Vincent Neil Wharton is an American vocalist and musician, best known as the lead vocalist
of heavy metal band Mötley Crüe.
Early life Neil was born in Hollywood, California to
Shirley and Clois "Odie" Wharton.
He has Mexican ancestry on his mother's side and Native American ancestry on his father's.
During the 1960s, his family moved around Southern California from Inglewood to Watts,
before finally settling in Glendora, attending Sunflower Intermediate School and later Royal
Oak High School.
As well as having an interest in music while a teenager, Neil was also interested in surfing,
basketball, baseball, football and wrestling.
Music career First stint with Mötley Crüe
Neil was discovered while performing with his band Rockandi in 1979, and joined Mötley
Crüe in 1980.
Neil had been friends with Tommy Lee in high school.
Mötley Crüe was looking for a lead vocalist at the time and were impressed by Neil after
hearing him through Lee.
Mötley Crüe released its first album, Too Fast for Love, the same year.
In 1983, Mötley Crüe released Shout at the Devil, which established the band as a big
act in rock and roll.
In 1985, Neil regrouped with Mötley Crüe to record Theatre of Pain.
In 1987, the band recorded the album Girls, Girls, Girls.
In 1989, the band released their highest-selling album, Dr. Feelgood.
Going solo In February 1992, Mötley Crüe parted ways
with Vince Neil.
Neil had taken up Indy racing a few years earlier, often turning up at celebrity races.
Neil enjoyed the sport so much that he eventually formed Vince Neil Racing.
He was racing in the Indy Lights open-wheel developmental series at the time.
Neil retired from racing in 1992 after crashing his car during a race in Long Beach after
the third lap.
Exposed Neil signed a solo deal with Warner Brothers
for $4 million.
He received a $2 million advance on his first record.
Neil sued Mötley Crüe for 25% of their future profits and $5 million in damages for being
fired.
In 1992, Neil released his first single.
He stated that the song was written in twenty minutes with his friends Jack Blades and Tommy
Shaw.
The single "You're Invited" was featured on the Encino Man soundtrack.
Neil made a video for the song that featured a cameo by Pauly Shore.
The video does not feature guitarist Steve Stevens as Stevens was hired after the song
and video had been released.
Stevens re-recorded the song for Neil's first solo album.
Neil performed the song live on the MTV Movie Awards.
Exposed, was Neil's first solo album and was released in 1993.
The album debuted at #13 on the Billboard charts.
The album featured Stevens, who subsequently played all bass and guitar tracks on "Exposed",
Dave Marshall, Robbie Crane, and Vik Foxx.
The band eventually went on tour, opening for Van Halen.
Carved In Stone In September 1995, Neil released Carved in
Stone, an industrial-oriented album produced by the Dust Brothers.
The album was recorded and was put on hold while Neil was dealing with the illness of
his daughter Skylar.
It sold fewer than 100,000 copies in the US, and Neil's contract with Warner Bros. Records
eventually came to an end.
The album was re-released in 2004.
Vince Neil has toured his solo band, which consisted of Slaughter members Jeff Blando
and Dana Strum, as well as drummer Zoltan Chaney.
Reunion with Mötley Crüe The band came back into the spotlight after
their Behind the Music episode aired on VH1 in December 1998.
The episode became the highest rated in the series.
The DVD was issued with ten extra minutes of footage in December 1999.
By 1997, both Neil's solo career and Mötley Crüe's fortunes were declining, so he accepted
their invitation to rejoin the band.
They released the album Generation Swine, which debuted at #4 on the Billboard charts.
Tension soon erupted within the band, however, this time prompting Tommy Lee to leave the
band.
The other band members replaced him with Randy Castillo and recorded the album New Tattoo
in 2000.
The renewed band went on hiatus when Castillo died from cancer in 2002.
Mötley Crüe released the new album Saints of Los Angeles in 2008 featuring all the original
members.
Tattoos & Tequila Vince released his third solo album, Tattoos
& Tequila, in 2010.
It is Neil's first solo release in seven years, since the live album Live at the Whisky: One
Night Only in 2003.
The album is a soundtrack to the book Neil released in the same year, "Tattoos & Tequila:
To Hell and Back with One of Rock's Most Notorious Frontmen".
Each song on the album corresponds with a chapter in the book.
Other ventures Business ventures
In 1994, Neil gave up ownership of his "Bar One" club.
In 1998, Mötley Crüe opened a store on Melrose Avenue in Los Angeles called, "S’Crüe",
which stocks clothes from both Sixx and Neil’s clothing lines, along with CDs, the Mötley
Brüe drink and other items.
The store closed in January 1999, with the band deciding to sell the items online.
In 2006, Neil opened his own tattoo parlor called Vince Neil Ink.
The shop is located on the Las Vegas Strip.
Neil founded Vince Vineyards, a winemaking venture that produced a 2003 Napa Cabernet
Sauvignon and a 2003 Sonoma County Chardonnay.
He also produces a limited edition Petite Sirah through EOS Estate Winery.
In 2005, Neil created the "Off The Strip Poker Tournament", which takes place in Las Vegas.
In 2007, Neil launched his own brand of tequila called Tres Rios.
Neil debuted the tequila at the Food Network South Beach Wine & Food Festival in February
2007.
Neil opened Dr. Feelgood's Bar and Grill in West Palm Beach.
It took over two and a half years for all of the members of Mötley Crüe to agree and
sign off on the bar concept and location.
It was finally determined that it would be located in downtown West Palm Beach, a stone's
throw away from the ocean and within the high rent district of downtown.
On January 19, 2008, Neil played a free concert on the streets of downtown West Palm Beach
to celebrate the grand opening of Dr Feelgood's.
In March 2009, Neil opened another Feelgood's in Miami Beach.
Vince also owns a Feelgood's in Las Vegas.
Mötley Crüe were on tour in the U.S. Crüe Fest.
Mötley Crüe announced that they will play the entire Dr. Feelgood album every night
of Crüe Fest 2 to celebrate the album's 20th anniversary.
In 2012, Vince Neil ventured into the Gentlemen's Club business, opening Deja Vu Presents: Vince
Neil's Girls Girls Girls in Las Vegas, Nevada.
In April 2014, Vince Neil, Chief Executive Officer and Chairman of RockStar Investment
Group along with long-time friends and business partners Bob Hewko and Mark Daniels, acquired
ownership in an AFL Football Team, the Jacksonville Sharks, Jacksonville Florida in April 2014.
Television & film In 1990, Neil had a small part in the film
The Adventures of Ford Fairlane playing Bobby Black, lead vocalist of the fictional rock
band that consisted of Carlos Cavazo, Randy Castillo, and Phil Soussan.
Opening sequences of the film featured the band playing at Red Rocks Amphitheater, where
Neil's character makes a grand entrance by swooping on stage via zip-line.
He then proceeds to die onstage under suspicious circumstances.
Black's misfortunes continue even in death when at his funeral a mêlée takes place
resulting in his cylindrical plexiglass casket rolling down a hill.
In 2002, Neil was one of the cast members on the first season of The Surreal Life.
In 2004, Neil appeared on the special Remaking Vince Neil, which showed him trying to recharge
his solo career.
He also recorded the single "Promise Me" produced by Desmond Child.
The song was for sale on iTunes for a brief period, but a solo album never surfaced.
Mötley Crüe's fortunes got a boost when Neil and Tommy Lee put aside their differences
and toured in support of the compilation album Red, White & Crüe.
The tour, dubbed Carnival of Sins, featured acrobats, fire breathers and a midget as part
of the overall circus atmosphere the band created.
In 2004, Neil played a tattoo artist in an episode of the CBS sitcom Still Standing.
In 2009, Neil worked on a pilot for an A&E reality TV show.
According to Neil, the program would follow him and his family after his parents moved
in with him.
As Neil told Eddie Trunk, "My wife [Lia] hasn't talked to my mom since the wedding," which
took place January 9, 2005, in Las Vegas.
In 2010, he was cast on ABC's Skating with the Stars as a celebrity contestant who skated
with professional ice skater Jennifer Wester.
In 2012, Neil participated in flight training in Henderson, Nevada for the PBS television
series The Aviators, as reported by the Las Vegas Sun.
Personal life Marriages
Neil married his first wife, Beth Lynn, in 1981; they divorced in 1985.
In April 1987, Neil married Sharise Ruddell, a mud wrestler and fashion model.
The couple had one daughter, Skylar, before divorcing in 1993.
In early 1993, he began dating actress and Playboy Playmate Heidi Mark after a blind
date arranged by her makeup artist.
The two were engaged within two months, and married in 2000.
After just 15 months of marriage, and several attempts at reconciliation, they divorced
in 2001.
Neil married his fourth wife, Lia Gerardini, in January 2005.
The ceremony was officiated by MC Hammer, an ordained minister and fellow cast member
on The Surreal Life.
In 2010, Neil announced their separation.
Charity work On August 15, 1995, Neil and Ruddell's daughter,
Skylar Neil, died of cancer at the age of 4.
He founded the Skylar Neil Memorial Fund in her honor.
Since that time, Neil and the foundation have raised awareness and funding for various children’s
illnesses.
The Skylar Neil Memorial Foundation has donated millions of dollars to The T.J.
Martell Foundation, and it sponsors an annual golf tournament to raise money for children
with cancer.
In the summer of 2011 Neil hosted a series of benefits called Rockin' The Red Carpet
that benefitted MUSIC for RELIEF as part of his tour with Motley Cruë, Poison and the
New York Dolls.
Legal troubles In late 1984, Finnish hard rock band Hanoi
Rocks was on their second American tour and a first one ever to reach California.
The two gigs meant to be held in Los Angeles sold out in twenty minutes.
On the day they arrived in Los Angeles, December 8, Hanoi Rocks drummer Nicholas "Razzle" Dingley
and the other members of the band visited Neil's home and spent the day at Redondo Beach.
After partying for hours, Neil and Razzle decided to take a trip to a local liquor store
in Neil's De Tomaso Pantera.
Neil, who was drunk, lost control of the car and hit an oncoming vehicle.
The two occupants of the other car were seriously injured and suffered brain damage, and Dingley
was killed.
Neil was charged with vehicular manslaughter and driving under the influence of alcohol
in connection with the crash.
His blood alcohol level was 0.17, well above the California legal limit at that time of
0.10.
In July 1986, Los Angeles County Superior Court Judge Edward Hinz, Jr. sentenced Neil
to 30 days in jail, five years probation, $2.6 million in restitution to the victims
of the crash and 200 hours of community service.
Neil got out of jail in 15 days for good behavior; Mötley Crüe dedicated their third studio
album, Theatre of Pain, to Razzle.
Neil was arrested in 2002 for punching record producer Michael Schuman to the ground in
a nightclub parking lot.
Neil was ordered to pay restitution and complete community service.
In 2003, Neil was arrested again after accusations that he assaulted a sex worker at the Moonlight
BunnyRanch by grabbing her around the throat and throwing her against a wall.
On April 9, 2004, Neil pled no contest to battery charges and he was sentenced to a
30-day jail suspension, 60 days anger management, and was fined $1,000 plus court fees of $132.
On December 15, 2004, an arrest warrant for misdemeanor assault was issued for Neil after
a fight during a show on October 30 where he left a soundman unconscious for 45 minutes.
Police had given the singer a criminal-trespass warning before he left the club and headed
to Houston for a Halloween show.
In 2007, Neil was arrested for suspicion of DUI in Las Vegas after police spotted him
making some erratic moves in his Ferrari.
Neil later worked out a deal with prosecutors where he pleaded guilty to reckless driving
in exchange for them to drop the DUI charge.
In June 2010, Neil was arrested on suspicion of drunk driving in Las Vegas after having
allegedly smashed a fan's camera and was released on $2,000 bond.
On January 26, 2011, Neil plead guilty to drunk driving and was sentenced to 15 days
in the Clark County jail and 15 days under house arrest.
In March 2011, Neil was charged with battery and disorderly conduct after an altercation
with ex-girlfriend, Alicia Jacobs.
On May 2, 2011, Neil’s attorneys plead not guilty on his behalf during an arraignment
and he was ordered to stay away from Jacobs then was scheduled to appear in court on August
8.
On August 8, 2011, Neil’s trial was rescheduled for November 7 due to an unexplained emergency.
Discography Studio albums
Live albums Singles
Guest singles ACurrent single.
Motorsport career Along with Neil's passions of fast cars and
fast women, he dabbled in motorsport in the early 1990s.
This culminated in a part season in Indy Lights in 1992 with P.I.G Racing.
He started four races finishing three of them and all point scoring positions.
Also that year he took part in the celebrity race at the Gold Coast Indycar event.
Complete CART Indy Lights results See also
List of celebrities who own wineries and vineyards References
External links Vince Neil – Official website
RockStar Investment Group - Official website Jacksonville Sharks AFL FootBall Team - Official
website Vince Neil Official Fan Club – Official
website Mötley Crüe – Official website
Official Crüe Fest 2009 Tour website Vince Neil at the Internet Movie Database
Racing Reference profile