The Lemmyosaurus

The hard rockin', hard livin' Lemmy has been the one constant in Motorhead's 30-year history.

Lemmy has a ritual before he goes on stage. "I take a piss, and light another cigarette," he says, in his hacksaw of a voice.

As the leader of Motorhead for 30 years he's loved every minute of playing live. On December 1, Motorhead will rock Auckland one more time as part of the band's 30th Anniversary World Tour.

"It's a great job. I like it," laughs Lemmy. "You find me a better job than going round the world, screwing chicks of all colours and religious persuasions and making people happy."

With comments like that, it's easy to get the wrong impression. You may have heard about this hard-drinking, heavy metal hero and speed freak, with a penchant for the pokies, the ladies, and strip clubs. He agrees his constitution is "durable".

He's famous for not getting hangovers because "you have to stop drinking to get a hangover". And his drink of choice - Jack Daniels - has not changed over the years because, "I like the taste".

"I'm going to leave my body to medical science fiction," he coughs.

But really, he's an incredibly polite bloke. With his famous facial warts, cowboy hat, and handlebar moustache, he's like a rough-looking mate you bring home and your parents love him. Especially your mum.

It was his mother who taught him that "good manners are free".

"That's a great rule," says the 59-year-old, who was born Ian Kilmister, son of a vicar. "I always knew that you shouldn't treat people like you wouldn't want to be treated yourself. That's the oldest and best rule in the book. And it always made complete sense to me. If you're an arsehole to somebody you're going to meet them on the way down. But that's not really even the reason for it, I just like being polite. What's wrong with that?"

Lemmy and his cohorts, right from the outset in 1975, played raging, fast, and loud music. "It was fast for back then, and loud, yeah. But the records are faster now. And we didn't mean to be the loudest band in the world, it was just that I liked it loud.

"It just wound up that way. We were much closer to punk than we were to heavy metal. I thought heavy metal was boring old shit. We were a rock'n'roll band."

The band's influence on not only metal bands like Metallica and Slayer, but rock music in general, is undeniable. Just ask Foo Fighter Dave Grohl, who collaborated with Lemmy last year on the Probot project. And Motorhead's Ace Of Spades is a song choice on Playstation's SingStar game alongside Madonna.

Lemmy started playing music in 1964 with two Blackpool R&B bands, the Rainmakers and the Motown Sect, and throughout that decade he was part of various other acts.

After a short stint as a roadie for Jimi Hendrix he joined heavy space rockers Hawkwind in 1971. In 1975 he got kicked out after being busted for drugs in Canada.

Never mind, back in Britain he set up his own band, at first he wanted to call it Bastard, but settled on Motorhead - the title of the last song he wrote for Hawkwind.

There have been a number of line-up changes over the years, with Lemmy being the one constant. The classic Motorhead line-up is considered to be Lemmy, drummer Philthy Animal (real name Philip Taylor), and guitarist Fast Eddie Clarke, who played together from about 1976 to 1982, and wrote classics like Overkill, Ace of Spades, and Bomber.

Lemmy reckons the highlight of Motorhead's long history came in 1981 when the band's live album, No Sleep 'Til Hammersmith, went to No 1 in the British charts. "That wasn't in the specialised chart, the heavy metal chart, that was the national chart," he says.

"Everybody was waiting for it. Everybody was waiting for a live album from us since we started. So their appetite was up and it didn't stay there for long, it was only there three weeks but the fact it went straight in at No 1 was a bit of a shock for the general music community - a bunch of snobs and dickheads, you know. And bingo, there we are, 'Hello there'."

He says that album is definitive Motorhead, but his personal favourites are Sacrifice (1995), We Are Motorhead (2000), and last year's Inferno.

Meanwhile, the lows of the band are mostly to do with the loss of members. He defends the number of line-up changes - five guitar players, three drummers and "one bass player" - with, "that's not bad for 30 years".

"The day Phil Taylor left though, that was a low point," he laughs.

So is Lemmy Motorhead? Or is it something bigger? "I invented Motorhead. I invented it. And it's my cowboy outfit and I'm playing in it," he chuckles. "But it's a vote, it's a democracy ... it's a verbal dictatorship. I run it like a rock'n'roll band because that's all it is."

Lemmy isn't getting any younger - he's 60 on Christmas Eve - and he agrees that one thing to do before we all die is to see his band live. "And you don't know how long I got so you better catch me quick before I fade out. Come backstage and I'll buy you a beer."

Bloody hell, I'll take you up on that.

"Okay man. Take care. Bye. Bye."

What a nice man.

Lowdown

WHO: Motorhead, British heavy metal band

CURRENT LINE UP: Lemmy (bass/vocals), Phil Campbell (guitar) and Mikkey Dee (drums)

ESSENTIAL ALBUMS: Overkill (1979); Ace of Spades (1980); No Sleep 'Til Hammersmith (1981) live album; No Remorse (1984) greatest hits album; Sacrifice (1995); Inferno (2004).

COLLABORATION: Lemmy and Dave Grohl, from the Foo Fighters, collaborated on the song Shake Your Blood for the Probot album. That project involved Grohl doing songs with some of his idols from the metal world.

WHEN & WHERE: Motorhead play Thursday, December 1, St James, Auckland