Mikkey Dee recalled his worst-ever Motorhead show, which, unfortunately, happened to be a headlining festival appearance.

The band's 2011 set at the U.K. event Bloodstock disintegrated into an onstage fight between the drummer and bandleader Lemmy, who’d been advised to cancel it because he was suffering from a heavy cold. A clip from the show can be seen below.

“Lemmy was sick,” Dee told Drum for the Song in a recent interview. “He had an absolute normal cold, nothing dangerous, but he was sick as a dog. He had a fever; he could barely speak; he was in a shitty fucking mood. … I said, ‘Lemmy, we have to cancel. You cannot do this show.’ And he insisted on doing this show.”

Things started to go wrong even as the performance began, Dee said. “[W]ithin one song… he turned around and said, ‘Mikkey, you motherfucker, you are killing me! Slow the fuck down!’ And I played every song slower than I have ever done because of Lemmy. … He was really angry at me.”

During a break in the show as guitarist Phil Campbell changed instruments, Lemmy went up to Dee and repeated the allegation that the drummer was “killing” him by playing too fast. “I had a bucket of ice where I had a towel in, and I took the towel and I fucking threw it right in his face, with ice and everything, and told him to fuck off, and I left the stage.”

As he prepared to leave the festival, Lemmy and Campbell continued playing, seemingly oblivious over Dee’s absence. He was persuaded to return. “I walked on stage, and we finished the show,” he said, “but it was horrendous; it was terrible. I was throwing drum sticks at Lemmy; I was throwing towels. He was yelling at me throughout the show. It was just terrible. [It was a] very, very important [show].”

He added that it was “so great” to return to Bloodstock as a member of the Scorpions after Lemmy’s death brought Motorhead to an end. “[W]e did a kick-ass concert,” he reported. “And I even said at the press conference, ‘I can only apologize for what we did in 2011.’”

You can watch the full interview below.

In April, Scorpions released their new song "Sign of Hope." It's the first sample of an upcoming studio LP, their first since 2015's Return to Forever.

Motorhead at Bloodstock 2011

 

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