Over the span of it's 22 years Motorhead has not exactly been a haven of personnel stability. Some 11 musicians have logged time in the band­ more than one shift, in the case of drummer Phil "Philthy Animal" Taylor. One man has remained constant. Bassist and vocalist Lemmy Kilmister, who's known to fans of Motorhead by first name only. Considering the friction that often accompanies a member's leaving, Lemmy takes a surprisingly nonchalant view of Motorhead's volatile history. "I've had a good time with everybody who's been in the band," he says. Translation: Motorhead's still here, they're not. The King Biscuit Flower Hour performance you hold in your hands captures Motorhead at one of its most notorious moments of transition. The show took place Aug. 10, 1983, about 15 months after guitarist "Fast" Eddie Clarke had left the band.

His replacement Lemmy recruited Brian Robertson, a versatile player who had left Thin Lizzy in 1977 and had been working with the band Wild Horses since his departure. He'd never done anything quite as heavy as Motorhead, but Lemmy says it didn't matter. "He was just an excellent guitarist," the bassist notes. "There's nothing else to say, really. He was just a good rock 'n' roll player, excellent. He was one of Phil's heroes." Robertson jumped at the chance to work with Motorhead, coming over to America to join a tour that was "in progress" when Clarke left. There was a Japanese tour, then Lemmy, Taylor and Robertson recorded Another Perfect Day, one of Motorhead's most respected albums. Unfortunately all was not well within this particular aggregation. Robertson was an odd duck in the Motorhead universe; his penchant for shorts and ballet shoes rubbed the denim and leather crowd the wrong way. And he didn't endear himself to the audience or his bandmates by refusing to play Motorhead's most popular songs, instead insisting on playing the more obscure material he'd recorded with the band so as not to court comparisons to the enormously popular Clarke. "The audience hated him," Lemmy says now. "I knew he wouldn't fit in with Motorhead. It was like he was concentrating on just being a special guest instead of being a member of the band." That's not to say Robertson didn't contribute to Motorhead's sound. Listen to his screaming guitar playing on "Tales of Glory", "Marchin' Off to War", "Another Perfect Day", and "Back at the Funny Farm". Combined with the jackhammer rhythm section of Lemmy and Taylor, this aural assault was perfectly in sync with the stellar concert reputation which Motorhead had developed up to that point.

It was 1983 — MTV and glitzy video pop. New Wave was on the horizon. Duran Duran was about to become the Fab Five. Boy George was the diva of the moment. But on this hot August night in Queens, New York, at L'Amour East, a dark, sweltering rock and roll club with Motorhead on stage playing at nuclear blast volume .... the world seemed safe for real-man rock 'n' roll. Lemmy was already a rock 'n' roll veteran by the time he brought Motorhead together. He first embraced rock 'n' roll after hearing Little Richard, inspiring Lemmy to actually first start playing in soul bands. A later group, the Rockin' Vickers, were more in the Motorhead vein, wearing dog collars and indigenous Finnish costumes. In the late 60's he moved to London and played in a variety of bands there, before serving a stint as a roadie for the Jimi Hendrix Experience. His big break came in 1971, when the group Hawkwind needed a temporary (or so they thought) replacement for bassist Dave Anderson. Lemmy stayed on for four years, singing the group's biggest hit, "Silver Machine", in 1972. But after being busted for drug possession in Canada in May 1975, Hawkwind booted him. Lemmy had a vision for his next project. "I wanted to be the MC5, basically," he explains. "Of course, the singer bailed out, and we couldn't get two guitar players at the time. So it ended up with me doing the singing. I never wanted to sing, I was just going to be the bass player." Motorhead was initially to be called Bastard, but Lemmy's manager at the time convinced him that a group with that name might not get invited on "Top of the Pops" or played on BBC One. Lemmy acquiesced and chose Motorhead from the name of the last song he wrote for Hawkwind; it eventually became the new group's theme song. Lemmy did try to make Motorhead a quartet, bringing in Clarke to join Taylor and original guitarist Larry Wallis. Wallis quit during Clarke's audition, however, and Motorhead soldiered on as a trio.

The group's first label, United Artists, rejected its initial recordings. For seven months, the group had to struggle without a recording contract, manager or income. With no recourse but non-stop touring, Motorhead even wound up supporting Lemmy's old mates, Hawkwind, at one point. Later, (three years later) United Artists would release these recordings as the album On Parole, when Motorhead began having success after moving to another record label. Chiswick eventually put out Motorhead in 1977; it hit the Top 50 in the U.K. and established Motorhead­ tough, raw, and pulverizing. Not for the faint of heart, it hit a chord with both the hard rock/heavy metal fans as well as the new punk rock generation that recognized in Motorhead the kind of blazing, uncompromising intensity (without the political undercurrent) that it appreciated in its new heroes. Motorhead was common ground for metalheads and punk rockers alike. It seemed appropriate then when Motorhead and The Damned collaborated on a few tracks — including a cover of the Sweet's "Ballroom Blitz" in 1978. That same year, Motorhead began a fruitful association with Rolling Stones producer Jimmy Miller that resulted in Overkill, which many fans still consider Motorhead's greatest album, and the follow-up Bomber. But it would be their 1980 release Ace of Spades, produced by Vic Maile, that vaulted Motorhead to its greatest success. The album reached No. 4 on the U.K. album charts, while the title track was a Top 15 hit single. Unfortunately Motorhead was unable to savor the triumph. On Dec. 20, 1980, Taylor accidentally broke a bone in his neck during a party in Belfast. And a coin thrown from the audience at a show in Yugoslavia hit the back of Lemmy's hand, causing a cut which became infected, requiring six days of hospitalization.

Motorhead's assault on North America began late in 1981, following the release of the classic live album No Sleep Till Hammersmith. Also at this time Lemmy and Eddie began a collaboration with Girlschool on a side project dubbed Headgirl, releasing an EP, St. Valentines Day Massacre, on which the two groups covered each others' songs. Iron Fist, the last record featuring the classic Lemmy/Clark/Taylor lineup, and which the band produced themselves was released in 1982. Shortly thereafter, Lemmy recorded a tongue-in-cheek duet of Tammy Wynette's signature song "Stand By Your Man" with the Plasmatics' Wendy O. Williams, prompting Clarke to leave in disgust (he later co-founded the group Fastway with UFO bassist Pete Way). Enter Brian Robertson for the recording of Another Perfect Day and the tour from which this performance was recorded.

Robertson's stay, however is short lived. Besides Robertson, Taylor would also leave the band in 1983, giving Lemmy license to re-make Motorhead. He was finally able turn it into a quartet, bringing in guitarists Phil Campbell (who's still on board today) and Wurzel (aka Michael Burston), as well as former Saxon drummer Pete Gill. The new lineup debuted in May 1984 at, appropriately enough, the Hammersmith Odeon. A decision to leave Bronze Records, its label at the time, leads to a slew of legal problems that prevents Motorhead from releasing anything for nearly two years. During the interim, Lemmy worked with then-unknown teen singer Samantha Fox (legalities kept that from being released, too) and contributed to Hear N' Aid, the hard rock community's answer to the assorted Band Aid and Live Aid benefit projects. The bassist would contribute to similar affairs throughout the decade, including Ferry Aid's "Let it Be" and the Elvis Presley tribute album, The Last Temptation Of Elvis, on which Lemmy and the Upsetters perform a rendition of "Blue Suede Shoes." Motorhead resurfaced in 1986, recording Orgasmatron with producer Bill Laswell. 1987 saw the return of drummer Phil Taylor and the release of Rock 'n' Roll. Back on active duty, the band tours nonstop including a monster show at the premier hard rock festival Castle Donnington. In 1988 the band releases another live album No Sleep At All. The tour in support of the album features opening act Slayer.

1989-90 finds the band once again in legal litigation with numerous record companies, preventing the release of any new Motorhead material. Toward the end of 1990, the legal troubles were resolved and Motorhead signs its first major record label deal with Sony Music subsidiary, WTG Records. Refreshed by the absense of legal headaches, and strengthened by the muscle of their new label, the band enters the studio to record 1916. The album is nominated for a Grammy in the Best Hard Rock / Heavy Metal Album catagory, but loses to Metallica. Taylor leaves again the following year to be replaced by former Dokken and King Diamond skin-pounder Mikkey Dee. They began releasing albums with regularity ­ March Or Die, in '92 and Bastards in '93. Wurzel left after making the Sacrifice album in 1995. The band has continued as a trio ever since, and in 1996 recorded their last album to date Overnight Sensation. The Motorhead legacy is now stronger than ever. At Lemmy's 50th birthday party celebration at The Whiskey in Los Angeles, other musicians gathered to pay tribute to him. The members of Metallica, dubbing themselves The Lemmys, (dressed in full Lemmy regalia) played a set of Motorhead's greatest hits. "I never heard us in anybody else, really," Lemmy modestly says when queried about Motorhead's influence. "But there again, you don't always hear influence. I was influenced by the Beatles and the Everly Brothers, but you can't really tell." Motorhead is as vital today as it was when this King Biscuit Flower Hour performance was recorded. A lead-fisted musical force that neither compromises nor takes prisoners.