Nikki Sixx Reveals The Extremely Difficult Guitar Riff That Was Written By Freddie Mercury

Speaking to Louder Sound, Mötley Crüe’s Nikki Sixx named the songs that affected his music career and revealed the guitar riff composed by Queen’s late frontman Freddie Mercury which he considers as unbelievably hard to play.

It is known that Mötley Crüe took a break from the music scene in 2015. Yet in 2018, the band’s frontman Vince Neil has announced on his Twitter that Mötley Crüe was recording four brand new songs. The announcement was later confirmed by Nikki Sixx as he said that new tracks were recorded for the soundtrack of ‘The Dirt,’ the band’s biography which was adapted on screen by Netflix in 2019. After Vince Neil‘s statement on their plans to continue making new music for the future despite the contract they had signed to no longer tour, the band has reunited and announced they will go on a tour in 2020 which was later postponed to 2022.

During his conversation with Louder Sound, Nikki Six has talked about the songs which have a great influence on him, changing his life. Along with other songs such as Black Sabbath‘s ‘Snowblind’ and David Bowie’s ‘Cracked Actor,’ he mentioned Queen’s 1974 track ‘Ogre Battle,’ describing the song as such an important one.

Nikki stated that when they had discovered the first Queen album, he and his friends were astonished by the marvelous melodies and chord progressions that were quite unique for them. He added that when he heard ‘Ogre Battle,’ it was a mind-blowing moment for him as the song mixed the hardest rock riffs and extreme melodies. He then mentioned Brian May once told him that Freddie Mercury wrote that guitar riff, and described the riff as ‘hard as shit’ to play.

Nikki Sixx told Louder Sound that:

“This was such an important song for me. My friends and I had already discovered the first Queen album and marveled at all those amazing melodies and chord progressions that were unlike anything we’d ever heard. But when we dropped the needle on Ogre Battle it was the most mind-blowing moment for me, because of how it mixed the coolest, hardest rock riffs and the most extreme, beautiful melodies.

Brian May once told me that Freddie Mercury wrote that guitar riff, which I didn’t know. It’s hard as shit to play! But when you really study Queen’s music you get such an incredible education in the art of songwriting.”

Nikki Sixx recently announced that he was celebrating the 20th year of his sobriety. He is also getting ready to release a memoir entitled ‘The First 21: How I Became Nikki Sixx,’ focusing on his story from his childhood through his musical career.