If you want to be a real rock star, you can go ahead and forget about those Red Bull and vodkas you're so fond of. Legit rockers are fueled by bigger, harder and flat-out weirder doses of alcohol than the mere mortals hitting on the bartender at your local watering hole. Sure, a few of our musical heroes will gladly down any bottle that happens to be within reach.
Some rock stars, however, prefer to refine and perfect their booze intake, settling on a signature cocktail that suits their outsized personalities and consequence-free lifestyles. Rocks Off salutes these excessive musical titans with the following examination of rock and roll's greatest drinkers -- and the drinks they made famous.
Sammy Hagar's Waborita
Outside of music, the Red Rocker is best known for two things: his alarming inability to drive under 56 mph, and his incredible love of tequila. Sammy turned his passion into a cash cow in 1999, when he began distributing the tequila served in his Cabo-San Lucas cantina. Turns out, it was a pretty good move -- in 2007, Hagar sold his majority interest in Cabo Wabo Tequila for a cool $80 million. The guy could probably buy Van Halen at this point, but it's possible that he's simply too wasted off of his signature Waboritas to bother. Sam likes the drink so much, in fact, that he named his backing band after it.
Ingredients: 3 ounces of Cabo Wabo tequila 1 ounce of fresh lime juice 1 ounce of Cointreau 1 splash of Grand Marnier
Directions: Combine ingredients in a shaker with ice. Shake vigorously in headbanging motion, then strain and pour into a salt-rimmed margarita glass. Richly ignore those claiming David Lee Roth's cocktail tasted fresher.
Marilyn Manson's Antichrist Sipperstar
For a shock-rock icon like Marilyn Manson, Coors Light just ain't gonna cut it. The former Brian Warner found the perfect beverage to suit his image and tastes in absinthe, the potent, anise-flavored spirit believed by dudes in your dorm to cause powerful hallucinations. Reportedly, it's the only booze Manson will touch these days, but that could just be marketing hype for his very own brand of the stuff: Mansinthe. If you're curious to try it, be careful. Perhaps by design, it's reputed to taste like the Devil's piss.
Ingredients: 1 ounce of Mansinthe absinthe 1 ounce of water juice of 1 lemon 2 teaspoons of egg white 1 dash of bitters 1 drop of pig's blood
Directions: Combine ingredients in cocktail shaker. Shake thoroughly with ice and strain into a cocktail glass. Apply black lipstick before drinking. Following consumption, smash glass and cut into own abdomen. Paint disturbing self-portrait in blood.
Lemmy's Tennessee Overkill
When he's not onstage fronting Motorhead, it's rare to find rock god Lemmy Kilmister without a cigarette in one hand and a Jack and Coke in the other. For decades, Lemmy has been a fixture at the Rainbow in L.A., downing one Jack Daniel's cocktail after another while racking up points on the Megatouch machine. It's a strong-yet-sweet cocktail that's both common and iconic, befitting the man himself.
Ingredients: 3 ounces of Jack Daniel's Tennessee Whiskey 2 ounces of Coca-Cola
Directions: Pour whiskey over ice into dirty bar glass. Add Coke. Garnish with butt of Marlboro Red. Imbibe continuously for 45 years.
Rihanna's Jameson & Ginger
Red hair, loves Jameson... anybody ever consider that Rihanna might be Irish? Whatever her true heritage, RihRih has been plenty outspoken about her love of Irish whiskey. She even payed tribute to the hooch in song, suggesting that we all "Let the Jameson sink in" on the track "Cheers (Drink to That)" from her Loud album. In fact, Rocks Off has a theory that her whiskey addiction may be the root issue behind her ever-increasing number of fugly tattoos.
Ingredients: 2 ounces of Jameson Irish Whiskey Seagram's Ginger Ale 1 lime wedge
Directions: Fill highball glass halfway with ice. Add whiskey and top off with ginger ale. Stir. Squeeze lime into beverage and drop in wedge. Add cocktail umbrella-ella-ella.
Motley Crue's Kickstop My Heart
Motely Crue's autobiography, The Dirt, is chock-a-block with insane tales of drink, drugs and debauchery. One of the most memorable revelations from the band's darkest days included terrifying goofballs Nikki Sixx and Tommy Lee, on at least one occasion, injecting pure Jack Daniel's into their veins after running out of drugs. Don't bother to ask why -- there's no reason that could possibly make sense. "Like what the fuck, we can just drink it," Lee would later say, in what passes for a moment of clarity for that guy.
Ingredients: 20 cc of Jack Daniel's Tennessee Whiskey 1 splash of rubbing alcohol 1 full serving of drug-induced insanity
Directions: Fully embrace drug-induced insanity. Soak cotton ball in rubbing alcohol and swab injection site. Draw whiskey into syringe. Expel air from vessel. Tie off with rubber tubing. Administer full dosage of whiskey intravenously. Lie down and pray for sweet release of death.
