖRHEAD and not sound like MOTÖRHEAD?' And I go, 'You know what, Lem? You're totally right. Let's not do it.' He won that one."

Dee went on to say that he appreciated and respected Lemmy's "simplicity". He explained: "You've probably seen in documentaries how he lived. He lived very simple, very tight. He had a million things [at his home]. You couldn't even get into his… You had a little trail like that. You look at some of these hoarder people. Lemmy had cool stuff, but it was so much, you could barely walk in there. And I said, 'Lem, why don't you get a three-, four-bedroom house instead?' He goes, 'What's the point, Mikkey? You can only be in one room at a time anyway.' [Laughs] How do you beat these one-liners? He was fantastic there. Like what he said, 'If you think you're too old for rock and roll, then you are.' Simple, straight, no bullshit, and that made him who he was. And I keep saying if everybody was like Lem, we wouldn't have any wars, we wouldn't have all this political correctness, all this bullshit that's suffocating humanity today. He was in for the fun and for the real rock and roll."

Lemmy died on December 28, 2015 at the age of 70 shortly after learning he had been diagnosed with cancer.

MOTÖRHEAD had to cancel a number of shows in 2015 because of Lemmy's poor health, although the band did manage to complete the aforementioned European tour a couple of weeks before his death.

In June 2020, it was announced that Lemmy would get the biopic treatment. The upcoming film, "Lemmy", will be directed by Greg Olliver, who previously helmed the 2010 documentary of the same name, "Lemmy".

A custom-made urn containing Lemmy's ashes is on permanent display in a columbarium at Forest Lawn Cemetery in Hollywood, California.

Back in May 2021, Dee told the "Waste Some Time With Jason Green" video podcast that Lemmy refused to quit touring in the weeks leading up to his death, even when his health was clearly deteriorating.

"We played the last show the 11th of December [of 2015] in Berlin, and he passed just [two] weeks later," Mikkey recalled. "And that tells you, the guy died with his boots on. And both me and Phil [Campbell, MOTÖRHEAD guitarist] were trying to talk him out of starting the second part of the European tour after Christmas. But there was no way in hell we could do that. And I said to Phil, 'Look, instead of arguing with Lemmy or pushing him not to do this,' because we said maybe we should break for a couple of months for him to catch his wind, basically. I said, 'Let's not push him anyway. Let him decide what he wants to do. He knows best what he wants to do.' And he wanted to be on stage. So we said, 'Let's just support him instead,' and that's what we did. But we never made it to the second leg of that European tour, unfortunately. It was the U.K. that was on the next part of it, I remember that."

Asked if he knew when he came home to Sweden that it would probably be the end for Lemmy, Mikkey said: "No. Not at all. Because I talked to Lemmy after that show in Berlin. We were all gonna go separate ways, obviously. I was gonna just fly out to Sweden, and Phil went back home to Wales. Lemmy was flying back to L.A., but I believe he was gonna fly to London and stay one night or two or so and say hi to friends and then fly back home. And I spoke to him right after the show. I went down to Lemmy's dressing room, and I said, 'All right. Go back to L.A. and figure out, maybe, another two songs from [MOTÖRHEAD's final album] 'Bad Magic' that you think that we should do. And we take out the two songs that we already played on this leg, and we put in two new songs from the record.' And he said, 'Yeah. All right. I'll check that out.' And I said, 'Let's hook up after Christmas.' Because it was the 11th of December at that time, and I figured we'd talk between Christmas and New Year's Eve and decide which two songs that we agreed on on playing on that next leg. And he said, 'Yeah, I'll go back and work on that.' And that was it. He had no intention of not coming back to Europe and touring. So we did a little finger hook, as we always did, and that was the last time I saw him, actually. Very sad."

Dee went on to say that Lemmy had made some changes in his life to improve his health after dealing with several issues over the last few years of his life, including heart trouble. "But my personal belief is that it was maybe a little too late," he said. "He should have maybe changed a little earlier. But knowing Lemmy, he was not for that. He was doing it his way or the highway, basically. And that made him to what he was. He never compromised with his music, he never compromised with friendship, he never compromised with what way he was gonna go for anyone else in that way, which is why MOTÖRHEAD was MOTÖRHEAD, and still is MOTÖRHEAD. But with that said, of course, the three of us were talking a lot about stuff, and it was not like he was some kind of a boss here. But we all worked so good together, and that's what created the magic, I would say."

Image credit: Sonor