Don Dokken underwent neck and spinal surgery in November 2019. This surgery, although crucial, led to several complications, most notably the partial paralysis of his right arm and hand. Although this surgery was crucial, it led to several complications, including partial paralysis of his right arm and hand. He is bitter about his surgeon.
He recently opened up to Monsters, Madness And Magic about his frustrations following neck and spine surgery in 2019. Depressed after the surgery, he still suffers from physical limitations. He explained the process:
“I’m hoping the surgeon that screwed my life up will get ran over by a bus… He really screwed me up. It took a year for me to be able to raise my hand above my head… So I was depressed, obviously. I came home. I was in a walker. I’m in a cane, and yeah, it sucked, man. But the bottom line is I would love to keep going as Dokken, but I can’t write any more songs. I’m screwed. I took my Steinway piano and shipped it to Los Angeles ’cause my daughter is a concert trained pianist. She was happy to get that. But I don’t know how I can write another record.”
Reflecting on the song writing process, he pointed out that, contrary to the group credits listed on their albums, it was he who primarily composed hits like ‘In My Dreams,’ ‘It’s Not Love,’ ‘Alone Again,’ and ‘The Hunter.’ He discussed the challenges he faced in collaborating with his bandmates during the band’s early years, particularly due to their drug use. He said:
“I was talking to Jon Levin the other day. I said, ‘If this album is successful, you wanna do another one?’ And he said, ‘I don’t know if I have it in me.’ I’m the writer, I’m the singer, just like I was in (the classic lineup of) Dokken. I’m not throwing my old guys under the bus, but I was the main writer. I wrote the hits — ‘In My Dreams’ and ‘It’s Not Love’ and ‘Alone Again’ and ‘The Hunter.’ Even though when you look at the record credits and it says ‘Don Dokken, George Lynch, Jeff Pilson, Mick Brown,’ they didn’t write those songs. And everybody knows in my camp that I wrote the songs — the guitar and the lyrics. Those other three guys were in Orange County with an ounce of cocaine trying to come up some good songs. And that’s why I couldn’t write with them, because I don’t do drugs. Never did.”
Don Dokken Slammed His Old Bandmates
Don Dokken does not have fond memories of the other founding members of Dokken. Suffering from their different lifestyles, Dokken is not afraid to talk about what his former bandmates put him through due to their drug use. The other members of the classic Dokken line-up, which Don Dokken criticized in an interview with 80’s Glam Metalcast in September, were George Lynch on lead guitar, Mick Brown on drums and Jeff Pilson on bass. In the interview, Don said:
“Jeff (Pilson) and Mick (Brown) and George (Lynch) had gone down the rabbit hole and they were coked up out of their minds man. So, yeah… it’s hard to keep a band together. ‘I said; ‘Guys, can you not do coke for an hour and a half?’ It drove me crazy, they were coked up out of their minds!”
Don also related the breakup of the band in 1989 to these drug problems. He added:
“So, that is what kind of brought the end of Dokken, because… I always would say, if I was into cocaine, we would have probably all got along. But the 3 of them, would go off into a hotel room, and sit in the back of the bus and do coke for days and I would just be in my bunk reading a book.”
This lineup was reunited from 1993 to 1998 and for a short period in 2016.
Don On His Relationship With George Lynch
Don acknowledges that he and George have had their disagreements and that they are not that close. He knows and respects that they are both eccentric characters. He explained to 80’s Glam Metalcast that Lynch’s replacement, Jon Levin, was a longertime bandmate and that even Lynch himself admitted Levin captured him better. He said:
“George is George. We talked about it. He had been opening for us with Lynch Mob, and then would come on with us for a couple songs. George and I have said we are too old to argue anymore. We can’t take the stress. George is very eccentric. I am very eccentric. It’s no secret we didn’t get along from day one. It ran its course. We aren’t BFF’s. We don’t hang out. George is George and I am me. Jon Levin is my guitar player. He has been in the band longer than George. Jon grew up listening to Dokken and his favorite guitarist is George. George went to the press and said ‘Jon Levin does me better than me!’”
You can listen to Don Dokken’s interview with ‘Monsters, Madness And Magic’ about his health issues and his band’s inside relations below.
