Metal Mayhem…For Real!
The setting: Monsters of Rock, August 1984, in Stockholm. Three heavy-duty bands on the bill – Mötley Crüe, Van Halen, and AC/DC. It didn’t take long before rock and roll antics turned real.
According to Tommy Lee, “We were all on the ‘Monsters of Rock’ tour… Motley had this thing we would do if we really loved you: … We would bite you” — and yes, that included his own bandmates. But when Vince Neil chomped Eddie Van Halen’s hand, tempers flared. Eddie “was so mad… ‘What the [expletive] is wrong with you?’” Lee laughed it off, but not everyone was amused.
As Vince Neil recalls, “We were outta control kids back then… I bit Eddie Van Halen’s hand.” His casual chomping—part of the Crüe’s twisted affection ritual, did not go down well.
It didn’t stop there. Lee admitted he also bit Malcolm Young of AC/DC, who “hated it, too,” pushing things further toward a tipping point
According to Crüe’s manager Doc McGhee, the biting, dubbed “Dark Angels,” escalated until a physical altercation broke out. “We had a dinner party… my guys decide to bite Eddie Van Halen… they end up biting Eddie and getting into a fistfight, and we ended up getting thrown off the tour. Doc McGhee reconts the incident (warning: NSFW language)
He added that the biting behavior was like a “dog bite,” serious enough to demand apologies every day
The result? Mötley Crüe were ejected from the festival. Van Halen and AC/DC demanded it. The promoter resorted to bizarre damage control, lifting Crüe’s trailer by crane and demanding a $15,000 deposit before any hotel would let them stay.
What was meant to be a career milestone became a wild, bite-fueled legend of heavy-metal mayhem, one that still gets talked about today.
Metal Mayhem!
Doug O’Brien
