Tommy Lee is looking back at his brief stint as a male escort before Mötley Crüe made it big.
“Very beginning when we all had moved into an apartment together, and then we meet this lady who’s the madame,” Lee, 63, said during the Wednesday, July 22, episode of Dax Shepard’s “Armchair Expert” podcast. “She was a few years older than us, and that’s where we met, and then started talking. She’s like, ‘I got work for you guys.’”
Lee said he was living with bandmates Nikki Sixx and Vince Neil at the time and received “$20 a week” from their manager to make ends meet.
“Each guy got $20 a week,” he noted, adding that they realized they could make more money working as escorts. “We saw some big numbers, and we were like, ‘OK, f*** it, let’s do it.”
Lee recalled going on “nine or 10” dates, often with older women who simply wanted companionship, although sometimes they were looking to get intimate with him.
“Sometimes go and just sit and have dinner with them,” he explained. “Just dinner, literally. Just want company just to dine with. … But you know what? I think I was lucky too, because a couple of the older women that I got, they were actually really fun.”
Lee said he earned $500 per date — a significant improvement from his $20 per week allowance.
Mötley Crüe was cofounded by Lee and Sixx, 67, in 1981 and later joined by guitarist Mick Mars and Neil, 65. The metal band released their breakout hit “Looks That Kill” in 1983 as part of their second album, Shout at the Devil. They have since sold more than 100 million records worldwide and achieved nine Top 10 albums on the Billboard 200 chart, plus seven platinum or multi-platinum certifications. Their 1989 album, Dr. Feelgood, reached No. 1.
Lee previously opened up about his experience as an escort before Mötley Crüe’s fame during a 2024 appearance on Theo Von’s eponymous podcast, revealing that he did the work for “about a year or so.”
“If the lady was, like, an older lady where you’re like, ‘I hope this is just dinner,’ you’re stoked. I’m just gonna have dinner and drinks and entertain her and that’s it, then you’d get stoked when that would happen,” he recalled. “But sometimes, they wanted more, and you’re like, [cringing] ‘Oh man.’ That part is not fun, ‘cause f***ing when you’re not into it is a weird thing.”
