Vince Neil Recalls What He Disliked About Opening for Van Halen

While most remember Vince Neil as being the lead vocalist for the heavy metal band Motley Crue, he also nurtured a promising solo career. During his time with the band, the singer gained a great deal of criticism from his fellow musicians when they accused him of losing his love for music. Not letting his departure end his music career, Neil released three solo studio albums and even opened for Van Halen. While thankful for the opportunity, the singer recently detailed the one aspect he disliked about opening for the band. 

Appearing on the Outsider podcast, Neil was asked about opening for Van Halen. While a fan of their music, the singer insisted, “No – it was great! I opened for Van Halen, my first tour as a solo artist. … It was pretty cool. Except for, when you open up for Van Halen – because it was Sammy – it was like date night…you’d take your chick to go watch Van Halen. So I when I was on stage, no one had gotten there yet!”

Vince Neil Shares Details Of Why He Returned To Motley Crue

Although still performing, Neil enjoyed the luxury of being the headline act. And he even suggested that was one reason he returned to Motley Crue. “When Motley went out, their tickets stopped selling; and I was doing pretty good, but I wasn’t selling out places – I was opening for guys.” He added, “So their manager called me up and said, ‘We’d like to meet with you…’ It took a while for me to say ‘okay’ [but] I finally gave in and I went to the recording studio where they were making Generation Swine… and I dunno… it was bad for a while, because I didn’t wanna be there.”

[RELATED: Vince Neil Hates This Motley Crue Album]

Returning to the group, Neil found himself helping Motley Crue with their album Generation Swine. While released in 1997, Neil still isn’t much of a fan. “I still hate that record. [There are] no good songs on it… I told ‘em, ‘This record sucks!’ [They said] ‘No. We love it. We love it.’”

Often accused of not loving music enough to make a career out of it, Neil proved the critics wrong. And as for Motley Crue, he declared, “When we broke up I was the first guy to put out a top 10 single… so I did everything they said I couldn’t do.”

(Photo by Anthony Devlin/Getty Images for Live Nation UK)