Here Today... Gone To Hell!

http://abcnews.go.com/WNT/story?id=2622568&page=2

Axl Rose as Voice of a Generation?
Guns N' Roses 'Sweet Child of Mine' Considered Analogy to 20th Century's Shift From Optimism to Disillusion
axl

Guns N' Roses lead singer Axl Rose may be offering a philosophical take on modern society while getting parties started with his hit "Sweet Child 'O Mine." (ABC News)
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OPINION By CURT CLONINGER

Nov. 1, 2006 ? It turns out that Guns N' Roses' "Sweet Child O' Mine" is the voice of my generation.

It narrates the 20th century's transition from optimism to disillusion, beginning with some dude's poetic idealization of his girlfriend, and dissolving amidst the sound and fury of encroaching insignificance.

Watch the full report on the "World News" webcast today at 3 p.m. ET.

It's like taking your date to the malt shop and winding up in a tomb.

The song's unforgettable opening guitar riff has earned it a place on many an aerobics mix tape, and justly so.

Its lyrics tell of an escapist teen love. I imagine the song's subject, "Sweet Child," wearing ripped jeans and several Cyndi Lauper bracelets, our narrator picking her up in the back of the trailer park in his green Impala, and they cruise to Makeout Point.

As the lyrics go, Axl Rose sings, "I'm just sitting here staring at your hair, and it's reminding me of a warm, safe place where as a child I'd hide." I can see them embracing tenderly, and going to shoplift a six-pack of Schaefer. So far, so good.

Then suddenly, out of nowhere, Slash's guitar drops the nihilism of postmodernism, and lite-rock riffing gives way to wah-wah-drenched fury. His melody lashes out like the neglected cry of some abandoned creature, like the grasping arms of a drowning man.

Our narrator's voice resurfaces ? deep, growling and utterly changed. He's asking a simple question, over and over. It repeats and builds into a falsetto wail, an epic complaint that demands an answer he knows he won't get.

Lost Ideals

It's one thing to write an essay bemoaning the decentering of contemporary man in postmodern society.

It's another thing entirely to play a wailing guitar solo that viscerally embodies that decentering. Slash's solo is our voice ? 2,000 years after a resurrection we never witnessed, facing a future that seems insoluble.

"Sweet Child O' Mine" doesn't simply pin its hopes for the satisfaction of mankind on idealized romantic love. Nor does it mow over the daisies and burn down the malt shop.

Instead, it proposes an ideal worth fighting for, admits the ideal is unachievable, and dares to ask, "Why the discrepancy?"

This question continues to echo unanswered from crappy dashboard radios in crappy green Impalas throughout our land.

Curt Cloninger is a writer, teacher, artist, and designer. His work has been featured in I.D. Magazine, HOW Magazine, The New York Times, Desktop Magazine, and at digital arts festivals from Korea to Brazil.

Whoever wrote that was obviously tripping, since the song SCOM should be replaced by Estranged.

OPINION By CURT CLONINGER

^ need i say more

No!

Did you read the article at all?

He suggests SCOM not because it's tragic, but because you can read it, fairly subversively or even in an (auto)biographical sense as the journey of a bright eyed young man with the world at his feet, to a lost, disillusioned, cynical and almost nervous adult.

The author likens this to the transition that's happened to the world over thelast decade. In the mid 90s, it seemed there was nothing we couldn't do. The philosophy of enlightened liberalism was triumphantly marching, civilization progressing, and we seemed to have conquered all of our battles.

Now- that attitude is dead. Morality, and ideas of what progress itself is, have died. Creationism and many other backward ideologies long since discarded, religious fundamentalism, moral absolutism and an almost global feudal system have all reemerged. 'Where do we go now?' indeed.

It's not that hard to see!

Sorry, I lost you at "Did".

I agree, NO !!

SCOM may be postmodernist...
but clearly Estranged is modernist !... So is most of use your illusion, including COMA.

I remember reading how Axl said it was very important for him to put a bit of hope at the end of the tunnel for each song.. no matter how heavy the storm is... it was important for him at a personal level but also because he felt responsible for his fans... he didnt want a pathetic song to cause someone to commit suicide... The introspective journey eventually leads to salvation...clearly modernist :P

Gn'R should have made movies ala Beatle's "Yellow Submarine" or Pink Floyd's "The Wall."

Songs like Estranged and Coma CANNOT be an 'Analogy to 20th Century's Shift From Optimism to Disillusion'  relating Axl to the voice of the generation because...

they never were main stream songs, only GnR fans like those songs, not the general population.  Almost everyone loves SCOM, and this guy is saying it affected the entire generation.... estranged and coma only affected GnR fans

Look at this way, listen to the way they sound, SCOM sounds like a 80/90's ballad song. Estranged doesn't cause it can easily be interpreted as a song released today.

yeah right that's exactly how the lyrics go :hihi:

Wow!  Someone knows what modernism is about here =)

I agree!

Also, AFD is a VERY postmodern artwork.  It blends all these styles together, classic rock, blues rock, punk, "metal"...  and it made it it's own! =)

i know you didn't right the column, but when YOU quote get it right yourself :hihi: but that's cool

Modernism isn't at all about when a song/art form in any medium was released, it's that in a critic's or reader's opinion it falls into the school of modernism.

Glad someone got my humor!

I thought modernism is meaning that it could be conceived by many people as sounding like it is from today. Please tell me what your idea of modernism is.

Get a Job

Appetite for Destruction reveled in the notion that everything is not alright, and at the same time it was immensely popular. It is the U.S. answer to the call, 'Nevermind the Bollocks'. Sure we had Black Flag, The Ramones, even. But this was akin to a pot of boiling water that someone put the lid on (the media) until it finally spilled over with Appetite. Excellent contextualization of 'Sweet Child'. The first part of the song harkens back to Poison and Motley Crue and the latter part of the song looks foreward to Alice in Chains and Nirvana-- with a balanced, solo interlude as a nod to both the MC5 and Hendrix.   

Lets not forget that this is a song about a mans love :love: for a women and then the realization that the relationship is going to hell. :crying:

That is the reason why it resonated and still does resonate in so many people.  :peace:

It's complicated, and I don't have time to explain lots about it. Read this for a semi-decent introduction. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Modernism

I have a job, thanks, and an interesting and difficult one it is too. Why don't you become a bit more articulate and eloquent and try and actually think?

Great read through that article/ABC news ? thanks jazjme? :)

I didn?t know that one can make such a deep interpretation of SCOM. But it make a lot of sense to me, as he is not only interpreting the lyrics but ? all important ? the music layer.

Additionally, I think Curt Cloninger refers ? between the lines ? to the biblical story, from which a quote ?Quo Vadis?? (Where do you go?) comes from, as he writes ?Slash's solo is our voice ? 2,000 years after a resurrection we never witnessed, facing a future that seems insoluble.
And also: ?Our narrator's voice resurfaces ? deep, growling and utterly changed. He's asking a simple question, over and over. It repeats and builds into a falsetto wail, an epic complaint that demands an answer he knows he won't get?.

So, resurrected Jesus carrying cross on his arm appeared to St. Peter on his flight from Rome (persecution of Christians). St. Peter asked Jesus: ?Quo Vadis Domine?? (?Where do you go, my Lord?? And Jesus answered: ?I go to Rome to give my life again?. These words referred to St. Peter, who realized himself, that he has to come back to Rome, to defend his faith, even if he has to die for it, what indeed happened, as he was crucified as well.
So this is just a reminder to the biblical story and the famous quote.

Going back to today?s global meaning of the question ?Where do we go now?? ? we really don?t know in which direction the world is going:

I agree with you mlewis here in 100 %

I also think SCOM?s second part is very decadent, somehow pessimistic - just the same the author writes: ?His [Slash's] melody lashes out like the neglected cry of some abandoned creature, like the grasping arms of a drowning man.
Our narrator's voice resurfaces ? deep, growling and utterly changed. He's asking a simple question, over and over. It repeats and builds into a falsetto wail, an epic complaint that demands an answer he knows he won't get?.

My other thought concerning SCOM:

The biggest shame is that such a great song is so much depreciated by the silly pseudo-artists trying to perform it live or doing their own covers.

e. g. Flat Pack & DJ Mylo techno cover ? the biggest harm and destruction of that great song & Slash?s riffs that one could EVER DONE!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5BzoBeD61NY

Also Fergie singing SCOM on The Black Eyed Peas tour & other stupid IMITATORS!

With such ?artists? Music won?t go far! It?s like going nowhere! A dead end!

What we really need in MUSIC now is ?Chinese Democracy? to be finally released!!!!? :yes: : ok:

Hope my thoughts make some sense to you all? :)

 :peace:

amusing but i disagree with the interpretation. at least when trying to match it up with some larger cultural this or that. it is a song where innocence and experience are bridged and that's as far as it should go.

Dude you should really read someone?s posts before quoting them.



Read the link the guy provided me, post modernism is concept you really seem to have no idea about, you?re just posting stuff to create some sort of impression that you?re smart so some that idiot might be dumb enough to believe it.

Sure SCOM is a timeless classic but it isn't post modern, maybe it was in the 80s but not now. Post-modernism isn't about a song sounding great.

Ummm- you can't be post-modern in the 80s and not now. Post-modernism refers again to a specific ideological movement, classically about 'the death of the author' essentially leading to the conclusion that meaning is in the power of the reader, and not the author. It's the predominant underpinning movement behind much modern literary theory.

? Yeah, that, yeah.

I'm not here to make anyone to "belive in" what I write. I just express my thoughts.? And it's still the same. I just misquoted the texts (still learning the tools here), that's why I edited my previous post - so read again if you wish. And as you can see I wasn't going into your modernism/post-modrnism talk at all.
Also thanks, but I'm not going to use your hint to read some Wikipedia stuff. I think the two last sentences of your (^ quoted) post prove that is you, who got lost in terms. And learn something about carrying on real/non-insulting-others Disscussion too.

Why can't we all just get along?

The take over of the telecommunication airwaves (the 90s) and  the more recent establishment of an elitism (class) division in the distribution of information itself on the Internet are changes in communication history that are unprecedented. In terms of our innocence and ability to comprehend what was happening at the time SCOM speaks loudly to the innocence of the sixties child and the changing of the guard in terms of political power from the Veterans to our parents the Baby Boomers?

While the telecommunication industry was studying tipping points and early adapters and we wondered if they were counting us, it turns out they were.?

No cable, no internet, no cell phones, no pagers for the kids in the early nineties, demographically generation X was living through economic conditions equal to the great depression (verifiable) so AFD was reflecting the simple truth to our living conditions for a substantial period of time. (They called it Grunge and us slackers, nice spin). The music industry like the eye of the needle grew increasingly narrow and humans became logjams trying to get through it. Sameness and Gate keeping became the norm and do not dare step out of it or be in any way unmanageable (see Music Coalition Report).?

Communication became less and less innocent and more and more jaded throughout the nineties until an evening at the Baked Potato in the late nineties would reveal we were no longer even capable of communication in any sense of normal. Mean was in to the point of shooting ourselves in the foot and total isolationism became a survival tool. This too is reflected in the evolution of GNR

What is best for me is what?s best; emerged as the only axiom necessary in the new American Leadership model after 2000. This motto should be duly noted as the conscious of the Baby Boomers now running this country. What generation X?s voice or reality will be if and when the X generation ever gains political power will be interesting, our low numbers alone indicate it may never happen.

 AFD and SCOM were the prelude to the feminism of Kurt Cobain (feminist) asking ?What is wrong with me? when in fact it was society that was turning towards the colder razor edge with all to increasing regularity. Our small generation X was just along for the ride, in terms of powers the guard changed and controlled larger and larger segments of the press. My Big issue with the Rock scene of the sixties is pretty much they left us to the vultures. They stole the book and floated away on their Yachts.

 The vultures were getting meaner and making more money than ever off of our innocence, be it in the pornography Capital of the World or the profit margins at AT&T, and AOL, from this new emergence we have moved to a belief through ownership and control of the media they can do anything they want. It took a long time to pull Ma Bell apart and no time to put her back together.. Masculine and Hierarchal these are a large step away from the steps taken Two thousand years ago. Americans don?t see it is as clearly as people in other countries see our loss of symmetry.

The idea of leave it better than you found it is no longer considered heroism it?s considered idiotic and uniformed decision-making in a profit loss statement to corporate America. How exactly can you be a hero when the hero has become the loser in terms of status?

As a country of people raised to believe in heroes is it any wonder we were lost and adrift. It was a mind field of ridiculous elevations of power and greed over talent and compassion that somehow and for some reason Geffen seemed determine to let rise GNR Persist.

 Maybe its a nod to Yoko Ono's contempt for the industry that Geffen persisted and GNR broke through the emerging gate keeping at all

So the question remains as relevant today as when it was asked all of those years ago, where do we go now?? Or maybe more importantly will they let us go?