When life gives you lemons, you make lemonade, and when life gives you broken ribs, well … you serve up some ribs and beer to your audience. At least that’s what Tommy Lee did during Motley Crue‘s stop at Nationals Park in Washington, D.C. Wednesday night (June 22).
As with past tour stops, Lee has been performing parts of the Crue’s set, gutting it out for fans while playing through four broken ribs. But now finding the humor in the difficult situation, Lee decided to treat some of the audience members to some ribs and beer.
“For the people that know, here’s a little fucking joke on the whole situation,” Lee told the crowd, as seen in video he shared below. “For those of you that don’t know, I brought a couple of unbroken ribs for y’all to throw down on.”
“Let’s fucking party, goddammit. Ribs? How about some fucking ribs?,” he continued as he tossed his tray full of ribs into the crowd.
Lee has been starting the band’s performances, and like previous stops he performed the first three songs of the night – “Wild Side,” “Shout at the Devil” and “Too Fast for Love,” before giving way to Tommy Clufetos to fill in for the remainder of the set. Lee also later returned to play piano and drums on Motley’s ’80s hit “Home Sweet Home,” per Setlist.fm.
Though having fun with the crowd with the ribs joke, Lee admitted to the audience that it hasn’t been a walk in the park. “Any of you guys ever broke a fucking rib? Yeah? Does that shit suck or what?,” exclaimed the musician, revealing that even breathing was sometimes painful.
Despite the pain, Lee remains behind the kit for the band, at least for a portion of each show. Motley Crue are currently in the midst of “The Stadium Tour” along with Def Leppard, Poison, Joan Jett and tour openers Classless Act. The band plays in Flushing, New York tonight (June 24), with dates coming up in Philadelphia, Charlotte and Nashville next week. Get your tickets here.
Motley Crue: Career Timeline
