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Tommy Lee’s wife reveals drummer broke ribs falling down stairs on holiday

By | Published on Tuesday 28 June 2022

Tommy Lee

The truth about Motley Crue drummer Tommy Lee’s broken ribs is out. He has previously said that he doesn’t have a “fuckin badass story” about how the injury happened, but he refused to give further details. Now his wife, Brittany Furlan, has revealed that he fell down some stairs while on holiday.

Motley Crue’s much delayed US stadium tour with Def Leppard, Poison and Joan Jett kicked off earlier this month. However, fans hoping to take in the full force of Lee’s drumming have been left disappointed, as he has only played a few songs each night.

It became apparent that something was wrong at the first show, when Lee decided to leave the stage after five songs. Explaining to the audience that he had broken some ribs, he said: “I wish I had a fuckin badass story, like me and [MMA fighter] Conor McGregor fuckin scrapping out in some fuckin bar or something, but I don’t”.

Since then, at most shows he has only played the first three songs of the set, before allowing Ozzy Osbourne drummer Tommy Clufetos to take over – although at the band’s most recent gig in Philadelphia on Saturday he returned at various points in the set to play a further five songs.

Last week, he told an audience in Orlando: “About fuckin two weeks ago, I broke not one, not two, not three, but four fuckin ribs right here. Crack. I’m not gonna tell you how because it’s fuckin bullshit. I wish I had a cool story for you, but I definitely don’t, man. It ain’t fuckin cool”.

So, he’s clearly not keen to spill the beans, but Furlan has apparently tired of people asking, so in a new Snapchat video she told all.

“Everyone keeps asking how Tommy broke his ribs, so I’m just gonna tell you”, she said in the video. “We were staying at an old rental house in Nashville. It was a cool, old quirky house, but the stairs outside were made out of stones and they were really uneven, and the roots were pushing them up from the tree. And everything was fine. I actually fell up the stairs a few times getting groceries, but whatever”.

“So, the day that we were leaving Nashville, our driver came and we had all this luggage and he wasn’t helping us – he just stayed in the car”, she continued. “And so Tommy was trying to carry all of our luggage for us. And he fell down these crazy stairs and broke four ribs. Not fractured, not bruised – broke. And it was crazy, cos I came out and he couldn’t breathe. It was really scary. He was on the ground and he was gasping for air”.

Despite this, she said, “he got on a plane that day still and went and did the rest of rehearsals [for the tour] in Pennsylvania. He went to the hospital in Pennsylvania when we landed and they were, like, ‘You have four broken ribs’. And they wanted to keep him there, but he did not wanna stay. He’s a fighter. He’s the toughest guy I know. I mean, look at all his tattoos. He just really fights through the pain”.

Yeah, that’s our Tommy. Tough. And a bit silly. After a short planned break in the tour since Saturday’s show, he’s now at least had a chance to rest for a bit. The next show is tonight in Charlotte, North Carolina. It remains to be seen if he can take the stage for a few more songs or even a full set.



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