Who?

If you’re saying “Who?” let it be known that I can’t talk to you any longer.

Just kidding.

Kind of.

I grew up as a child of the long-haired metal-playing ’80s.  I’ve seen Motley Crue in concert five times and probably at least 30 other heavy-metal bands that I won’t spend time naming right now.

Nikki Sixx, Motley Crue’s bassist, has undergone a bit of a transformation over the past 25 years.  Just as I’ve matured, gone to law school, had kids, given up one career and started another, and started writing my book, he’s given up heroin, stopped drinking, started a new band, written three books, AND become an incredibly insightful photographer.

Music, books, and photography.  Win, win, win.

And here is where I would love to insert a photograph of Mr. Sixx himself, but I’ve never personally taken one, so that will have to wait.

Quite honestly, after about age 21, I’d probably forgotten about Nikki Sixx.  Sure, if Motley Crue came on the radio, I would turn it up loud and rock out, but then it was back to my regular “more mature” music appropriate to a law student, and life went on.  A couple years ago, a friend with whom I exchanged music and talked photography asked me if I’d listened to any of Nikki Sixx’s new band Sixx: A.M.  And therein lies the re-introduction.  I loved the new music, and in fact, recently bought the new album “7″ (highly recommend).

Anyhow, fast forward a year or so, and I started reading a lot of memoirs.  Why?  The stories.  I love a good story.  A good real life story of heartbreak, triumph, struggles, hardships, and well, life.  I had started to toy with the idea of writing a memoir concerning a certain theme in my life, and in order to do it well, I knew I needed to read lots and lots more memoirs of others to find out what works and what doesn’t work.  It was then that I came across This Is Gonna Hurt, Nikki Sixx’s sequel to Heroin Diaries.  I haven’t read Heroin Diaries, and my assumption is it’s a lot of “got high, got laid, next city, two women, did more drugs, nameless faceless s*x, and wow wasn’t that fun, and oh, I almost died.”  Maybe I’m wrong.  I don’t think so.  But, let’s get back to This Is Gonna Hurt.

The full title is This Is Gonna Hurt: Music, Photography and Life Through the Distorted Lens of Nikki Sixx.  And being the photo snob that I am (you know, I’ve been shooting most of my life, started in film, shoot film now, I didn’t just recently pick up a camera…), of course I thought “Photography? Really?”  And it was then that I discovered Nikki Sixx’s photographic talents.  I loved reading his creative thoughts behind his images and his search to find beauty in what society considers “people not beautiful” or “ugly” or “unworthy of being photographed.”  And he no kidding shoots.  For a lot of his photographs, he uses an early photographic process called wet plate collodion, one that I am only recently starting to explore.  He also mostly shoots in black and white, which is near and dear to my heart.

Most recently, I found his tumblr, Some Call me Sixx, and I’m blown away by his creativity, his photographic vision, and well, everything.  As he says, “I’m a recovering addict, and cameras are my new drug.”  Though I’m not a recovering anything, I still relate to the sentiment.  My cameras and photography, get me out of myself.  They help me to be a better me.

I love that he shoots Leica, large format, wet plate, holgas, dianas.  Anything and everything.  I love that he has a concept of what he wants to shoot and goes out and makes that happen.  I love his personal photography projects.  I love what photography means to him because I feel the same way.  I love that it would be so easy to judge his heavy-metal-tattooed-self, and yet the book, the tumblr, the new music are reminders not to judge based only on appearances, which is also the vision inherent in his photography.  I love that I bought the very first Motley Crue album when it came out (before really anyone had heard of Motley Crue), that at 13, 14, 15, 16, 17 and 18, he was speaking to me, and that now at 43, I’m still listening.

A