Motörhead

Motorhead (spelt Motörhead) are indelibly associated with their charismatic larger-than-life founder and front man Lemmy, one of British rock's biggest personalities. He's built his ferocious reputation on uncompromising attitude and a party lifestyle that resulted in him becoming the personification of heavy metal (though he dislikes the term and prefers to describe his music as rock'n'roll). Lemmy was fired by Hawkwind in 1975 and, adopting the title of the last song he wrote for Hawkwind, he formed Motörhead to play "fast, loud, raucous, arrogant, paranoid, speedfreak rock'n'roll". Initially this fell on stony ground with several flop singles, but they eventually broke into the UK Top 40 with the Overkill album in 1979 and built an avid live following. But it was the 1980 single Ace Of Spades that came to define Lemmy and Motörhead and the Ace Of Spades album became their biggest hit, reaching Number 4 in the UK album charts. They also captured imaginations with the St Valentine's Day Massacre collaborative EP with all-female rock band Girlschool and subsequently went to Number 1 with the No Sleep 'Til Hammersmith album in 1981. Despite personnel changes and a subsequent lack of hits, the legend of Motörhead continued with albums like Orgasmatron (1986), Sacrifice (1993), Snake Bite Love (1998), Inferno (2004), Kiss Of Death (2006) and The World Is Yours (2010).