Lemmy: The Definitive Biography by Mick Wall review sex speed and cigarettes

A life of the Motörhead frontman shows us a man who kept up the habits of a rock’n’roll reprobate till the very end

When news arrived in December that Lemmy, the frontman of the hard-rock band Motörhead, had died, there was naturally great sadness at the passing of a music legend. But, among the scores of eulogies, there was also surprise that he had lasted so long.

The man born Ian Kilminster didn’t go in for healthy living. It was rare to find Lemmy – the name allegedly came from his habit of asking people to “lend me a fiver” – without a Jack Daniel’s in one hand and a Marlboro Red in the other. Following his early, demented adventures with LSD, speed became his drug of choice and remained so for next three decades. He wrote a song about it – 1977’s “White Line Fever”.

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