By Kurt Wolff
When Scott Borchetta, president and CEO of Big Machine Records, was presented with the idea of a country tribute to rock band Mötley Crüe, he didn’t hesitate. “He just goes, ‘Done,'” Crüe bassist, cofounder and songwriter Nikki Sixx told Radio.com. “And we [the members of Mötley Crüe] sat down and talked about it and said, ‘Wow, OK!'”
Sixx said the bandmates “got it” right away, because “a lot of ’80s rock fans are now new country music fans, and vice-versa. And the more we started talking to Scott, talking about the artists and how they love the band, it became really organic.”
Radio.com sat down in Nashville recently with Sixx and lead vocalist Vince Neil. Both spoke enthusiastically about the project, which features new versions of Crüe classics recorded by such country artists as Florida Georgia Line, Justin Moore, LeAnn Rimes, Rascal Flatts, Darius Rucker and Gretchen Wilson. Titled Nashville Outlaws: A Tribute to Mötley Crüe, the album hits stores and digital outlets Aug. 19.
Neil and Sixx both admitted they hadn’t paid much attention to country before they were presented with the tribute idea. But once they did, they realized that rock and country (especially in its current incarnation) have quite a bit in common.
