Here Today... Gone To Hell!

Long Awaited Return of Guns N' Roses
Single ?Chinese Democracy? takes humanitarian theme

By Chris Holehouse
Epoch Times Staff

Nov 6, 2008

All the controversy and chatterings of the reorganized mega-band Guns N' Roses aside, one thing is for certain?Axl Rose still flaunts his rock and roll craft with a humanitarian undertone, keeping his conciseness neatly aligned with justice and human rights.

Millions of fans remember the epic, soul stirring 1993 Guns N' Roses piece Civil War, where Rose and his platinum selling G N?R troupe painted a rallying anti-war protest that left even the most apathetic moved. Beginning with the famous line, "What we've got here is a failure to communicate," sampled from the film Cool Hand Luke, the song provoked strong introspection and an array of intense emotions. By the time Rose's gripping tone and the words "Peace can last forever" chimed, one would be hard pressed not to be totally immersed and laden with a full body chill.

It's been a long time since 93' and the GN?R sounds of old, and Guns N' Roses have taken on a few new reforms. The band released its first single and title track, ?Chinese Democracy,? from the heavily delayed and strongly anticipated album of the same name, which slates to be made available exclusively through Best Buy retailers on November 24.

The song Chinese Democracy, was inspired by the Martin Scorsese film, Kundun which documents the life and teachings of the exiled Tiebetan leader the Dali Llama.  Rose first played the song live at a Las Vegas show in 2001 stating "?right now China symbolizes one of the strongest, yet most oppressive countries and governments in the world."

Past the Tibet situation, Rose brings to light yet another atrocity in China with his mention of the persecution of the spiritual practice Falun Gong with the lyrics "Blame it on the Falun Gong, they've seen the end and you [the Chinese Communist Party*] can't hold on now."

The persecution of Falun Gong has been a reality in China for nearly ten years, starting in July of 1999, and the media outlets and news sources in both the East and the West, have been for the most part, tight lipped. Axl Rose has taken steps in a meaningful and honorable direction with the inclusion of real and breathing humanitarian content that takes aim at reaching the world's people through his tried and true medium of hard rock music.

http://en.epochtimes.com/n2/arts-entertainment/chinese-democracy-guns-n-roses-6749.html

Thanks for posting this article.  Very nicely written and gives Axl postive credibility.

That is really fucking cool. I will be forwarding this to a few people. Thank you for sharing this find.

Very rare article indeed, Axl gets positive words, well, every fifteen years...

Thanks for posting this !

cool shiz!

The only thing I would discuss about this article is when it mentions Civil War as a 1993 song...I guess it was released as a single that year, but the song was well known since its release in UYI in 1991 and even before, considering it was firast released in 1990 as part of Nobody?s Child: Romanian Angel Appeal.

Nevertheless it?s an interesting article.

i dont think Civil War ever had a single release?

Very cool article, thanks for posting!
Nice to read a positive article for a change.

Civil War

Released: May 29, 1993 (UK)

UK Chart peak: 11

GFSTD 43 CD
Civil War (LP version) / Garden Of Eden (LP version) /
Dead Horse (LP version) / An interview with Slash from March 1993

GED21810 CD (Germany)
Civil War (LP version) / Garden Of Eden (LP version) /
An interview with Slash from March 1993

http://htgth.com/releases/use-your-illusion2/civil-war.html

Super cool post. Thanks for sharing.

Nice!

Good to see there is more out there than the tired old shit, and someone is actually thinking about Axl's music. : ok:

That is a really cool article. I hope other media outlets pick up on it.  :)

Thanks for posting that.  : ok:

 :)




/jarmo

Just wanted to add this last part, for those who haven't clicked the link:

* Editor's note--The lyric appears to implicate that 'you' is referring to the Chinese communist regime based on the context, and is inserted in brackets for the benefit of the reader. This is the editor and writer's understanding and has not been confirmed with the artist(s).

I wonder if the song and title of the new album will indeed get Axl banned from China if he hasn't already been banned yet.

I thought I heard Axl say that he was already banned!

I only remember Axl saying at a concert in China that he had better go ahead and come see the country before he was banned.

Cool read.

Once again, Mr. Axl Rose demonstrates his songwriting talents to be much more complex and deep than the average shit songs on radio today (Hello, Nickelback!)

They probably banned him shortly after!  :hihi:

At least, I THINK he said he was banned on the Eddie Trunk show.  If anyone can clarify this bit if (mis)information, that would be great!

Freakin' China.  ;D

I believe he said he wanted to visit China before he was banned from going there. I don't think he is actually banned, but who really knows!

I sent this on to a friend of mine.  We're both Falun Gong practitioners and he would love this.

He went there.  He said he visited Chairman Mao's tomb.

interesting, i went and read some info about Falun Gong , and the persecution in China.

it would be interesting to get an interview with Axl talking about his view in the subject and why he have choosen Chinese Democracy as the name of the cd.

The Epoch Times are the Falun Gong's newspaper. Of course they would do an article on the song.

I don't really give them much credibility, though. They didn't even spell Dalai Lama correctly in the article.

I agree with the sentiment that Axl is a good humanitarian, though.

Wow. I'm surprised that someone actually wrote something intelligent in an article, rather than just repeating the same things over and over again.  :smoking:

Yes I know that, but what I said was the reason he went there he said.

Looks like most of you forgot how Axl introduced 'Chinese Democracy' in Las Vegas, Nevada on January 1, 2001 so here you go:

I really do like that Axl quote.  But do you really think that movie just happened to be on TV right before he was about to do his first show in years.  My guess is he put the movie on for inspiration or motivation.  Or it was just a BS story he made up to segway into Chinese Democracy.  Just something I've always kinda wondered about.  Either way I love the story and the song.

prairieboy,

he doesn't say that it was on before he was leaving for the first show, maybe he was about to leave to go to the studio (or wherever) and the movie was on, and it inspired him to write the song,

Good point, I guess I always interpreted it that way. 

Axl was at the House Of Blues in Chicago when Vegas called and asked to do a warm-up gig for RIR at the House Of Blues.
So it was at the House Of Blues in Chicago where he saw Kundun.