TOMMY LEE Says He Was Drinking Two Gallons Of Vodka A Day ‘For A Long Time’: ‘Your Liver Is On Crutches At That Point’
Maher was in shock when he heard this, so much so the comedian had to confirm with Lee that he was referring to himself when talking about drinking two gallons of vodka a day. It would be reasonable to assume that Tommy Lee won’t be in the best state of health after a lifetime of hedonistic rockstar antics. But on the contrary, the drummer has told numerous outlets including Yahoo! Entertainment that in recent years he has been given a clean bill of health, and he is surprised to have made it through his decades of excess in one piece. To their credit, Motley Crüe has not shied away from the darker aspects of their time as rockstars, nor the addiction that plagued their careers. The death of Dingley is recounted in the band’s memoir, “The Dirt,” an unflinching portrait of the band’s excesses, particularly their alcohol and drug use. As Lee discussed on “Steve-O’s Wild Ride” (via YouTube) the band even used to compete with other rockers to see how messed up they could get, with Lee saying some of the members of Guns N’ Roses once tried to “outdrink” them, but Lee said he and Crüe bassist Nikki Sixx had the last laugh in that situation.
In an interview with the comedian Bill Maher on the “Club Random” podcast in October 2023, the drummer shocks his host by admitting to drinking around two gallons of vodka per day when his drinking was at its heaviest. “Alcohol’s such a fuckin weird one, because… Fuck! It’s just — it’s easy to fall in love with, the way it makes you feel, the way it makes you relax, and then all of a sudden you’re, like, ‘Fuck! I’m drinking two gallons of vodka a day?’ This is not… You’re trying to kill yourself now,” said Lee. “I didn’t notice it until towards the end of it, when I was like, ‘Oh dude, I’ve got to stop. This is fucking insane,'” he continues. “Like, I was drinking just out of boredom. I would just wake up and be just building a glass with just all vodka and just a little eyedropper of cranberry or lemonade. I was drinking two gallons – not pints, not quarts, but gallons, the big-handles – a day. That’s fucking crazy. I would just wake up and be just building a glass with just all vodka and just a little eyedropper of cranberry or lemonade.
Despite putting his body through the wringer during the height of his career, Lee, who is now sober, said he has not suffered any long-term health issues — much to his surprise. Maher, who himself has been in recovery for alcoholism and drug addiction for more than 25 years, was taken aback by the admission — which Lee first publicly made in 2020. The 61-year-old rock icon offered up the startling revelation during a chat with comedian Bill Maher on the latest episode of his “Club Random” podcast. “Two gallons a day. I swear to you, dude. I swear to God,” he said. “Gallons. The big handle. Two.” His wife, Brittany Furlan, who he married in 2019 on Valentine’s Day, was part of the reason he decided to sober up.
“I met someone who I can trust because I didn’t trust anybody that I’ve dated before. I’d say Tommy is my first true love and I’m finally safe and happy,” Furlan said. “She was like, ‘Baby, I don’t know, I don’t think I’ve ever even seen anybody drink that much. Like, you’re kind of scaring me,'” he quoted her saying, noting she asked him whether he would wake up.
Tommy Lee is now about a year sober, but in a recent interview, the rock star recalled his heavy drinking days, which included guzzling up to two gallons of vodka per day. Motley Crue drummer Tommy Lee was a recent guest on the Club Random With Bill Maher podcast, and while the conversation started with Lee discussing the recent celebration of one year of sobriety, it turned to discussing a bit of Lee’s prior excesses with drugs and alcohol. At one point, the drummer told Maher that he used to drink two gallons of vodka a day. “I go through these phases where I just want to live a different life and fuck all the dumb shit,” he explains. “And then I decide, ‘You know what? I don’t want to live like that anymore. I want to have a lot of play and be fucked up and stupid and all that shit.’ So, in this particular instance, I had been home… I had all this time at home, not touring, just being at home. I did what I told you. I just enjoyed being home. I literally did nothing. I would just float around drink and just fucking drink.” Nevertheless, though Lee managed to consume an ungodly amount of alcohol per day during the wildest period of his life as a rockstar, it doesn’t mean that his behavior was in any way healthy.
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Titled Andro, Lee said that the record — set to drop Oct. 16 — is “pretty wild.” And in the meantime, he’s staying sober, at least for now. Luckily for Lee, the band as a whole became self aware of their various bouts with excess and decided to make a move toward something healthier as the ’80s came to an end. When Maher expressed his surprise at the amount Lee offered, the drummer reiterated, “Yeah. Two gallons of shit. I swear to you — dude, I swear to God.” He went on to add that this was his drinking habit for “a long time,” noting, “Your liver is on crutches at that point; it’s just barely functioning.” Motley Crue drummer Tommy Lee was drinking gallons of vodka every day last year — so much that his new bride was afraid she’d wake up to find him dead.
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After discussing some of the things he did in his youth, like Motley Crue challenging Guns N’ Roses to see who could outdrink the other, Lee spoke specifically about his alcohol intake during those early days. “…I just realised, ‘Whoa dude, you’re drinking enough to like, you could probably die.’ And it wasn’t even fazing me… I just became sort of immune to it.” In the lead-up to rehab, Tommy tells Yahoo! that he began drinking again after Mötley Crüe’s last tour due to a combination of burnout and having nothing else to do, having previously been four years sober before that.
This isn’t the first time Lee has made the audacious claim about his prodigious vodka intake. Tommy Lee shared that back in his rock ‘n’ roll heyday as the drummer of Mötley Crüe, he used to “drink two gallons of vodka” a day. The musician said he checked into a rehab facility and has now been sober for one year, but still approaches sobriety as a day-by-day process. “I don’t know if it’s a forever thing, but for now, I’m not drinking vodka today,” he said.
Tommy Lee reveals he drank 2 gallons of vodka a…
- Tommy Lee, the drummer for Mötley Crüe, revealed that before he got sober nearly a year ago, he was “drinking two gallons” of vodka on a daily basis.
- But on the contrary, the drummer has told numerous outlets including Yahoo! Entertainment that in recent years he has been given a clean bill of health, and he is surprised to have made it through his decades of excess in one piece.
- “Two gallons a day. I swear to you, dude. I swear to God,” he said. “Gallons. The big handle. Two.”
- Despite frequently indulging in drugs and alcohol during his heyday — as it was depicted in the Netflix biopic The Dirt — the Motley Crue drummer just made the shocking revelation that he used to drink “two gallons of vodka a day” during his younger years.
Tommy Lee can’t believe his doctor recently gave him a clean bill of health, given what he’s put his body through in his 61 years. Furlan, who is Lee’s fourth wife, was a viral star on Vine and now has over 2 million Instagram followers. She opened up about her relationship with the rocker on the Netflix documentary “The American Meme.” “I didn’t notice it until towards the end of it, when I was like, ‘Oh dude, I’ve got to stop,'” he said in a video interview with Yahoo! Entertainment, while also discussing his new solo album, “Andro,” which he has been working on in quarantine.
I was drinking two gallons — not pints, not quarts, but gallons, the big-handles — a day. The 61-year-old drummer joined Bill Maher on his Club Random podcast, where he divulged the power alcohol had over him and his Mötley Crüe bandmates. Lee shared the vodka tidbit after Maher told him what Sammy Davis Jr. once said after becoming sober — the hardest part about quitting drinking is “getting up in the morning and knowing that’s as good as I’m going to feel all day.”