Guns N' Roses

[Jay]

Are there any Guns N' Roses fans here? I've been really into them lately. I was only two when Appetite For Destruction came out, and I can just barely remember when the Use Your Illusions I&II albums came out. I watch all of the bootleg videos on YouTube and I really wish I could go back in time, only being as old a I am now, and see the clasic lineup in concert.

[Mike's Beard]

Appetite For Destruction was the first album I ever bought. Me and my older brother had to pool our pocket money together to afford it. Then when our mother heard how often the 'f' word cropped up she tried to ban us from listening to it!

[Jay]

Appetite For Destruction was the first album I ever bought. Me and my older brother had to pool our pocket money together to afford it. Then when our mother heard how often the 'f' word cropped up she tried to ban us from listening to it!

My mom made my dad get a piece of paper and write down which songs I could listen to.  I think Sweet Child O' Mine was the only song by them that I could hear. Unless a "clean version" made it to MTV by way of a music video. The funny thing is, I knew what "the F word" was. I knew what it sounded like, and I knew how to spell it. But I wasn't allowed to hear Axl say it, for some dumb reason. 

[the captain]

They were an amazing band, the perfect combination of danger and rawness on one side, but pop appeal on the other, to cut through the very slick-leaning scene of the late '80s. (If you go back to their studio work and photos, though, they were pretty highly styled). Great songs.

[rab2591]

Back in my high school days I used to really be into them. I over-listened to Appetite for Destruction and now I rarely listen to it anymore....but I still think it's a great album.

On the contrary, Chinese Democracy was an unsurprising disappointment...I bought it and still regret buying it to this day.

[the captain]

I'm in the same boat on all that. Appetite and Lies were huge to me, and I bought cassettes (ah, those days...) of the Illusions on the day they were released. Not my typical listening fare anymore, but they all still hold a place for me. Then Spaghetti was a mess. And while I was curious enough about Chinese Dem to listen, I didn't even buy it. The best pop music is either perfectly of its time or timeless; new GnR didn't feel like either one to me by that time.

[grillo]

The first song I ever learned on guitar was sweet child o mine, which came out the summer of either '88 or '89 (freshmen or sophmore year) and I memorized every inch of those tabs . I can still play most of the key riffs from appetite without even thinking about it. GNR were the first band I got into that wasn't The Beach Boys or Jan & Dean. Or REM.
But  other than GNR Lies I really can't stand the other albums. There are some okay songs but the production is crap and the guy that replaced Steve Adler is a souless clown. Try and find the demos for November Rain and Don't Cry and you'll here what the follow up could've sounded like.

[guitarfool2002]

Big fan here, but only of the original lineup that produced Appetite and GnR Lies. I'm a big Izzy Stradlin fan, and as far as rhythm guitarists go he was one of the best in rock. Any recent interview with Slash, who seems to be popping up everywhere these days, has him mostly praising how good Izzy was. Just for fun, check out some of Izzy's solo albums to hear where his influence fit into the band's style.

THAT was one of the foundations of the band in its glory days. Izzy and Slash bring back Gibson-through-Marshall, tightly played rock guitar. And the songwriting was top notch, seriously - does Sweet Child O Mine ever not sound good on the radio?

I could go on for pages about them, seriously, so I have to limit myself a bit... I will add a few things:

- A great memory was having my cassette of Appetite loaded up and blasting on my Walkman on a trip to Los Angeles in early 1989. The videos were still in heavy rotation on MTV, and the band was everywhere. Sitting in LAX and destroying my ears by blasting "Welcome To The Jungle", it was cool. Then "G n R Lies" was a summertime cassette, which I played endlessly on a trip to the Jersey Shore one summer. I still think Patience is a brilliant piece of rock music. It was a ballsy move for a band like Guns to release an all-acoustic, drum-less single and video, and look what happened with the "Unplugged" phenom soon after.

- Definitely seek out the pre-Appetite demos, they're not all good but they do make fascinating listening. Welcome To The Jungle holds up as a demo very well, and is actually "bluesier" in the early form.

- Apart from historical reasons, I think it may be wrong to assume you missed anything by not seeing the original lineup on tour. Direct from people who were there in person, and from a few boots on the Appetite tours, they were sort of a mess on stage. The drugs, the general intoxication levels of various members, the way they just didn't play together - don't get me wrong, they were an intense live band when they were on the Sunset Strip by all accounts,  but their demons got the best of them when they got on the big tours, which is one reason why Adler got fired after a national TV appearance on Farm Aid where he wasn't on his game.

And I agree 100% the replacement drummer never worked for me, that's when I walked away and focused on their older music which I really enjoyed. And that damn "Terminator" video sucked too.

- By all means search for the band's live concert broadcast from Hollywood on MTV in 1988. Intense, star-making stuff, just live raw rock and roll. *THIS* is the version of Knockin On Heavens Door that floored me, and the official album version sucked out all of the intensity of that LA club performance, which included Slash rolling on the floor during his solos, looking totally gone.

The band could have ruled the world of rock for years to come but in all honesty they f***ed it up. After Izzy left they lost what drew me personally to their music in the first place, that Keith Richards-Joe Perry style that is timeless when played by the right people with the right attitude, and GnR owned it for a few years.

[stack-o-tracks]

Bahahaha it's great that everybody else realizes how much of a putz Matt Sorum is. Almost 3 years later and he still hasn't gotten over the fact Scott Weiland jumped the Velvet Revolver ship. He also wants both himself and Adler to play drums if the "original" GNR lineup reunites. 

[A Million Units In Jan!]

I was never a huge fan-they were really big towards the end of my middle school, and the beginning of high school years. I will say though, that I love the song 'Patience'. It reminds me of a time when I was young teen and I had no idea what the world was about (sigh). One song I really liked later on was 'Estranged'. Then they had the whole video trilogy mess that had something to do with dolphins. I didn't get it.

[the captain]

Then they had the whole video trilogy mess that had something to do with dolphins. I didn't get it.

Hahaha. But yep. The Illusions were when the whole balance of Big Theater and raw rock sort of went off track. Those videos ... wow. Yeah. It's hard to knock, because that kind of creative tension is what mad GnR great. Axl undoubtedly brought that big sensibility to the garage rock of the others. But it went haywire and never came back.

[Shady]

Huge fan!!

And guess what. I think Chinese Democracy is their best album, even if it's only Axl in the band

[Jay]

I seem to be the only GNR fan in the world who thinks that Matt was a better drummer than Steve Adler. 

[Loaf]

My favourite GnR album is Use Your Illusion II, and second may be Spaghetti Incident.

I'm a big fan of the Spaghetti Incident and it was the first CD I ever owned. I used to alter the settings on my dad's CD player to put Axl's vocals low in the mix. It was a long time before I knew many of the words.

I like Matt Sorum's work on GnR's records too.

As for post-1993, has anyone heard Gilby Clarke's 'Pawnshop Guitars' album? Great stuff. Imagine GnR with more of a 60s/70s influence.

[guitarfool2002]

I think Gilby was chosen in part because he was into the same style and sounds of playing rock guitar as Izzy Stradlin, as I mentioned earlier. His sound and style was a more instant fit than finding someone who wasn't into those sounds as much. Pawnshop Guitars is a cool record, and again I'd recommend looking for Izzy's other solo albums apart from his first "JuJu Hounds" disc which had the most success/airplay with the song "Shuffle It All" where he wears his Keith Richards influence on his sleeve!

While Izzy has jammed with Slash off and on since leaving Guns, I get the impression he wouldn't be into a GnR reunion or much of anything else related to that band name. And he and Axl were the backbone of the band, in its first incarnations. It was Slash and Steve Adler having been friends and bandmates pre-GnR, and Axl and Izzy forming the band, and Duff joined the band having moved to LA as a guitarist. So there was the group dynamic.

[Loaf]

I used to own Izzy's 117. It was a bit meh.

I also own a couple of other Gilby Clarke solo albums and it's fair to say he peaked with his first and it was all downhill after that.

Slash's Snakepit's first album is fun.

I was really into Duff McKagan's Believe in Me album when it came out. Haven't heard it in quite a while.

[Alex]

Was never a huge GNR fan...not that much different from Poison or Motley Crue...but I have to admit, SCOM is a damn catchy song.

[the captain]

...not that much different from Poison or Motley Crue...

I would have to disagree pretty strongly with that. I would say GnR was on a far higher level of songwriting and musical competence, not to mention more of a garage-blues (later especially meeting melodramatic bombast) influence. Whereas Poison was purely delightfully shallow, infectious pop only superficially coated with the "metal"-of-the-times sheen. And Motley Crue, a different sort of post British (metal) Invasion with the dopey tough guy/devil imagery, more like a Quiet Riot or something.

[Loaf]

Was never a huge GNR fan...not that much different from Poison or Motley Crue...

I'd disagree too. GnR aimed for a depth in their songwriting (see especially the "long" songs from UYI 2) that few other vaguely metal bands had.

[Jason]

GNR were definitely not a "hair metal" band. They were kind of like a version of the Stones for the late 80s, full of that bad-boy machismo and great guitar licks. Besides, shouldn't we all love GNR because they covered a Manson track?

[D409]

Bahahaha it's great that everybody else realizes how much of a putz Matt Sorum is. Almost 3 years later and he still hasn't gotten over the fact Scott Weiland jumped the Velvet Revolver ship. He also wants both himself and Adler to play drums if the "original" GNR lineup reunites. 

Matt Sorum's a good drummer, but he doesn't have the same feel for G'N'R that Steven Adler had on Appetite For Destruction, i.e. Adler was a better drummer for G'N'R. Appetite was classic. On the very day Use Your Illusion's 1 & 2 came out, I thought they'd never make another album ever again, and they never did until the belated Chinese Democracy, a reasonable album in its own right which has nothing apart from Axl Rose to link it to old school G'N'R.

[pixletwin]

I never felt GnR wrote genuine music. I was never convinced by what I heard.

[rab2591]

I never felt GnR wrote genuine music. I was never convinced by what I heard.

What's more genuine: An entire band jamming/singing about the streets of a city which they all walked on, or an entire band singing about surfing and only one member actually surfed?

GnR created some incredibly complex music....the entirety of Appetite For Destruction seems very genuine and convincing to me...however, I'm a very easily convinced person

[guitarfool2002]

I never felt GnR wrote genuine music. I was never convinced by what I heard.

Quite the contrary, at least on the Appetite For Destruction and GnR Lies era material. Guns was one of the *few* authentic bands in the LA metal scene, and I've heard other members of other bands who played that scene say they wished they were writing the songs Izzy and Axl were writing because the lyrics were more genuine and real than Poison, the Crue, etc.

Several band members were addicted to smack, and one sold it for profit: Mr. Brownstone is about fighting a heroin addiction. Sweet Child O Mine was a love letter to Axl's girlfriend, with music by Slash playing a guitar exercise over chords Izzy wrote. Welcome To The Jungle was about Axl arriving in LA from the midwest, and the video is even more graphic than the lyrics. One In A Million is also about situations Axl saw in LA. My Michelle is about a real girl who told Axl she wished someone wrote a song about her. Out To Get Me was about Axl's troubles he had in the midwest. Nightrain is about cheap booze the band would drink when they didn't have money. November Rain was written as an epic song before Appetite, and was on early demos from the band: they held it off Appetite because Sweet Child was already on there as a ballad.

The songs are real! They're about the experiences of the actual band - How much more genuine could they have been in the lyrics? They're heads and shoulders above bands like Cinderella, Poison, Winger, and other Sunset Strip denizens from the late 80's who did unfortunately write a lot of contrived, fake stuff. But GnR was different, musically and lyrically.

Disclaimer: This is for Appetite and Lies era, and some of the Use Your Illusion tunes. Anything after that I don't bother with.

[pixletwin]

I really don't want to come off as trolling, because that is not my intent at all. Really I think it's just Axel that I don't buy. Something about him, I just dunno. It's almost as if he "lived" his lyrics (as you say) for the same of appearing to have street cred.