Once Izzy left the songwriting suffered drastically, to me he was sure damn important to GNR.
Axl always pushed to evolve the sound of the band, he wanted GNR to be more versatile and more power to him, UYI sans some filler songs is excellent!
The guitar tone of Slash will ALWAYS be GNR sound, whether people like to admit it or not. Hasnt been another guitar to own the sound of the band like he did, not saying the rest are bad guitarrist but they will never be THE sound of GNR, they cant evoke the feeling Slash did with his solos.
I cant believe the posts some people make here, happy friday!