Motley Crue's Vince Neil is Finally Bored With Boobs

Photo by Paul BrownWhile listening to Mötley Crüe’s just-released Greatest Hits album—their fifth, if you’re counting—you should expect to experience a wide range of seemingly conflicting emotions. During the first few cuts, you’ll likely be smirking. “Seriously?” you’ll wonder aloud. “Does anybody over the age of 16 enjoy glam cock rock anymore? Even ironically?” But somewhere around the middle of “Shout at the Devil,” you may catch yourself smiling, as the song makes you think about that kid in the fifth grade who drew pentagrams on his notebooks and taught you how to make rock horns. You’ll hum along to “Smokin’ In The Boys Room,” not because you like the song, necessarily, but because the melody was drilled into your brain back when MTV still played videos. And then “Home Sweet Home” kicks in, and you’ll be like “Oh my god, I totally remember that video,” and then you’ll Google it just to make sure it was as beautifully retarded as you remember. You’ll sing along with the chorus of “Girls, Girls, Girls,” repeating lyrics that you never realized you knew. (“Girls, girls, girls! Long legs and burgundy lips!” Wait, what?) You’ll break out a little air-guitar for “Dr. Feelgood,” which as it turns out is a muscle memory. By the second verse of “Same Ol’ Situation,” you’ll be on your feet, dancing across the room with all the glam-cock-rock swagger you can muster, maybe even flashing your tits to a nonexistent band. And guess what? You won’t be doing it ironically.Don’t worry, there’s nothing wrong with you. That’s why Mötley Crüe puts out so many Greatest Hits albums. So that adults with dignity and a healthy sense of cynicism can have yet another opportunity to remind themselves what it feels like to be an unabashed, power-chord-loving idiot. I called Vince Neil, the Crüe’s longtime frontman, to ask how a band can survive and even flourish for almost three decades when their creative aesthetic can essentially be boiled down to “Hooray for boobies!”Eric Spitznagel: Why put out another Greatest Hits album?Vince Neil: I don’t know. I honestly have no idea. (Laughs.) I didn’t put it out. Our management company did.