Estranged an Awesomely Bad Song?!

[jarmo]

Yes he is, now back on topic.




/jarmo

[nesquick]

ok, no problem.

[Voodoochild]

The funny thing? Just saw @ MTV Brasil: November Rain is the 5th wrost song ever to them. They said: "the song is Stairway to Heaven-ish, but several times worse. And the "worst moment" was the ending, with Axl's vocals.

Yeah, MTV Brasil is full of shit and their VJs are crap. They have been slamming VR and GNR for no reason. Bunch of idiots. 

[badgirl]

Just an FYI, but the "women are sending Axl their vaginas in the mail" comment was made by Nick Kroll, who i went to college with. He is actually, incredibly funny.
i wouldn't get too bent out of shape about Estranged making the list. we all know its, if not THE best, one of the best Guns songs. besides, VH1 usually gives Guns big props..
i'm surprised they didn't put November Rain in its place.  it fits all the criteria (long, bloated, sensitive) but isn't as good a song.

[N.I.B]

i dont like mtv. simply said. they had the number one band Nirvana out of 20 (GN'R was second, yay?) so It goes to show what dumbasses they are.

[Naupis]

I like the song sometimes, but also find it to be very boring others. I can see how this became a selection for the list. No need to rag on VH1 for not liking it. GNR is going to need them if they ever plan on getting airplay on TV.

[KeVoRkIaN]

I'm also at a loss about this - I thought VH1 was attacking the song not the video - which I love anyhow.

[grog mug]

Estranged is GN'R's best work.  I didn't know a band could actually make a song that great.  It surpasses November Rain and Coma, which are two other great GN'R makes.  When the song winds down in the end and the last couple of minutes are laid back.  It's like GN'R is reflecting back on all the good times they've had leading up to that point.  VH1 is crazy, if there is a bad GN'R song it should of been Since I Don't Have You!!!!

[RichardNixon]

I think "Estranged" is GN'R's all-time best song. It's one of the greatest songs ever written, IMHO. At first I was pissed to see that it made this list, but what can ya do?

[St.heathen]

Thing is with a such a unique and huge song as Estranged you need to "take it out there"  and sell it.  They did it with November Rain, they played the VMA's, played it -  i would guess at nearly every live show.  With Estranged they didn't push it like they could have.  It came out when the band were not seeing eye to eye. 

The video - i think it's great, but as the song was meant to be a part of a trilogy - the video didn't seem part of it. They also re-used the Dolphin imagery for Since I don't have you - which if i remember rightly came out  not long after Estranged appeared.

I don't think they played it live as often as they should have ( i don't know facts and figures but it definatly wasn't as regular as NR).

And to top it all off they didn't give it a Propper single release, so they didn't give it a chance really. Not in the UK anyway.  You had to buy the import.

Estranged, like Coma, will always remain songs the fans love because they - as someone else has said - they are not your average rock songs, they challenge a little more thought than that.  And they are like our little gems.  It would be a shame if we never heard those live again one day.

From what i have seen i think MTV and VH1 are more into their reality tv than the music anyway.

[Spartikcus]

Well said St.Heathen.
I feel like calling them right up or starting some sort of protest.
Just now on my car ride home, before I read the news,
I was listening to Estranged and I said to myself "This has got to be GNR's best song".
And now they shovel this garbage in my face!
Well just because Dee Snyder says so doesn't mean shit.

[ccorn69]

you know i thin sometimmes we have to ignore people, and this time we need to ignore vh1; for me the song and the video for estrangedrock, i've loved them from the first time i saw it back when they still played videos on mtv. if others dont like it, well fuck'em im not gonna let tha tbother me, and vh1 wnats to name it one of the awsomely bad songs, well fuck 'em too...

[cumbum]

like i said if u wann amake fun of the video...no problemo...but this is a show about bad songs...and estranged is not a bad song!

That's a little fucked up, heh.
I could care-less if they make fun of the video, but talking about the song is just a little odd.
I thought the song was really great. *shrug*

[jgfnsr]

The funny thing is that when VH1 was on and this show was on, I told my brother that I prayed to the Heavens that "Estranged" wouldn't get on the countdown, even though I had a hunch that it would. Turns out I was saying that at video #33 and then Estranged made an "undignified" return to TV when it was played at 32 with critics bashing it left and right with all kinds of irrational statements and arguments.
I think this may have turned out to be a great thing for GNR and for the song because it does give it airtime and promotion - yeah its a bit pathetic, it should have gone down as the greatest video/song of all time in my opinion, but Im glad that since this video has suffered a bad fate from the day it stopped playing on MTV's rotation in 1993, at least it gets a mentioning now. Any promotion is good promotion at this point for GNR and the video and the song. I hope people get into it - that was Axl's dream.

The fact that this song even makes the list of "awesomely bad metal songs" shows what kind of impact it ultimately had on the public. I have a feeling that Axl and GNR had worn out the public's emotional interest when November Rain, Don't Cry and Yesterdays had played out Axl's emotions on video by the time Estranged came out. People also have a hard time relating to Axl's problems as demonstrated by the lyrics and content of the song and video. Axl did not publicize well that he had nearly committed suicide in 1990 and that he was in therapy dealing with some incredible traumas, despite his interviews with many magazine publications. Axl was still putting up a Rock God front and so people couldn;t connect the hard hitting image of Axl and his style with his true emotions. As someone commented tonite on the program, Why is Axl Rose bitching when he had girls sending their vaginas to him by postal express? I wonder so myself at times, but its definitly clear that his emotions which had brought him to the top of the rock world ultimately brought him and the band down as well. Something bothered the man - the only ones who know the real truth about the guy are his bandmates and his ex-girlfriends and I still find it strange as fuck how little they have exposed of the guy. I'll bet that its out of pity, because Axl is not a totalitarian leader. People can say whatever they want about him and get away with it. He's a geniune "sweetheart" who got carried away by some harsh elements in his life and those who wanted to take advantage of him for that and his talents and money and so these people feel bad about the guy and just don't talk about him and let him be.

By the way, as I've stated in the past - I broke down and cried when I first watched the video in 1999 on the "Welcome to the Videos" compilation. No Don't Cry for me, Im much better now and I got GNR's music to thank for nearly all of it.
I consider that moment to be the point where I became an ultimate GNR fan and I never looked back or looked to any other source for a greater music because I never had to again. I believe the cinematic piece to be the "most emotive video" (as personally stated by Andy Morahan in the "making of fucking videos - Estranged") ever in the MTV era and the song is indeed a very powerful one that has changed my life and given me a hope. The melodies are incredibles, the solos amazing and Axl's whispering at the beginning of the song sets the tone for a song that was unlike anything that GNR had ever recorded up until that point. I wish these "critics" (who are really rock journalists and comedians who are paid for a living to bash those with success and fame) would do a little research in the life of the guy who was behind many of the concepts and songs that made GNR the ultimate in Rock N' Roll in their time. Perhaps they'd have a better understanding of Axl's genius and know that unlike nearly all of the songs on that list, that is one that wasn't pulled out of his ass and that it really means something.

I look forward to the day that Axl gets his dignity back and can answer up to these haters. If he never does, then at least I got a treasure of Rock N' Roll that most people are too shallow and objective to understand in their lives.

 
MNR

If The Dude may digress for a moment...

"Velvet Revolver: the rock band that redeemed GN'R."

Surely you jest.

[Doc Emmett Brown]

I couldn't believe my fucking eyes reading this. I always thought the song was amazing. Besides I have never thought of GnR as a "metal" band anyway. To me they have always fallen into the bluesy hard rock vein. In their time they were a modern stones or zeppelin. And if they want to rag on the piano solo as not being rock n roll or metal or whatever the fuck they want to try to categorize the band cheaply into they should listen to let it bleed.

 

I first listened to Let it bleed after hearing the UYI's (because GNR introduced me to the Stones), and I felt it was an inspiration for the UYI's.  It's really sad when people criticize GNR using piano, but the Stones get to use all that and more - and made some of their greatest songs with it!  But as killingvector said above, it was public perception of the band that hurt the song.

[groupie]

the thing about people saying how guns shouldn't have used pianos and horns and all sorts of shit they used besides the basic rock instruments one the illusion twins is because people wanted a new appetite. i don't get it.why can't a band experiment? that's what makes a good band. if you play the same kind of music all the time, people get bored, so the illusion twins is in my opinion an experiment, a very succesful one, a very huge step forward when it come to the band growing up as musicians.
estranged is pure genius-the lyrics are fantastic;you can really see how axl isn't  a violent empty-headed junkie that lots of people take him for, but a very talanted guy who just came to one point in his life where he just wants to straighten up some thing with himself.
it's a very matture song. and about the piano solo;it's totally okay,and by the way the guitar solos were a total masterpiece. and even axl himself thanked slash for the killer guitar melodies. so don't get upset about some idiots saying how estranged sucks. cuz everyone here agrees with you that it's a fuckin great song. 

[nesquick]

the thing about people saying how guns shouldn't have used pianos and horns and all sorts of shit they used besides the basic rock instruments one the illusion twins is because people wanted a new appetite.

I agree. I think piano on rythmic is fantastic.

[Spartikcus]

The second I heard the Estranged piano solo I went straight to my keyboard and learned it key by key.
It is a beautiful solo that should never ever have been bashed like it was on this show.

[Wheres Izzy]

I watched part of it and didn't see what they had to say about "estranged" but they also mentioned Danzig in there which I thought sucked. I don't love Danzigs solo stuff like I love the misfits but I mean I thought "mother" was a cool song. And a very weird thing was when they were recaping up to that point every song sounded like really cheesy, pop, glam, make-you-throw-up-in-your-mouth, hair metal except for "estranged" and "mother". It could be just because I like those songs and not the others but they really didn't seem to fit anywhere near every other song on there, which probably deserved to be there. Of course I am sure theres a RATT message board somewhere saying the opposite. Just much much fewer people on it.

[Axl_owns_dexter]

What did they say about "Mother?"  That song just plain rocks.