The guitarist was on the road with Rob Zombie when Nikki Sixx rang with a list of songs, and Tommy Lee says the band has been a different outfit since.
John 5 did not have to audition for Mötley Crüe. He had to answer his phone.
The guitarist described how the job came to him during a question-and-answer session at the “Sunset Strip” edition of “Rock ‘N’ Roll Fantasy Camp“, held in Hollywood, California in late April and early May. He joined the band in the autumn of 2022, taking the place of co-founding guitarist Mick Mars.
“Well, it’s funny because I talked to the guys [in Mötley Crüe] every day anyways. So it was wonderful,” he said (via Blabbermouth).
John continued: “I was on tour, and [the Mötley Crüe] guys were on tour. So they were doing ‘The Stadium Tour‘, and I was on tour with Zombie. And then I got the call when I was on tour. And I was, like, ‘Yeah.’ And Nikki [Sixx] gave me [a list of] the songs [to learn] and he goes, ‘Okay, learn these.’ And I’m thinking to myself, ‘I know these songs. I’ve known [these songs] forever. I know these songs just like the whole world knows these songs.’ So it was wonderful. I was super excited.”
Both bands were working at the time. Mötley Crüe were partway through “The Stadium Tour“, the 2022 run they shared with Def Leppard, Poison and Joan Jett & The Blackhearts, and John 5 was out with Rob Zombie.
Knowing the material turned out to be the easy part. The first rehearsal was where things went sideways.
John said: “[I would hang out] with [the Mötley Crüe] guys all the time [before], but [now] it was different. And when I got into the room, I was, like, ‘All right, I’m excited for the first day of rehearsal.’ And it was the only day I was late. I was, like, an hour late. And everybody was there. And I’ve never been late ever in my life, because… I don’t know if Nikki did it on purpose and he said, ‘Hey, we’re rehearsing at 1:00,’ and everyone got there at noon. Yeah, but it was great.”
Four years on, he describes the job in the same terms he did at the start.
“It’s just been a dream. It’s just been so much fun. All we do is laugh and have a great time. When we’re on stage and people watch us on stage, we’re, like, yucking it up even on there. So it’s just been a dream. It’s been an absolute dream come true,” he added.
Tommy Lee, sitting alongside him, put it more bluntly.
He said: “And just so I can elaborate. When John came in, and with all due respect to Mick Mars, [John] brought this f**king fire, this new fire and excitement to every one of us. It was just this giant, like… I don’t know, man. S**t just got really, really good. And he’s an incredible guitar player, and he’s a sweetheart. To me, that never happens. Like, you’re a really good musician, but you’re an a**hole. And he’s… [John] 5 is everything.”
Mars co-founded Mötley Crüe in 1981 with Sixx, Lee and Vince Neil, and played on every record the band made. He stopped touring in October 2022, citing ankylosing spondylitis, a form of arthritis that fuses the vertebrae and which he has lived with since his teens.
What followed took three years to settle. Mars sued the band in April 2023, arguing he had been improperly removed and stripped of his ownership stake after telling his bandmates he could no longer handle the road, and separately alleged that Sixx had not played bass on “The Stadium Tour“. The band rejected both claims, said they had offered him compensation, and pointed to sworn statements from touring staff describing mistakes onstage in his final period with the group.
The matter went to private arbitration and ended on January 28, 2026, when the Honorable Patrick J. Walsh issued a final award. He rejected Mars‘s claims, found the band had been entitled to remove him under an operating agreement signed years earlier, and ruled that the allegations about pre-recorded parts were unfounded. Mars had received a $1,500,000 advance against 138 shows and was ordered to repay the proportion covering those he did not play, a figure reported at more than $750,000. The band said afterwards that they considered themselves fully vindicated. Mars released a solo album, The Other Side Of Mars, in 2024.
John 5, born John Lowery, spent close to three decades in high-profile guitar positions before this one. He played with David Lee Roth, spent six years in Marilyn Manson from 1998, and then seventeen years with Rob Zombie, alongside a long run of solo instrumental records.
