Nikki's story

[The Silent Hunter]

-Nikki Sixx


Nikki's short life story

Sixx was born Frank Carlton Serafino Feranna on December 11, 1958 in San Jose, California.[1] He was raised by his single mother, Deana Richards, and her abusive boyfriend, after his father and namesake, Frank Ferrana abandoned the family. When he was six, he and his mother moved to New Mexico for a short time, after which they moved to Jerome, Idaho, with his grandparents. The family moved several more times, to El Paso, Texas, then to Anthony, New Mexico, back to El Paso, and then returned to Jerome.

While living in Idaho, Sixx became a teenage vandal, breaking into neighbors' homes, shoplifting, a drug addict and being expelled from school for selling drugs.[2] His grandparents sent him to live with his mother, who had moved to Seattle. He lived there for a short time, and learned how to play the bass guitar after buying his first instrument with money made from selling a guitar he stole from a guitar shop that he stopped by while waiting for a bus.

At the age of 17, he struck out on his own, moving to Los Angeles and working at jobs at a liquor store and selling vacuums over the phone while he auditioned for bands. He auditioned for the band Sister, with Blackie Lawless of W.A.S.P. before joining London, a local glam outfit whose lineup saw numerous changes and whose major claim to fame was that its singer, Nigel Benjamin, had sung with a late version of Mott the Hoople. Nikki soon left the band, convinced that his ideas for world domination would never come to fruition with Dane Rage and Lizzie Grey as his partners in crime.

Nikki's other short story

Nikki Sixx (born Frank Carlton Serafino Feranna, Jr. December 11, 1958 in San Jose, California) is an American bassist, author, photographer, and the main songwriter for the legendary heavy metal band Mötley Crüe. He has also played bass for glam metal band London, as well as stints in experimental band 58[1] and the hard rock band Brides of Destruction, while also being the frontman of Sixx:A.M.  

[The Silent Hunter]

Nikki's life story in motley Crue

In 1981, Sixx founded Mötley Crüe with drummer Tommy Lee. The band decided to self-record their debut album, Too Fast for Love, which was subsequently released in November 1981 on the band's own Leathür Records label. After signing with Elektra Records they re-released the album. The band then went on to record and release Shout at the Devil, raising the band to national fame. Like his bandmates, Nikki Sixx binged on alcohol, cocaine, and most notably heroin. Sixx has often stated that he would use his body as a human chemistry set, mixing excessive amounts of drugs on a regular basis to search for a new high. On the night of December 23, 1987, Sixx was declared dead for two minutes after a heroin overdose, only to be revived by paramedics with two adrenaline shots to the heart (this incident was the inspiration for the song "Kickstart my Heart"). In an interview, Sixx states that after he was declared dead, the ambulance arrived, but one of the paramedics in the ambulance was a Motley Crüe fan. "Apparently, the paramedic took one look at me and said, 'He's not gonna die'". On an earlier trip to London, Sixx overdosed at a dealer's house and the dealer apparently tried to beat the life back into him with a bat. Afterwards, the dealer dumped Sixx into a nearby dumpster. Sixx recounted the incident in The Heroin Diaries: A Year in the Life of a Shattered Rock Star.

I had overdosed in London exactly a year earlier: Valentine's day 1986. We had played the Hammersmith Odeon, and the second we left the stage I caught a taxi with Andy McCoy from Hanoi Rocks. He took me to a heroin apartment in a real shabby neighborhood. I was drunk and I remember I was very impressed that the dealer had clean needles. When he offered to shoot up for me, I let him. Big mistake. The problem with street drugs is you never really know exactly how potent they are from dealer to dealer, so I OD'd on the spot. My lips turned purple: I was gone. The story I heard was that the dealer grabbed his baseball bat and tried to beat the ******** life into me. He couldn't so he flung me over his shoulder to dump me in the trash, because nobody wants a dead rock star laying around. Then I came to...and I guess I had yet another dark secret to never tell anybody.

This incident was the inspiration behind the lyric "Valentine's in London, found me in the trash" from the Mötley Crüe song "Dancing on Glass".

Soon after his overdose, he and his bandmates went into rehab. In 1989, the band produced their most successful record, Dr. Feelgood, with producer Bob Rock. The album stayed on the charts for 109 weeks after its release. When Mötley Crüe reformed at the end of 2004, Sixx declared himself sober.

Sixx wrote most of Mötley Crüe's material, including tracks such as "Live Wire", "Home Sweet Home", "Girls, Girls, Girls", "Kickstart My Heart" and "Dr. Feelgood". In the 1990s, all four members began contributing to the material on the albums.

As of 2006, Mötley Crüe have finished a reunion tour featuring all four original members. They've stated that they will record demos for a 2007 album. An exact target release date has not yet been set. Mötley Crüe also embarked on a 2006 tour co-headlining with Aerosmith, called "The Route of All Evil". According to a recent press release from Neil, Mötley Crüe is set to go into the studio in January to record their new album, due for release in 2008. They have released a new single The Saints of Los Angeles, from their upcoming album of the same name.  

[The Silent Hunter]

Nikki's equipment

Nikki Sixx usually plays Gibson Thunderbird Reverse Basses, and had his own signature bass produced, the Gibson Nikki Sixx Signature Blackbird.[3] It was discontinued in 2003, but has recently been put back in production by Epiphone. His inspiration to use the Gibson Thunderbird came from Pete "Overend" Watts of Mott the Hoople and John Entwistle of The Who. Early on, he was sponsored by B.C. Rich, and used Mockingbird & Warlock basses (this can be seen in the videos for "Live Wire" and "Looks That Kill"). When Gibson weren't making Thunderbird basses to his preferred specification, Hamer made Thunderbird style basses for him. Apparently the mid '70s Thunderbirds have the sound he was trying to emulate with the Hamer produced models. After that he used Spector Basses during Girls, Girls, Girls and Dr. Feelgood.

During the 1990s, Sixx started using 12-string basses made in Japan by the Hiroshigi Kids Guitar Company; less than 30 were produced. He owns at least five of them: a black one with red lettering and white binding, a black one with gold binding, a black one with white lettering and white binding, a red one with "Helter Skelter" written on it, and a green one. The red and green ones have dragon inlays on the body. He has also used Ernie Ball Music Man 5-String basses, most notably while on tour with Brides of Destruction and the two newly recorded songs for the 1998 Mötley Crüe album, Greatest Hits.

He also has used Fender Precision Basses, particularly when smashing basses at the end of a set. They are usually black Squier Precision Basses with white pickguards. He previously used Ampeg amplifiers, but has switched to Basson amplifiers.

While recording The Heroin Diaries soundtrack, he used a '59 Fender Precision which was amplified through a '64 Fender Bassman. The '59 Fender Precision is also his favorite bass for recording in the studio.  

[The Silent Hunter]

Nikki's side work

In 1989, Sixx was a featured guest artist on the album Fire and Gasoline by Steve Jones, formerly of the Sex Pistols. Sixx co-wrote and performed on the song, We're No Saints.

Besides his Mötley Crüe duties, Sixx also had a side project dubbed 58, issuing their debut album in 2000, Diet for a New America. Where Dave Darling played guitar as well as Steven Gibb (son of Barry Gibb from the Bee Gees) and Bucket Baker was the drummer. The first single of the eleven track album is Piece of Candy. The animated video clip for the song was only available on the internet.

Nikki Sixx also formed a band called Brides of Destruction with Tracii Guns of L.A. Guns. After one album, the band broke up due to extremely poor album sales and the inability to get any radio airplay. Sixx also co-wrote the song "Rest In Pieces" along with singer/songwriter James Michael for Drowning Pool. He had planned to produce their second album but singer Dave Williams died and Sixx didn't know what to do with the song. He later gave it to Saliva after he met their singer Josey Scott. Sixx had a cameo in the "Rest In Pieces" video.

In 2006, he was one of the songwriters for Meat Loaf's long-awaited album, Bat out of Hell III: The Monster Is Loose.

He recently got together with Kelly Gray and formed Royal Underground Clothing. Its men's line was debuted in fall 2006 and can be found at Neiman Marcus, Bloomingdale's and Nordstrom department stores. The upcoming women's line debuted in Spring 2007.

In 2006 Sixx helped co-write a number of songs from the American debut EP, Heads Will Roll, for one of ex M2M band member, Marion Raven. Sixx also co-wrote and played on four songs on Raven's debut album, Set Me Free with DJ Ashba.

Since 2006, Sixx had been working on a book titled The Heroin Diaries: A Year in the Life of a Shattered Rock Star, a collection of his journal entries from 1986 and 1987 (when his heroin addiction was at its most dangerous). Written with British journalist Ian Gittins, it also presents the present-day viewpoints of his bandmates, friends, ex-lovers, caretakers, business associates and family as they respond to specific passages.[5] Sixx also worked on a soundtrack to be released with the book called "The Heroin Diaries"

The soundtrack was recorded by his new band, Sixx:A.M. The entire album was written and produced by Sixx, James Michael, and DJ Ashba and Lar (with other contributors such as Scott Stevens). Michael also sang lead vocals and played rhythm guitar. DJ Ashba played the lead guitars. The album was released on August 21, 2007, and the book was released on September 18, 2007.

Along with Big & Rich (John Rich and Big Kenny Alphin), and James Otto, Sixx co-wrote the song "Ain't Gonna Stop" for Otto's 2008 "Sunset Man" CD on Warner Bros/Raybaw Records.

He has been working on a charity foundation called Covenant House."Mötley Crüe founder and bassist Nikki Sixx knows first-hand what it’s like to have to fend for yourself on the streets, which is why he has launched “Running Wild in the Night,” a fundraising initiative for Covenant House." Covenant house provides for for homeless and runaway youth in 21 cities, as he knows what its like to be running from something in your life, past and present. This information can be found on his official site, under the link titled "Running Wild in The Night."  

[The Silent Hunter]

NIKKI SIXX THE HEROIN DIARIES

“You can’t quit until you try/You can’t live until you die/You can’t live and tell the truth/Until you learn to lie…When you’ve lost it all/That’s when you finally realize/Life is beautiful.” “Life is Beautiful,” The Heroin Diaries soundtrack.

Most people know Nikki Sixx as the bassist and founding member in one of the most successful bands in rock & roll, Mötley Crüe. Others are aware of him as a member of Brides of Destruction, or a producer/songwriter who’s contributed to albums by Meat Loaf, Saliva and Marion Raven. Still others have read about him in the ground-breaking book, The Dirt, learning how he grew up with a single mom and her abusive boyfriend after his father abandoned him at an early age, then how he was shuttled to various homes, raised by his grandparents before becoming a teenage vandal - breaking into homes, shoplifting and finally expelled from school for dealing drugs.

And while the Crüe song, “Kickstart My Heart,” recounts Nikki’s near-death experience after a drug overdose on December 23, 1987, The Heroin Diaries reveals the Sixx saga in a way that a so-called rock star has never done before, opening himself up and laying bare a point at which he’s at his lowest.

On Christmas Day 1986, Nikki should have been enjoying the fame and kudos of being a multi-million dollar mega rock star. Instead, he spent the day alone, naked, cradling a shotgun and shooting up smack under a Christmas tree in a big empty mansion in Van Nuys, CA.

The book recalls a harrowing year of addiction that led to Nikki’s spiritual death and re-birth, from Christmas ’86 to the fateful day when he had to be revived by paramedics. The writings all come from diaries he kept during those 12 months in Hell, with his own subsequent comments and clarifications added on.

The Heroin Diaries is a devastating, first-hand and candid account of a troubled soul collapsing at the seams, a member of one of the most infamous and wildest rock bands in the world, a tale of decay told by both its tragic anti-hero and the people around him.

It is also a story of recovery, of an abject figure fighting a crippling addiction and finally, somehow, emerging with his sanity bruised, but intact, an inspirational narrative, and one which should inspire anybody fighting the same terrible demons that consumed Nikki Sixx.

This included all-night heroin and coke binges that would end with Sixx cowering in the walk-in closet to his bedroom; paranoid and hallucinatory delusions climaxing with desperate phone calls to police of security companies; violent and abusive relationships with family, friends, lovers and fellow band members; a love affair with the needle that would only end, on Dec. 23, 1987, when it literally killed him.

Stumbling across his own journals several years ago, Sixx realized The Heroin Diaries would be a devastating antidote to any deluded kid who feels, as he once did, that heroin addiction is in any way glamorous or alluring.

The Heroin Diaries, co-written by Sixx with music journalist Ian Gittins, published by MTV Books and Simon & Schuster, will be preceded by a soundtrack on Eleven/Seven Music inspired by it, as Nikki got together with another pair of producer/songwriter/ musicians, his good friends James Michael and DJ Ashba, to create a musical accompaniment to the text.

“I obviously lived the book, but they read it,” says Nikki of the collaboration, which was so successful it blossomed into the band Sixx:A.M. “It was great to be able to sit down with these guys, who know me so well and are two of my best friends, but didn’t know me then, and submerse ourselves in that time.

“We really pushed, pulled and developed this together, each of us contributing in our own way, three guys with one vision. To be able to do that, with the egos taken out of it, and just follow the music wherever it took us, was great.”

The result closely follows the outline of the book, a year-long cycle of heroin use and recovery, the 13 original pieces, one for each chapter, from the opening “Xmas in Hell,” with its heavy metal ode to the yuletide standard, “Carol of the Bells,” through the emotional crisis of the first single, “Life is Beautiful,” and the rueful acknowledgment of relapse (“Accidents Can Happen”) to the harsh condemnation of childhood (“Dead Man’s Ballet”), the painful steps of withdrawal (“Girl with Golden Eyes”), the acceptance of a higher power (“Permission”) and a celebration of ultimate spiritual rebirth (“Life After Death”).

Together, Nikki, James Michael, who does all of the vocals on the album, and DJ Ashba, who provides the crackling, emotional undertow with his searing guitar work, come together to find the aural equivalent of The Heroin Diaries’ psychic underpinning. Nikki also reads excerpts from the book, accompanied by some of the most heartfelt and moving music he has written over the course of his remarkable career.

“We never intended for this to be a band,” admits Nikki. “We didn’t plan on ever playing these songs live. It was never really about that. We were just three guys, and now, all of a sudden, we’re one. I love Mötley Crüe. They have been a huge part of my life - the most successful part - and I will continue to do it. But I needed to go over here for a while to exorcize the demons.”

The three grew increasingly tight, with both James and DJ finding themselves applying what Nikki was going through to their own situations.

“James is one of my very favorite singers and people,” says Nikki. “I didn’t push for him to be the singer on the project… It came organically. And it was just wonderful because James has been through a lot of his own stuff, and this turned out to be very personal for him as well. There are parts of songs that he would probably tell you were about his own childhood, or DJ who’s one of my very best friends and extremely talented artist, I’m sure could point out many aspects of the album that he can relate to his life as well. Because it came from one vision and three guys, you’re going to get some different interpretations. I’m curious to hear how the listener experiences that. It connects on a level that people can take and make their own. These aren’t our songs anymore... They’re everybody else’s. Like your own children when they grow up and have their own lives.”

Sixx, who will donate a portion of the proceeds from the project to his own “Running Wild in the Night” initiative for Covenant House, which helps fund creative arts programs around the country focusing on music, says the experience of writing and recording The Heroin Diaries has “grounded” him.

“This has helped me grow roots,” he explains. “I feel so in the honesty and reality of ‘that was then and this is now.’ My life is so different. I feel so connected. I don’t know how to explain it, but I feel very humbled and very grateful.”

He’s not sure whether he’s found God, but he’s more than willing to share his experiences in hopes it will do some good for others who can relate to his situation.

“Addiction is one of the biggest problems we have on this planet right now,” he says. “What I can do as a tiny, tiny part of this work is just to give back. Maybe one person gets it, maybe 100, maybe 100,000, maybe a million. I’ll never know. If I can pass my knowledge on without being a preacher or without getting on a soap box, that would mean something. All I’m saying is, this is my experience. Read it, or not. Believe it, or not. Absorb it, or not. I’m not telling anybody what to do. I’m just putting my experience out there and hoping you can learn something from it.”

“For me, the word ‘God’ was always hard to swallow. But think Hare Krish-na, Budd-ah, G-ahh-d… We say ‘ahhh’ when things make us feel good. The monks use ‘ahhh’ in meditation. I’m in ‘awe’ of my life, that I’m even alive. I’m in awe that I get to have the opportunity to spread this message. When I think God, I don’t think Jesus Christ. I think of a complete spiritual safety net, being able to let yourself go. I’m happy to go through life, see what happens and be in ‘awe’ of, be able to enjoy, the moment… and stop worrying about expectations or trying to predict the future. These are things I couldn’t do in the past.”

“I’m powerless to do anything now, because people will have their own opinions after they read the book and listen to the soundtrack. My deepest, darkest moments are out there. If you want to live life on your own terms, you’ve got to be willing to crash and burn. I’m just very proud to have so many amazing people around me. The difference between now and then is I have a support system. I wasn’t able to stay off drugs then. I am able to stay off drugs now.”

The Heroin Diaries—the most addictive rock & roll saga since The Dirt.