Ian Fraser Kilmister (24 December 1945 – 28 December 2015), better known as Lemmy Kilmister or simply Lemmy, was a British musician. He was the founder, lead singer, bassist and primary songwriter of the rock band Motörhead, of which he was the only continuous member, and a member of Hawkwind from 1971 to 1975.
A foundational force in the genre following the advent of the new wave of British heavy metal, Lemmy was known for his appearance, which included his signature friendly mutton chops, his military-influenced fashion sense and his gravelly rasp of a voice. It was once declared "one of the most recognisable voices in rock".[1] He was also noted for his unique posture when singing, which was once described as "looking up towards a towering microphone tilted down into his weather-beaten face".[2] He was also known for his bass playing style, using his Rickenbacker bass to create an "overpowered, distorted rhythmic rumble".[2] A notable aspect of his bass sound was his guitar-like riffing, often playing power chords using heavily overdriven tube stacks by Marshall.
Lemmy continued to record and tour regularly with Motörhead until his death on 28 December 2015 in Los Angeles, where he had lived since 1990. He was diagnosed with prostate cancer two days before his death. Alongside his music career, he had minor roles and cameos in film and television. He was known for his hard-living, road-driven lifestyle, which included chain-smoking and daily consumption of large amounts of alcohol and amphetamine.
Early life
Lemmy was born Ian Fraser Kilmister in the Burslem area of Stoke-on-Trent on 24 December 1945.[4][5] When he was three months old, his father, an ex-Royal Air Force chaplain and concert pianist,[6] separated from his mother. He moved with his mother and grandmother to nearby Newcastle-under-Lyme, then to Madeley.[7] When Ian was 10, his mother married former rugby player George L. Willis, who already had two older children from a previous marriage, Patricia and Tony, whom Ian disliked. They later moved to a farm in the Welsh village of Benllech, with Lemmy commenting that "funnily enough, being the only English kid among 700 Welsh ones didn't make for the happiest time, but it was interesting from an anthropological point of view".[8] He attended Ysgol Syr Thomas Jones, a comprehensive school in Amlwch, where he was nicknamed "Lemmy."[9] It was later suggested by some that the name originated from the phrase "lemmy [lend me] a quid 'til Friday" because of his alleged habit of borrowing money from people to play slot machines,[7][10][11][12] although Lemmy himself said that he did not know the origin of the name.[13] He soon started to show an interest in rock and roll, girls, motorbikes and horses.
At school, Lemmy noticed a pupil who had brought a guitar to school and had been "surrounded by chicks." His mother had a guitar, which he then took to school, and was himself surrounded by girls even though he could not play. By the time he left school, he had moved with his family to Conwy. He went on to work several odd jobs, including one at the local Hotpoint electric appliance factory, while also playing guitar for local bands such as the Sundowners and spending time at a horse-riding school.[7] He saw the Beatles perform at the Cavern Club in Liverpool when he was 16, and then learned to play along on guitar to their first album Please Please Me. He also admired the sarcastic attitude of the group, particularly that of John Lennon,[14] and later said of the group, "Brian Epstein cleaned them up for mass consumption, but they were anything but sissies. They were from Liverpool ... a hard, sea-farin' town, all these dockers and sailors around all the time who would beat the piss out of you if you so much as winked at them. ... The Rolling Stones were the mummy's boys—they were all college students from the outskirts of London. ... The Stones made great records, but they were always shit on stage, whereas the Beatles were the gear."[15]
Career
1960–1970: Early years
Lemmy playing bass and singing, with his trademark high microphone position
In Stockport, Lemmy joined local bands the Rainmakers and then the Motown Sect who played northern clubs for three years. In 1965, he joined The Rockin' Vickers[16] who signed a deal with CBS, released three singles and toured Europe, reportedly being the first British band to visit the Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia. The Rockin' Vickers moved to Manchester, where they shared a flat together.[7]
Leaving the Rockin' Vickers, Lemmy moved to London in 1967. He shared a flat with Noel Redding, bassist of the Jimi Hendrix Experience, and with Neville Chesters, their road manager. He got a job as a roadie for the band.[1] In 1968, he joined the psychedelic rock band Sam Gopal under the name Ian Willis and recorded the album Escalator which was released in 1969.[17] After meeting Simon King at a shopping centre in Chelsea in 1969, he joined the band Opal Butterfly, but the group soon disbanded, having failed to raise enough interest with their singles.[7]
Lemmy in 1974 in St. Louis, USA Hawkwind Hall of the Mountain Grill tour (his last with the band)
In August 1971, Lemmy joined the space rock band Hawkwind, who were based in Ladbroke Grove, London, as a bassist and vocalist. He had no previous experience as a bass guitarist, and was cajoled into joining immediately before a benefit gig in Notting Hill by bandmate Michael "Dik Mik" Davies, to have two members who enjoyed amphetamine.[18] Lemmy states that he originally auditioned for Hawkwind as a guitarist, but on the morning of the Notting Hill gig, they decided not to get another guitarist. By chance, the bass player did not show up and left his equipment in the van. He often said, "Their bass player was pretty much saying 'please steal my gig!' So I stole his gig." Lemmy quickly developed a distinctive style that was strongly shaped by his early experience as a rhythm guitarist, often using double stops and chords rather than the single note lines preferred by most bassists. His bass work was a distinctive part of the Hawkwind sound during his tenure, perhaps best documented on the double live album Space Ritual. He also provided the lead vocals on several songs, including the band's biggest UK chart single, "Silver Machine", which reached #3 in 1972.
In May 1975, during a North American tour, Lemmy was arrested at the Canadian border in Windsor, Ontario, on drug possession charges. The border police mistook the amphetamine he was carrying for cocaine and he was kept overnight in jail before being released without charge. The band and management were concerned that his arrest might stop the band from crossing back into the United States, even though he had been released without charge. They were also tired of what they saw as his erratic behaviour, so they decided to fire him.[19][20]
He once said of Hawkwind: "I did like being in Hawkwind, and I believe I'd still be playing with them today if I hadn't been kicked out. It was fun onstage, not so much offstage. They didn't want to mesh with me. Musically, I loved the drummer, the guitar player. It was a great band.” [21]
After Hawkwind, Lemmy formed a new band called "Bastard" with guitarist Larry Wallis (former member of the Pink Fairies, Steve Peregrin Took's band Shagrat and UFO) and drummer Lucas Fox. Lemmy and Took were friends, and Took was the stepfather to Lemmy's son Paul. When his manager informed him that a band by the name of "Bastard" would never get a slot on Top of the Pops, Lemmy changed the band's name to "Motörhead" – the title of the last song he had written for Hawkwind.[22]
Soon after, Wallis and Fox were replaced with guitarist "Fast" Eddie Clarke and drummer Phil "Philthy Animal" Taylor and with this line-up, the band began to achieve success. Lemmy's guttural vocals were unique in rock at that time, and were copied during the time when punk rock became popular.[citation needed] The band's sound appealed to Lemmy's original fans and, eventually, to fans of punk. Lemmy asserted that he generally felt more kinship with punks than with metalheads; he even played with the Damned for a handful of gigs when they had no regular bassist.[23] Motörhead's success peaked in 1980 and 1981 with several UK chart hits, including the single "Ace of Spades," which remained a crowd favourite throughout the band's career, and the UK #1 live album No Sleep 'til Hammersmith.[24] Motörhead became one of the most influential bands in the heavy metal genre. Their – and Lemmy's – final live performance was in Berlin, Germany, on 11 December 2015 during the band's 40th Anniversary Tour.[25]
Personal life
At the age of 17, Lemmy met a holidaying girl named Cathy. He followed her to Stockport, where she gave birth to his son Sean, who was put up for adoption.[7] In the 2010 documentary film Lemmy, he mentioned having a son whose mother had only recently reconnected with him and "hadn't got the heart to tell him who his father was." Later, during his time with The Rockin' Vickers, he slept with a woman in Manchester named Tracy; she had a son, Paul Inder, whom Lemmy met six years later. As an adult, Inder became a guitarist and occasionally joined Lemmy on stage.[7]
Lemmy lived in Los Angeles from 1990 until his death in 2015, his last residence being a two-room apartment two blocks away from his favourite hangout, the Rainbow Bar and Grill.[26]
In the 2005 Channel 4 documentary Motörhead: Live Fast, Die Old, it was claimed that Lemmy had slept with over 2,000 women. He later quipped, "I said more than 1,000; the magazine made 2,000 of it." Maxim had Lemmy at No. 8 on its top ten "Living Sex Legends" list, as they claimed that he had slept with around 1,200 women.[27] He is featured in the book Sex Tips from Rock Stars (2010) by Paul Miles.[28]
Dave Grohl, on his Probot website, describes musicians with whom he has worked. In his entry for Lemmy, he wrote:
We recorded [Lemmy's] track in Los Angeles in maybe two takes about a year and a half ago. Until then I'd never met what I'd call a real rock 'n' roll hero before. Fuck Elvis and Keith Richards, Lemmy's the king of rock 'n' roll—he told me he never considered Motörhead a metal band, he was quite adamant. Lemmy's a living, breathing, drinking and snorting fucking legend. No one else comes close.[29]
Lemmy was well known for his heavy drinking. The documentary Motörhead: Live Fast Die Old stated that he drank a bottle of Jack Daniel's every day and had done so since he was 30 years old.[30] In 2013, he stopped drinking Jack Daniel's for health reasons.[31] During his time with Hawkwind, he developed an addiction to amphetamine and LSD, particularly the former. Before joining Hawkwind, he recalled Dik Mik, a former Hawkwind sound technician, visiting his home in the middle of the night and taking amphetamines with him. They became interested in how long "you could make the human body jump about without stopping", which they did for a few months until Mik ran out of money and wanted to return to Hawkwind, taking Lemmy with him.[11]
I first got into speed because it was a utilitarian drug and kept you awake when you needed to be awake when otherwise you'd just be flat out on your back. If you drive to Glasgow for nine hours in the back of a sweaty truck you don't really feel like going onstage feeling all bright and breezy. [...] It's the only drug I've found that I can get on with, and I've tried them all – except smack [heroin] and morphine: I've never "fixed" [injected] anything.[11]
In November 2005, he was invited to the National Assembly for Wales as a guest speaker by Conservative member William Graham. He was asked to express his views on the detrimental effects of drugs and called for the legalisation of heroin. He stated that legalisation would eradicate the drug dealer from society and generate money from its taxation, however hard this would be to accept.[32]
Lemmy collected German military regalia; he had an Iron Cross emblazoned on his bass, which led to accusations of Nazi sympathies. He stated that he collected Nazi memorabilia because he liked the way it looked, and he considered himself an anarchist.[33][34] He spoke against racism many times. [35][36][37][38] Lemmy said he was against religion, government, and established authority.[39][40] In 2011, he identified as agnostic, saying: "I can find out when I die. I can wait. I'm not in a hurry."[41]Jeff Hanneman, the founder of the thrash metal band Slayer, befriended Lemmy due to their shared fondness for collecting Nazi memorabilia.[42] According to Keith Emerson's autobiography, Lemmy gave him two of his Hitler Youth knives during his time as a roadie for the Nice. Emerson used these knives many times as keyholders when playing the Hammond organ during concerts with The Nice and Emerson, Lake & Palmer before destroying them. Lemmy defended his collection by saying that if his then-girlfriend (who was black) had no problem with it, nobody else should.[40]
Illness and death
Lemmy performing in 2015
In December 2000, Lemmy's tour was cancelled when he was hospitalised in Italy with the flu, exhaustion, and a lung infection.[43] He was hospitalised with extreme dehydration and exhaustion in Germany in July 2005.[44] As he grew older, he consumed less alcohol and drugs because he suffered from diabetes and hypertension. In June 2013, it was reported that he had an implantable cardioverter-defibrillator fitted.[1] His tour was cancelled in July 2013 due to a severe haematoma.[45] He referred to his continuing drug use as "dogged insolence in the face of mounting opposition to the contrary".[40] Towards the end of his life, he had to use a walking stick.[46] He had started smoking at the age of 11.[47] In August 2015, he said he had cut down his smoking habit from two packs a day to one pack a week.[48] He was hospitalised with a lung infection in September 2015, after having breathing problems when performing onstage.[49]
On 28 December 2015, Lemmy died at his Los Angeles apartment from prostate cancer, cardiac arrhythmia, and congestive heart failure.[50][51][52] Motörhead announced his death on their official Facebook page later that day. According to the band, his cancer had only been diagnosed two days prior to his death.[53]
Lemmy's manager, Todd Singerman, later revealed:
He [Lemmy] gets home [from tour], we have a big birthday party for him at the Whisky a Go Go. His friends came down and played. Two days later I could tell he wasn't feeling good. So we took him to the hospital. They release him. Then after the brain scan, they found the cancer in his brain and his neck. The doctor comes with the result a couple of days later and says "It's terminal."[54]
Lemmy's doctor had given him between two and six months to live. Mikael Maglieri, owner of his nearby hangout Rainbow Bar and Grill, subsequently had a video game machine that Lemmy was fond of playing taken from the establishment and put in Lemmy's apartment so he could continue playing it from his bedside.[55] Although his manager had planned to keep the news private until his eventual death, Lemmy strongly encouraged him to make the diagnosis public in early 2016, but he died before a press release could be drafted.[55]
Funeral
Lemmy's memorial service took place at Forest Lawn Memorial Park, Hollywood Hills, on 9 January 2016.[1] The service was streamed live over YouTube with more than 230,000 people logging on to watch,[56] while others gathered at the Rainbow. His body was cremated following the funeral. His remains were placed in a 3D-printed urn shaped like his trademark cavalry hat and emblazoned with the slogan "Born to lose, lived to win".[57] The piece was on display during his funeral and was later interred at Forest Lawn.[58]
In March 2021, it was revealed that some of Lemmy's ashes were, by his own request, put into bullets and sent to his closest friends, including Whitfield Crane, Rob Halford, Michael Monroe, Doro Pesch and Riki Rachtman.[59][60] In August 2023, it was reported that some of Lemmy's ashes were also scattered into the mud at Wacken Open Air music festival.[61] In April 2024, it was reported James Hetfield got an Ace of Spades tattoo with some of Lemmy’s ashes in it. [62]
In 2005, the UK magazine Classic Rock presented Lemmy with its first "Living Legend" award.[67] In a 2013 interview with the magazine, Lemmy said he had never expected to make it to 30, but he spoke very pointedly about the future, indicating neither he nor the band was obsessing about the end:
Death is an inevitability, isn't it? You become more aware of that when you get to my age. I don't worry about it. I'm ready for it. When I go, I want to go doing what I do best. If I died tomorrow, I couldn't complain. It's been good.[68]
In February 2016, the Hollywood Vampires performed at the Grammy Award ceremony as a tribute to Lemmy.[69] On 11 June, Download Festival paid tribute to Lemmy by renaming the main stage the "Lemmy Stage", and in the slot where Motorhead were due to play, there was a video tribute to Lemmy in which they played his music and his peers talked about him.[70] On 17 November, Metallica released a tribute song titled "Murder One", named after Lemmy's frequently used amp. The song, from their album Hardwired... to Self-Destruct, depicts Lemmy's rise to fame. On 18 January 2017, Lemmy was inducted into the Hall of Heavy Metal History for being the creator of thrash metal.[71] In 2017, the extinct crocodile relative Lemmysuchus[72] was named after Lemmy.[73] On 14 November 2016, asteroid 243002 was officially named 243002 Lemmy,[74] complementing asteroid 250840 Motorhead, named after the band in 2014.[75]
In 2018, Hawkwind recorded a new acoustic version of Lemmy's "The Watcher" (originally recorded on Doremi Fasil Latido, 1972) on the album The Road to Utopia with production, arrangement and additional orchestrations by Mike Batt and a guest appearance from Eric Clapton.[76]
Collaborations
Lemmy worked with several musicians, apart from his Motörhead bandmates, over the course of his career. He wrote the song "R.A.M.O.N.E.S" for the Ramones, which he played in his live sets as a tribute to the band. He also produced a Ramones EP and an album for Warfare entitled Metal Anarchy in which Würzel guested on guitar, He was brought in as a songwriter for Ozzy Osbourne's 1991 No More Tears album, providing lyrics for the tracks "Hellraiser," (which Motörhead later recorded themselves and released as a single), "Desire," "I Don't Want to Change the World" and the single "Mama I'm Coming Home". Lemmy noted in several magazine and television interviews that he made more money from the royalties of that one song than he had in his entire time with Motörhead. After being diagnosed with Type 2 diabetes in 2000, for which he was hospitalised briefly, Lemmy again appeared with Motörhead at WrestleMania X-Seven playing WWE wrestler Triple H to the ring. Lemmy published his autobiography, White Line Fever, in November 2002. In 2005, Motörhead won their first Grammy in the Best Metal Performance category with their cover of Metallica's "Whiplash". In the same year he began recording an unreleased solo album titled Lemmy & Friends, which was intended to include a collaboration with Janet Jackson.[77]
Lemmy made appearances in film and television, including 1990 science fiction filmHardware and the 1987 comedy Eat the Rich, for which Motörhead also recorded the soundtracks including the title song. He appeared as himself in the 1986 The Comic Strip Presents... episode "More Bad News", along with fellow heavy metal musicians Ozzy Osbourne, the Scorpions and Def Leppard. In 1984, Motörhead were the musical guests on the TV show The Young Ones, in the episode "Bambi". He appears in the 1994 comedy Airheads (in which he is credited as "Lemmy von Motörhead").[79][80] Lemmy has a cameo in Ron Jeremy's 1994 pornographic film John Wayne Bobbitt Uncut as the discoverer of Bobbitt's severed penis. The appendage is thrown from the window of a moving car and lands at Lemmy's feet who exclaims: "Looks like a dick! Fucking hell! Ah well, it's not mine at least." The film's soundtrack also features the Motörhead song "Under the Knife".[81]
He was the main character in the 16-bit video game Motörhead, released for the Commodore Amiga and Atari ST in 1992.[88] Lemmy also appeared as an unlockable character in the 2009 game Guitar Hero: Metallica.[89] He also provided his voice for the 2009 video game Brütal Legend, voicing the Kill Master, a character designed and based on his surname and likeness.[90] Lemmy was also the inspiration for the Mario character Lemmy Koopa, who made his first appearance in Super Mario Bros. 3.[91] In the Victor VranDownloadable content "Motorhead Through The Ages", there is a new "Lemmy's Outfit" armour. The other Motörhead bandmates' armour is also available. As an easter egg, a holographic woman in the final level of 2020's DOOM Eternal proclaims, "Lemmy is God!". The appearance of the character King Novik from the same video game is also loosely based on facial features of Lemmy.[92]Deep Rock Galactic features one of Lemmy's hats as a cosmetic called "The Ace of Spades" with the description "In honor of a motoring head."
Equipment
Lemmy in his trademark singing stance, 2005
Lemmy positioned his microphone in an uncommonly high position, angled so that he appeared to be looking up at the sky rather than at the audience. He said that it was for "personal comfort, that's all. It's also one way of avoiding seeing the audience. In the days when we only had ten people and a dog, it was a way of avoiding seeing that we only had ten people and a dog."[93] Inspired by Jimi Hendrix, Lemmy recorded his vocals in the studio in total privacy, meaning he would sing in an enclosed recording booth where no one can see him, not even the producer.[94]
As a member of Hawkwind, Lemmy first used a Rickenbacker belonging to Dave Anderson. When Anderson failed to show up for a charity gig, Lemmy took his place. Following the departure of Anderson, Kilmister bought a Hopf Studio bass off Hawkwind synth player Del Detmar.[15] He used Rickenbacker basses[95] for most of his career. In September 1996, a Rickenbacker belonging to him was a featured part of the Bang Your Head exhibition at the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in Cleveland, Ohio, US.[96] From 1996 onward, Lemmy's main bass was a Rickenbacker 4001LK, from a limited edition run of 50 instruments, featuring hand carved body wings, featuring oak leaves, three HB1 humbucker pick-ups and all gold plated hardware. Lemmy had commented that at last Rickenbacker had made decent pick-ups. When asked about the appeal of the Rickenbacker instruments, Lemmy said "The shape. I'm all for the image — always. If you get one that looks good, you can always mess with the pickups if it sounds bad."[97]
With Hawkwind Lemmy used a Selmer amplifier. With Motorhead, he got a Marshall Amplification 1992 JMP Super Bass Mark 2 bass stack[98] from 1976, with a 4x15" and a 4x12" cabinet. In 2008, Marshall issued a model dedicated to Lemmy, the 1992LEM, which was available with the same cabinets Lemmy used.[99]
Musical style
Lemmy described his style as "I play a lot of notes, but I also play a lot of chords. And I play a lot of open strings. I just don't play like a bass player. There are complaints about me from time to time. It's not like having a bass player; it's like having a deep guitarist.[100]
Lemmy's unconventional playing style changed the dynamics of the group's rhythm section. Hawkwind drummer Simon King explained that "A lot of the time I play with [guitarist] Dave - he'll get into a kind of rhythmic thing and I'll follow him so you get this kind of percussion and rhythmic guitar thing going, so Lemmy can loon forward a bit because he's very much a front man and gives off a lot of energy, so he can get out front and play a sort of lead on bass which sometimes is very effective",[101] and Motörhead drummer Taylor echoed the sentiment with "Onstage he's difficult to follow cos he's not really a bass player. There's no solid bass lines to follow. A lot of the time I play more with Eddie [Clarke] than with Lemmy, but he's out on his own because he is what he is."[102]
2011 – The Head Cat – Walk The Walk… Talk The Talk
Band collaborations
1978 – The Doomed (one-off performance at the Electric Ballroom, 5 September 1978). Bootleg recording with Dave Vanian, Captain Sensible, and Rat Scabies. Brian James had left The Damned and took the rights to the name with him.
^ abcdBlake, Mark (March 2016). "Lemmy: 1945-2015". Q. No. 356. Bauer. pp. 8–10. Archived from the original on 22 January 2016. Retrieved 22 February 2019.
^See the notes for Smash It Up – The Anthology 1976 – 1987.
^Hobson, Rich (4 November 2021). "The 50 best Motorhead songs". Louder Sound. Retrieved 6 April 2022. "You know I'm born to lose and gambling's for fools, but that's the way I like it, baby, I don't want to live forever"
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