Michael Starr recently spoke to Brutal Planet Magazine about Steel Panther’s rise to fame in the early 2000s. He discussed how having well-known musicians like Mötley Crüe’s Vince Neil perform with them played a role in their journey, sharing a story about Neil’s memorable and drunken performance.
“The first dude to get up on stage is Vince Neil,” the vocalist said. “This happened in Vegas in, like, ‘91 or some sh*t, I think. He got off stage with us. No shoes, and he’s hammered, and he sings ‘Live Wire’ and ‘Shout at the Devil.’ I was like, ‘This guy’s [the coolest].’ Vince Neil is one of the coolest dudes around. He really is a super sweet guy. And those kind of guys getting on stage with us is really cool ’cause we’re big fans, and, you know, other celebrities that were our age, we knew that ended up having success in their life.”
“The thing that really helped us out with them getting on stage is they would talk about us to other people and spread the word of our band,” he continued. “And it just got everywhere. I mean, people just knew who we were, especially in LA, and that’s the right place to be if that’s happening for you.”
Steel Panther performed alongside Neil’s whole band years later, joining Mötley Crüe and Def Leppard as special guests on the Mirrorball Tour in 2011. Starr has often spoken about how the Crüe influenced his music through the years though a controversy a few years ago created tension between them.
The conflict began after Starr joked about ‘bringing Vince Neil back from the dead’ during a chat with Little Punk People and explained it by saying the Vince Neil from earlier years was ‘dead and gone.’ This led Mötley Crüe’s Nikki Sixx to slam the singer and Steel Panther on social media, calling them ‘backstabbers.’ Drummer Stix Zadinia fired back, saying Sixx was looking for attention.
In 2020, Starr talked to Little Punk People again, sharing his hope that the fight was over. “Hopefully that thing was just like a blip in the heavy metal news,” he said. “I think if we were to run into each other, I would totally be, ‘What’s up, dude?’ The last thing I want to do is have a band that influenced my musical taste and direction be mad at me.”
It seems the Crüe’s influence on Starr continues to this day, though it’s unclear if the tension between them subsided.
Steel Panther is currently focused on their upcoming 2025 world tour, which will start in March in the US. Mötley Crüe is looking to start their Las Vegas residency at Dolby Live the same month.
