‘Kickstart My Heart’ is a song by American heavy metal band Mötley Crüe, originally released on their 1989 album, Dr. Feelgood. Released as the album's second single in 1989, ‘Kickstart My Heart’ reached number 27 on the Billboard Hot 100 chart in the United States in early 1990.
In a 2015 interview, Mötley Crüe bassist Nikki Sixx related the origins of ‘Kickstart My Heart’, which he wrote while the band was already working on Dr. Feelgood. Sixx was playing acoustic guitar in his house while scribbling words on a piece of paper. When the group’s former manager read the words, he encouraged Sixx to share it with the rest of the band. Sixx was reluctant, but eventually did show the band and the track came together quickly. The phrase "kickstart my heart" supposedly refers to Sixx's overdose incident where a paramedic injected his heart with adrenaline;
Steven Adler disputes Nikki Sixx's version of the events that inspired the lyrics for the song. The former Guns N' Roses drummer recalled to the Triple M radio station in May 2018: "He wrote it about the paramedics took that syringe and did that Pulp Fiction thing to him. But they didn't do that; they didn't do that. I dragged him into the shower with a broken hand and a cast on my hand, I rolled him in, I put the cold water on him in the shower and I started slapping him in the face with my cast. And next thing you know, the purple in his face just disappeared. And then right then, the paramedics came in and they grabbed him out of the shower like a rag doll, dropped him in the living room and they just pumped his chest with their hands. And that was it. But he got a hell of a good song out of it. It is entertainment, after all."
The song deals with the band's newfound sobriety during the songwriting process and on stage. The rush they used to get from drugs they were now getting in other, more natural ways. Nikki Sixx told Rolling Stone: "That was a song I had written very quickly and had brought into rehearsal. I thought it was a throwaway, something that would belong on Too Fast For Love. It just really took on a life of its own and fit on the album a lot better than it should."
The video clip was shot at the Whisky a Go Go on October 5, 1989, during Mötley Crüe's warm-up show before embarking on the Dr. Feelgood world tour. Sam Kinison is featured at the start of the video chauffeuring the band to the Whisky in a 1946 Buick ambulance.
Label – Elektra
Songwriter – Nikki Sixx
Producer – Bob Rock
SONG LYRICS
[Verse 1]When I get high, I get high on speed
Top fuel funny car's a drug for me
My heart, my heart
Kickstart my heart
Always got the cops coming after me
Custom built bike doing 103
My heart, my heart
Kickstart my heart
[Pre-Chorus]
Ooh, are you ready girls?
Ooh, are you ready now?
[Chorus]
Whoa, yeah
Kickstart my heart, give it a start
Whoa, yeah
Baby
Whoa, yeah
Kickstart my heart, hope it never stops
Ooh, yeah
Baby, yeah
[Verse 2]
Skydive naked from an aeroplane
Or a lady with a body from outer space
My heart, my heart
Kickstart my heart
Say I got trouble, trouble in my eyes
I'm just looking for another good time
My heart, my heart
Kickstart my heart
[Pre-Chorus]
Yeah, are you ready girls?
Yeah, are you ready now, now, now?
[Chorus]
Whoa, yeah
Kickstart my heart, give it a start
Whoa, yeah
Baby
Whoa, yeah
Kickstart my heart, hope it never stops
Whoa, yeah
Baby
[Bridge]
Kickstart my heart
When we started this band, all we needed
Needed was a laugh
Years gone by, I'd say we've kicked some ass
When I'm enraged or hitting the stage
Adrenaline rushing through my veins
And I'd say we're still kicking ass
I say, ooh-ah
Kickstart my heart, hope it never stops
And to think, we did all of this to rock
[Chorus]
Whoa, yeah
Kickstart my heart, give it a start
Whoa, yeah
B-b-b-b-b-b-baby
Whoa, yeah
Kickstart my heart, hope it never stops
Whoa, yeah
Baby
Kickstart my heart, hope it never stops
Whoa, yeah
Baby
Whoa, yeah
Kickstart my heart, give it a start
Whoa, yeah
[Outro]
Kickstart my heart