What to know
- Mötley Crüe brought its Return of the Carnival of Sins Tour to Toronto’s RBC Amphitheatre, celebrating the 20th anniversary of the band’s original 2005 production.
- The rock legends delivered a career-spanning set featuring classics including Shout at the Devil, Home Sweet Home, Girls, Girls, Girls and Dr. Feelgood.
- Guitarist John 5, who joined the band in 2022 following Mick Mars’ retirement from touring, continued to prove a seamless fit alongside Vince Neil, Tommy Lee and Nikki Sixx.
- The emotional highlight came during Home Sweet Home, when Nikki Sixx and Tommy Lee shared the story behind one of the band’s biggest hits before performing it.
Crossing the bridge into Toronto’s RBC Amphitheatre Wednesday night (July 22) for 80s metal legends Mötley Crüe, you might’ve expected to step into a time machine of big hair, caked-on makeup (for guys too), animal print and spandex. But that flat-out stereotyping was wrong.
The 16,000-capacity venue, packed but with seats still available, was filled with original fans — guys with a lot less hair but still proudly sporting rock T-shirts, and women choosing flats over high heels. There were a few fashion standouts, particularly the one gentleman decked out in a band-adorned top hat and cape.
After the success of the Netflix 2019 biopic The Dirt, and/or some parental guidance to tag along, there were also 20-somethings, teens and pre-teens there to take in the rock ‘n’ roll spectacle that Mötley Crüe has been presenting for 45 years, if they didn’t catch them at Rogers Centre in 2022 or along the way.
Yes, the band — frontman Vince Neil, now 65; drummer Tommy Lee, 63; bassist Nikki Sixx, 67; and then guitarist Mick Mars, 75 — did do a big farewell tour in 2014-2015, after signing a legitimate “cessation of touring agreement,” then publicly set the contract on fire in 2019 as a fun publicity stunt to proceed with a stadium tour, but after The Who, KISS, Scorpions, Ozzy Osbourne, Judas Priest and Cher, we know not to take farewell tours seriously.
Quite frankly, it’s a miracle they are all still alive, given their well-documented and admitted excesses. Sixx has long been sober (and his life with his wife and young daughter are lovely to follow on social media). Lee has seemingly mellowed, and Neil had a stroke in 2024.
But after forming in Los Angeles in 1981, what changed recently is John 5 (Rob Zombie, Mailyn Manson) replaced Mars in 2022. Mars has long lived with the debilitating disease called ankylosing spondylitis (AS) and was unable to keep touring, but he also sued Mötley Crüe for royalties and his ownership interest in 2023 and lost in arbitration in 2026.
This tour, which just started on July 17 and runs for 33 dates through to Sept. 26, with Tesla and Extreme in tow, is in celebration of the 20th anniversary of their Carnival Of Sins Tour, the tour that brought the band back together after five years and featured a full-on circus theme: pyrotechnics, dancers, acrobats and a dark storyline inspired by the band’s history — and Lee playing at one point suspended above the crowd.
The Return of the Carnival of Sins Tour is a bit toned down. The red-and-white striped circus tent is a nod to the old production and four female dancers are a prominent part of the show, wearing tasteful lingerie, crawling and writhing around, and occasionally using whips as props. Neil moves around less and while Lee stayed put — no 360-degree or aerial kit — he is still a monster to watch. Sixx , the anchor, remains one of rock’s most watchable bassists and John 5 is the perfect fit, with his own flair.
With a creepy clown on video narrating moments in the set, the band opened with a ton of songs from the 80s: 1981’s “Red Hot,” before tearing through 1983’s “Louder Than Hell,” 1987’s “Wild Side” and 1983’s “Shout at the Devil,” 1981’s “Too Fast for Love,” 1984’s “Looks That Kill,” 1983’s “Too Young To Fall in Love,” and “Take Me To The Top,” before adding a pair of later-era material, 1991’s “Primal Scream” and 1997’s “Afraid.”
The highlight and perhaps the most anticipated moment of the set was their 1985 power ballad, “Home Sweet Home,” who recounted the story of the song’s genesis.
Putting on a red hat, Sixx crouched down at the edge of the stage, letting everyone know they’ve been coming to Canada since 1982. “We’re like a disease, we just keep coming back. Is that alright?” he says to cheers. He then mentioned Mötley Crüe’s Las Vegas residency last year for which they tried to come up with ideas for the intimate show, “unlike this fuckin’ madness that is going on tonight,” he laughed.
“We decided to bring it to you guys because we realized that no matter who you are, even if you’re a musician or a producer, none of you guys actually have any idea where music comes from, and what we’ve discovered 45 years together — we’re gonna talk about this — we have no fucking idea where it comes from either,” Sixx said, joking that he doesn’t know if it comes from the universe, “the great God” Keith Richards or the late Ozzy Osbourne “raining down love on us.”
He then played four chords, which we all recognize, and said they kept sticking around. “It’s 1978. 1979. It’s 1980. Mötley Crüe forms in 1981, nothing and finally…” Lee, sitting at the piano, takes over the story.
He recalled being at rehearsal, and “after the guys would leave, I’d fuck around on piano and the same chords kept coming to me.” He said he doesn’t know “where the fuck they come from, there’s some magic, you know. I can’t even explain it.
“There’s an actual word that’s called frisson; It’s that feeling when you’re given big goosebumps, and your hair stands up,” he said stroking his tattooed arm. “It goes something like this…”
He then played the opening to “Home Sweet Home,” as Neil walked over to Lee, took the sheet of white paper, presumably with the lyrics, and started singing the 1985 song which introduced the band to a wider-than-metal audience.
It was the only reflective pause in a powerhouse show that continued with the Brownsville Station cover “Smokin’ in the Boys Room,” “Live Wire,” “Girls, Girls, Girls” and the inevitable closing blow of “Dr. Feelgood.”
With more than 100 million albums sold worldwide, seven platinum and multi-platinum albums, nine Top 10 albums, six top 20 pop singles, three Grammy nominations and a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame, Mötley Crüe’s impact on rock history is undeniable.
There is also a charitable element to the night, with $1 from every ticket sold donated to the After School Arts Program (ASAP!) through the Mötley Crüe Giveback Initiative, supporting students with hands-on programs in music and the arts.
And maybe that’s the irony of Mötley Crüe in 2026: a band that has spent decades singing about all things rock ‘n’ roll has somehow outlasted the very expectations that should have ended them. When the carnival ended with “Dr. Feelgood,” it was clear the band has not yet run out of juice.
