10 Most Underrated Band Members

If life on the Sunset Strip had gone another way, Motley Crue would probably have been known as the greatest punk rock band of the 1980's. While Nikki Sixx and the rest of the gang were mining a frantic form of hard rock in their early days, things turned a corner once they acquired Mick Mars.

Instead of being a like-minded starry eyed kid on the Strip, Mars was a seasoned veteran of the scene whose background came from the blues scene. While the band's influences clearly came from other theatrical acts like the Sex Pistols and KISS, Mars's musical well was much more in tune with guys like Jeff Beck and Cream. Rather than just playing Sixx's compositions straight-ahead, Mars' guitar tone would give the band a completely different dimension of sound.

To hear his guitar pyrotechnics in action, take a song like "Wild Side." The initial crux of the song is based on the heavy riff that screams Crue, but the real swagger of the tune comes in the bridge, where Mars twists the song on its head into a more bluesy shuffle. From his whammy bar dive bombs to his lead guitar riffage, Mick Mars gave Motley Crue just the right amount of classic rock bravado to tilt them into true greatness.