Slash Helps Ex-Gunner Get Off DrugsAugust 15, 2010
In 1978, a Hollywood kid named Saul Hudson saw a skateboarding schoolmate wipe out and he stopped to lend a hand.
Little did they know that 32 years after that fateful meeting, Hudson -- now known as guitar hero Slash -- would be getting Steven Adler on his feet again.
After nearly 20 years of estrangement, Adler's childhood friend and former Guns N' Roses bandmate is helping the drummer conquer the addictions that destroyed his career and nearly killed him.
"It's not like I ever lost any love for Steven," Slash says. "Over the years, I kept tabs on him. When it got really, really bad, I went over and tried to get him help. I've been on this long recovery thing with him. I was just trying to get to him before something truly dire happened to him."
"It's just so wonderful to have a relationship with Slash again," says the 45-year-old drummer. "He is one of my biggest supporters, and one of my biggest supports when it comes to sobriety and getting my life together. I've always looked up to him. Even when we were kids, I looked up to him."
After forming in the mid-'80s and taking L.A. by storm, GN'R's original lineup -- mercurial singer Axl Rose, guitarists Slash and Izzy Stradlin, bassist Duff McKagan and happy-go-lucky Adler -- conquered the world with their 1987 debut album Appetite for Destruction. The bandmembers had no problem living up to that title, indulging in every sexual, alcoholic and chemical excess they could.
"I didn't get into music to do drugs," claims Adler. "I got into music for the girls. The drugs came later."
They came hard and fast. By 1990, when the band reconvened to record what would be the Use Your Illusion albums, the unreliable Adler was firmly in the grips of heroin addiction. After a disastrous gig at FarmAid -- when the drummer fell while taking the stage -- he got the boot.
"Getting kicked out of Guns N' Roses for drugs sounds like the most hypocritical thing in the world," admits Slash. "But he just got to a point where he was impossible.
"Everybody else had cleaned up their acts, at least enough to be coherent. But we couldn't retrieve Steven. He was in such denial that you couldn't even deal with it. I wouldn't have kicked him out of the band on my own, but Steven was just too far out of reach."
Adler -- whose resentment over being ousted is still apparent in My Appetite -- now says he knows better.
"I did feel that way," he admits, "It's a shame that part of the book is a year old. I've grown up since then. We were all doing drugs, yes. But I took it that one step further. I couldn't control myself. I couldn't play to the best of my ability. I messed up. I accept it. I'm the one that threw it all away."
And he had to go to court to get some of it back, suing the band to recover more than $2 million in lost royalties -- something else he blamed on the others.
"It wasn't the band. I didn't know at the time -- I didn't know for two decades -- but it was the management screwing me," he alleges. "The band didn't try to take anything from me."
Watching Celebrity Rehab With Dr. Drew one night, Adler remarked he'd be willing to try it. Within a week, his family contacted Dr. Drew Pinsky. Adler had someone else he needed to talk to.
"I told Dr. Drew I needed to talk with Slash. I didn't think I could get the most out of it unless I did. So he hooked up a meeting where it was just me and Slash in a room with no cameras or nothing. And I got to apologize to him for blaming him for 20 years of downfalls and drugs and jails and institutions when it wasn't his fault. He didn't put the needle in my arm. I did. Same with the band -- I thought they let me down. But really, I let them down."
So far, so good. He's on a 55-city tour to promote My Appetite. He's gigging with his band Adler's Appetite, playing GN'R classics. He's got a new single called It's Good to Be Alive. He even drummed on Slash's recent self-titled album. His dream is to reunite GN'R -- "I would love more than anything to finish what I started with those guys, and If I have to kidnap them to do it, I will," he laughs. But that's the future. Today, as Slash says happily, "he's doing good."
Edited, complete interview here:
http://www.torontosun.com/entertainment/music/2010/08/12/15007871.html
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