MOTÖRHEAD's LEMMY: 'I've Been Listening To EVANESCENCE A Lot'

StayThirstyMedia.com recently conducted an interview with MOTÖRHEAD's Lemmy Kilmister. A couple of excerpts from the chat follow:

StayThirstyMedia.com: Tell me a little about your relationship with THE RAMONES. (Lemmy wrote a song called "R.A.M.O.N.E.S" for the band, and performed it with them at their last show in 1996).

Lemmy: I met them back in 1977 when they came to England, actually I think it was 1976. I just fell in well with Joey and Dee Dee, you know. Johnny wasn't so friendly but then he never was. The other two I got on really well with. And, terrible they're all gone. I couldn't believe it. I mean, Johnny and Dee went within seven months of each other? Ridiculous. Bang, bang, bang, they're all gone. I think they kind of died when Dee Dee left, you know, in a way. I think that crippled Joey, because he had no buddies in the band then.

StayThirstyMedia.com: You had the strongest personal relationship with Joey, right?

Lemmy: Yeah, I guess. Well, Dee Dee as well, you know. But Dee Dee was … you didn't always get much from Dee Dee because he was kind of busy in his head. He was very damaged, you know, Dee Dee, damaged goods. So there was always that baggage he was carrying around with him, you know. I never really got the thought that he was ever happy, that he had the opportunity to be happy with his life. Did you read that book, "Poison Heart"? (Dee Dee's autobiography). It was awful, the bitterness. That's what his whole life was about.

StayThirstyMedia.com: When's the last time you played in the States?

Lemmy: Two years ago. It wasn't a big tour. On our own we don't sell a lot of tickets. And we don't sell albums, you know. People got their head up their ass about us.

StayThirstyMedia.com: It doesn't seem like people buy albums at all anymore.

Lemmy: Well, they don't listen to them, you know. I think if they listen to them they might buy them but they don't. You can't do nothing about that. Just keep playing for the people who do listen to them.

StayThirstyMedia.com: And most fans don't start out buying records. They listen to their parents' records or their friends'.

Lemmy: Well, it's alright for you, but when I was growing up and I wanted to listen to a record, my parents had "The Pirates of Penzance"! So you kind of made your own amusement, you know what I mean?

StayThirstyMedia.com: Do you listen to contemporary music?

Lemmy: Yeah, sometimes, not as much as I did. I've been listening to EVANESCENCE a lot, I think they're fucking excellent. Excellent production, excellent songs, excellent arrangement. The girl's got a great voice, you know. And I don't even fancy her, which is a big part of girl singers, you know what I mean? I think they're just great. I went to see them in Vegas.

StayThirstyMedia.com: Do you think newer bands like EVANESCENCE give kids as much to look up to as bands like MOTÖRHEAD?

Lemmy: Kids will work it out. Kids are always going to like rock n' roll. You can't stop them. They've been trying to since 1958. You can't stop them. No matter how much schmaltzy crap they put out, whatever's on the charts. Hip hop now is a joke, and rock n' roll will always rear up again. It always has, in some form or another.

Read the entire interview at StayThirstyMedia.com.