Hailed by headbangers and hearing-aid salesmen as the world's leading cause of deafness, and appearing innumerable times on the Richter scale and hard-rock charts as ground breakers of seismic and sonic disturbances worldwide, Motorhead have unleashed their third live album, appropriately titled Everything Louder Than Everyone Else (CMC International Records). A double-disc 25-track collection, recorded live in Hamburg, Germany in 1998, packed to capacity with loud, brutal and murderously melodic aural assaults that hang around like a waft from a burning fart, Everything Louder is quintessential Motorhead – cacophonous and cathartic. Starring, after almost 25 years, leather-lunged vocalist/songwriter/bassist and bullet-belted legend, Lemmy Kilmister, abetted by his longtime guitarist/collaborator Phil Campbell and Mickey Dee, who Lemmy claims is the greatest drummer in the world, Motorhead have just finished a month-long headlining tear across North America in support of Everything Louder. After witnessing them immolate a sold-out crowd of about 900 greasy tattooed guys and 10 nervous-looking girls at Irving Plaza on May 18, I can testify that when Motorhead hit the road, the road doesn't stand a chance.

Since being kicked out of his last band, Hawkwind, and forming Motorhead in 1975, Lemmy, self-professed speedfreak/World War historian/gardener and bludgeoning bassist, has been writing, recording and performing hell-raising, iron-fisted rock'n'roll numbers and is the axle around which the group's many line-ups have revolved. Mr. Kilmister originally called the band Bastard, but in his first, last and only concession to mass-market appeal, he changed the name to Motorhead and since then hasn't looked back or even bothered to change his clothes. A tag line at the end of the 1916 album has a Monty-Python-style Vicar's voice asking the dear Lord to "Bless Motorhead with such success that they may someday be able to purchase one more pair of trousers each." In a similar ironic manner, the band named their 17th album Overnight Sensation. Who says bad guys don't like a good laugh?

"Motorhead, are they still alive?" a patron at the bar next to Irving Plaza asked me as we discussed the evening's itinerary. Earlier, Lemmy had been seen a little larger than life, shooting pool, chatting and holding still for a few pictures, proving rock'n'roll will never die; it just puts on a few extra pounds and needs a bigger bullet belt. Indeed, Everything Louder, Motorhead's third official live album and first in ten years, finds Lemmy and his louts with the umlauts showing no signs of slowing down or cleaning up. And as the new CD and tour prove, Motorhead, for the past few years a power trio in the definitive sense of the term, absolutely kill every other band on the planet, including my own. "You bastards!" Like some kind of primordial ooze, the band predates punk, thrash, grunge and every twisted metallic aberration in between and has managed to outlast them all and only grow stronger in the process.

The liner notes on Everything Louder feature quotations from such cultural icons as Joey Ramone, Ron Jeremy (porn star), Lars Ulrich (Metallica), Tony Iommi (Black Sabbath guitarist) and even Tom Arnold (?!), all gushing like Wayne's World wannabees about Motorhead's pervasive influence, world-class endurance and unique sense of humor. Perhaps Beavis and Butthead put it most succinctly when they said, "Motorhead Rules!!!"

Like Motorhead's two previous live albums, the peace-disturbing No Sleep Till Hammersmith and the insomniac's delight No Sleep at All, Everything Louder delivers a combo platter of Motorhead's meatiest fare from the band's early years. Unbelievably, molten oldies like "Overkill," "Orgasmatron" and, of course, "Ace of Spades" still rage as relentlessly as ever, perhaps even more so, thanks to the double-bass barrage of drummer Mickey Dee. One surprisingly poignant moment in Everything Louder is Lemmy's dedication of the song "No Class" to the memory of original punk rock chainsaw babe Wendy O. Williams who died shortly before the new album was recorded and who joined Lemmy on vocals in an early '80s collaboration between Motorhead and Wendy's band, The Plasmatics. In concert, Lemmy describes Wendy as "a friend of mine and yours." His elegy might have gone over the heads of fans in Hamburg, but it hit home here in New York City. The rest of Everything Louder is a selection of songs from Motorhead's last six studio albums, all recorded in a prolific, if under-publicized ten years. Newer and lesser-known tracks like "Sacrifice," "Civil War" and "Born To Raise Hell" thrash and burn with the lyrical intensity and performance energy of tunes and shows from 20 years ago. Lemmy and company may not have come up with many new ideas in the past couple of decades, but they certainly haven't forgotten what staked their claim to rock'n'roll fame in the first place.

"We are Motorhead and we're going to kick your ass," quoth the Lemmy to kick start the new CD. And he ought to know; he's been at it long enough and if his luck and liver hold up, he'll be kicking ass for a long time to come. Who knows, maybe someday Mr. Kilmister, Phil and Mickey will get that second pair of trousers after all.

June 1999