Encounter: Lemmy

Tweet

emailprint

Lemmy

Robert John

THE SUN IS STILL SHINING on L.A.'s Sunset Strip as Lemmy Kilmister takes his favorite spot at the bar of the Rainbow Bar & Grill. Sipping from a glass, he feeds dollars into a machine to play games of trivia and chance like Clock Teaser, a quiz about women and nature. At 67, the Motörhead frontman looks just as he always has: black cavalry hat with gold insignia, prominent warts and mutton chops, embroidered cowboy boots. But that’s Diet Coke in his glass, not Jack Daniel’s. And while the jokes roll out easily in his distinctive British rasp, he sounds like a man who’s still recovering from a gut punch.

This is Lemmy’s first visit back to the Rainbow in six months. The last time was before a bout of heart trouble and bruising last summer forced Motörhead off the road for the first time in years. “There is nothing weirder than having everything you are taken from you in one day – bingo,” he says. Now he rides an exercise bike every day at his new condo nearby. His drinking has slowed to a trickle, and the two packs of Marlboro Reds he used to smoke each day are down to one or two cigarettes a day. “Let’s face it – it isn’t as much fun,” says Lemmy. “But it can’t be as much fun if I die. I don’t believe that’s much fun, either.”

This is an extract. To read the full story, pick up a copy of Rolling Stone Middle East

Tweet

emailprint