Released: March 10, 1998
Motörhead never relied on long preparation, but Snake Bite Love pushed that habit into risky territory. Lemmy later recalled that the band had no songs six weeks before recording, while illness kept him out of some rehearsals. How much could instinct accomplish when the material was still being built on the way into the studio?
“Love for Sale” suggests quite a lot. Phil Campbell’s riff moves with a greasy, clipped swing, leaving room for Lemmy’s bass to scrape underneath it. Mikkey Dee keeps the tempo controlled and saves his harder kick patterns for the turns between sections. The lyric is pure late-night salesmanship—sex, pills, and bad intentions—but Lemmy’s phrasing creates the hook. He crowds the verses, then stretches the title across the chorus as if he has all night.
The rhythmic details often hold the record together. “Dogs of War” works from a rigid, marching guitar pattern while Dee fires short bursts around the snare. Lemmy delivers the battlefield language from inside the soldier’s head, where duty and death have become part of the same routine. The title track loosens up with a dirtier rock ’n’ roll bounce. Lemmy said the song was rebuilt after Dee’s drums had already been recorded, with Campbell replacing the original guitar idea. Some of that friction remains in the finished version: the drums stay firmly planted while Campbell’s riff curls around them.
“Assassin” shows the risk of accepting the first workable idea. Its verses drag a blunt riff beneath Lemmy’s barked medieval imagery before Dee breaks the song apart with a tom-heavy, almost tribal passage. Few Motörhead songs contain a section that strange. The detour gives “Assassin” its identity, though the repeated title and stretched-out structure never fully grow around it.
“Take the Blame” solves the same problem with sharper decisions. Dee opens with fast double-kick work, Campbell locks into a serrated riff, and an organ suddenly cuts through the middle of the song. It is an odd colour for Motörhead, yet the band keeps moving beneath it and prevents the arrangement from becoming a novelty. Lemmy’s political lyric is just as direct: powerful people create the disaster, then distribute the guilt to everyone below them.
The slower material reveals how much range this lineup had when it gave an idea enough room. “Dead and Gone” begins around a clean, circling guitar figure, with Lemmy singing in a tired lower register before the distorted sections widen the song. Lemmy also played background rhythm guitar during the verses, which helps explain why the part sits so naturally beside his bass phrasing. “Joy of Labour” heads in the other direction. Its verses grind around a low, sludgy pattern where Lemmy’s chordal bass nearly becomes another rhythm guitar. The pre-chorus briefly opens into a sadder melody, then the main riff drags everything back down.
The hurry becomes harder to ignore later in the record. “Night Side” has speed and a workable guitar part, but the chorus relies on repetition without building tension. “Desperate for You” races ahead while its “desperado/desperate” rhyme sounds written to beat the clock. Both songs reach the end efficiently. Neither develops far beyond its first clear idea.
So how much could instinct accomplish? On Snake Bite Love, enough to produce the tom break in “Assassin,” the organ detour in “Take the Blame” and the bruised quiet of “Dead and Gone.” It could not finish “Night Side” or make the hook in “Desperate for You” sound less hurried. The album captures three musicians capable of building strong music at the last minute—and leaves the last-minute decisions where everyone can hear them.
Written by Rob Joncas for DeadNoteMedia.
Artist information and music courtesy of the band.
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