Lips recalls turning down guitarist gig in Motörhead but thinks would have taken the offer a few years later

Lips recalls turning down guitarist gig in Motörhead but thinks would have taken the offer a few years later

Anvil frontman Steve “Lips” Kudlow was recently interviewed by Andrew Daly for Vinyl Writer Music.

Lips was asked to join Motörhead back in the early 1980s to which he recalled (with slight edits): “It was around the Hard ‘N’ Heavy album, but it was after that point. We were recording Metal On Metal. They had come to play here in Toronto at a big, huge venue called The Coliseum. Lemmy had some kind of spasm in his arm, and it couldn’t play. So, they stopped the show, lost half an hour of the show.”

In terms of when he was asked to join Motörhead, Lips indicated: “Fast” Eddie Clarke had just left the band. That’s when they asked me to come down on the tour bus and come with then. I was like, “No. I’m under contract. I’m not bailing on my own band. How can I do that?”

With respect to how the history of metal could have been forever changed had he joined Motörhead at that time, Lips opined: “Well, there wouldn’t have been Another Perfect Day, and there would be no Forged In Fire.” He added: “There might be a combination of those two things in one album, but it’s one album. But it would probably have been a one-off like it ended up being anyway because Lemmy wasn’t too particular who he was getting on with for that length of time. At that moment, it was an emergency. He just needed a guitar player. He would worry about a good one later. He basically said, “Right now, we’re doing the Iron Fist tour in the US, and I need a guitar player right now.” [Laughs].”

On whether he put Lemmy in a spot by turning him down, Lips stated: “Well, yeah, because he’s going, “Fuck, you know, we’ll be out of this show AND this show, because I have to wait for somebody else to do it.” I mean, it wasn’t until we had recorded Forged In Fire and he had recorded Another Perfect Day that we saw each other and actually had a discussion about it. Anyway, he sees me tell me that he’s going to have an open promoter and have the whole European/British tour when you come through here, but his first words, “Why don’t you fucking do it?” I said, “Well, you know who I am and what I was getting ready to do. I was getting ready to record the album; I’m under contract.” He said, “Well, that’s OK, listen to my new album.” That was it. I thought it was great. I still think it’s a great album [Another Perfect Day]. I think it’s one of the better Motörhead albums and more different ones because it’s actually a very separate type of album from the rest.”

Lips continued: “Yeah, man, I think it was better than Iron Fist. I thought Iron Fist was almost redundant to Ace of Spades. I told that to Lemmy’s face. I had a long-standing relationship with the guy. He was a great guy, but like an older brother who was in another band, who asked me to join at one point but couldn’t do it. Not that we didn’t want to. We just couldn’t do it, that’s all.”

When asked whether he would have joined Motörhead had he been asked a few years later like in 1985, Lips opined: “Yeah…in between in the dead spot, especially the dead four years. Yeah, I probably wouldn’t have been obligated to do anything, right? Yeah…yes, I probably would have.”

You can read the rest of the interview with Lips at Vinyl Writer Music‘s website.

Anvil‘s “Metal On Metal” video (from Metal On Metal album):

Motörhead‘s “One Track Mind” video (from Another Perfect Day album):