MÖTLEY CRÜE’s NIKKI SIXX Explains Why He Legally Changed His Name

Nikki Sixx

MÖTLEY CRÜE bassist and founder Nikki Sixx spoke to Australia’s “The Project” about his memoir, The First 21: How I Became Nikki Sixx, which comes out today.

“I was born Frank Feranna in 1958,” Nikki said. “A lot of messaging that I heard when I was a young boy about my dad and about my mom — and I ended up being raised by my grandparents — I kind of carried that with me. When I got into that time in my life when I started to become of age and the hormones and discovering rock and roll, by the time I got to a place where I was playing in bands, I didn’t wanna carry my dad’s name on with me.

He continued: “So I changed my name to Nikki Sixx legally and said, ‘I’m moving forward.’ And I did. I got my own family — everything Sixx everywhere. I actually did manifest a new life. But in writing the book, I realized it wasn’t all true. My dad didn’t just walk out on us. There were a lot of discrepancies. And so in the book, what I enjoyed was I got to learn a lot about my history. It kind of really helped me heal, I guess, in a lot of ways, some of the stuff, and I hope I can pass that on to other people.”

In the book, bassist reveals that he stole the name Nikki Sixx from Jeff Nicholson, who, as frontman of a California cover band called SQUEEZE, went by Niki Syxx.

“I loved that name right away — even though it was missing that sweet extra K,” Sixx writes, as per the New York Post. “Then and there, I decided to steal it. For a while I went around calling myself Nikki London… ‘Nikki Nine‘ was on the table briefly.”

Eventually, he went back to his original inspiration, slightly changing the spelling: “Then I thought, ‘F*ck it… I’m just going to be Nikki Sixx.”

New dates and tickets for “The Stadium Tour,” featuring MÖTLEY CRÜEDEF LEPPARD, POISON and JOAN JETT & THE BLACKHEARTS can be found at this location.