What do you think the band needs?

[Twisted Nerve 85]

A fucking Album would be nice

Unless they wanna go down in history as the greatest cover band of all time 

[Kitano]

Hmmm....how 'bout get Slash, Duff, Izzy, and Matt back in the band?? ?.? That would be great, but for now, the only thing they need is a friggin' release date for Chinese Democracy!

You do know that matt scrotum isn't an orginal member of the band.   According to Axl he was only an employee anyway.

[Timmy]

...to release the album

[discobiscuit1]

As much as I hate Matt Sorum and his no style ham fisted drumming...calling him an employee was so unbelievably childish.

As far as what the band needs.

What they need is to have ownership of the project, so that they can have an equal partnership and say exactly what they think without fear of being 'fired'.

Only then will we get a true band effort, and an album released. Until then we all know which group of people were a BAND called GNR and which ones are employees, as Axl likes to call it.

An open line of communication with the band and fans would be nice too ...though its possible that they may need to work on communication between themselves first

[noizzynofuture]

This is a loaded question. ?First you have to wrap your mind around the idea that this current group of individuals are a band. ? "The Band" is out touring their solo projects and can't feel like they're still in GNR. ?The frustration has to be growing having to try for 2 years now to answer the question of when CD is coming out.

To answer the queston, the band needs to communicate with the fans.

We're about due for another member to officially announce their resignation ?

[marknroses]

They need a weapon of mass destruction to kick all the haters away from this message board and other GNR communities.

THE "haters" you refer to happen to be GNR fans like me.
As a GNR fan I take pride in GNR's music, performances, songs, stories, lyrics and rock n' fuckin roll memories from 1985-1993. I do not take pride at all for what Axl has done since 1994. In fact I consider is very much a disgrace to what he accomplished before. However, I was willing to give this whole new band a chance - 5 years ago - when Axl himself was publicizing the very possibility of an album coming. I didn't invite Axl to make any announcements about the new band nor any performance - nobody did, yet he did it himself and left us all hanging for 5+ years with promises repeatedly broken, concerts & tours canceled for what was in the end a very unremarkable  and meaningless "rebirth" of GNR. I was never impressed by anything the new band did with the exception of a couple of things:
1. Oh My God (instrumental)
2. The diversity & prior experience of talents in the new band that I once thought would be comparable with the old lineup.
3. The Exorcist Intro in concerts
4. The first 35 seconds of the MTV Vmas in 2002
5. When they played NEW material live (making otherwise crappy songs in my opinion sound somewhat interesting and exciting)

Well, thats all I could count. Not too impressive AT ALL. With the old band, I could write a fucking DOCTORATE describing all the great and cool things that the band was, what they did and what they stood for - none of which really ever existed, at least in the public eye with this new band. I used to count on Axl's promise that the new GNR songs would answer and make up for the lack of solid releases but now I don't think it fucking matters anymore. He could even release a record with material that is comparable in greatness with all the greatest hits of the old GNR combined (which I highly doubt he is capable of at this point) and it wouldn't change the fact that pulled this whole shtick in such a way as to alienate a large portion of his old fan base. His time passed. He could have released this record in 2002 while the hype was up but shot in down in a shitty fashion. For a million reasosn that I have no time of patience to list, this GNR will never make another AFD or even a UYI and have it come out and change the world and be successul.

Those of you who thing Axl doesn't care about fame or fortune must have your heads checked because you haven't listened closely enough to Paradise City. He's victory or death - there's no middle ground, no second chances with this guy.

Did it ever occur to anyone that there's a difference between finishing the record and putting it out? I don;t doubt for a second that there's something called CHINESE DEMOCRACY (I hate that name too) made by this band. But there's so much going against this record both inside the band, outside the band, privately, legally, publically and most importantly in Axl's head that it is insurmountable. Axl may have transcended his lowly existence in Indiana and conquered the world but he could never conquer himself. He even threatened at times not to release UYI and that is scary to me because I love that record - it changed my life. But we had Slash & Izzy & Duff who checked him and made him get on with the importance of putting out a record, and winning over fans with the greatest performances ever witnessed on stage. Today Axl is surrounded by yes men - some of you out there are included - and he will given every excuse until death parts him from us and u can all waste your time with questions like these that will never have an answer because it will never exist.

The question I would like to raise instead is not what this Nu GNR needs, but what do we fans need?
We all need to hit up ebay and get some GNR bootleg DVDs from 1985-1993 and watch this phenomenal rock band in action from performances all over the world, get your energy from them and rock hard in your own lives. Thats how I think we could even make Axl happy. Leave him alone.
    

MNR

[Continental Drift]

As one of those self-admitted Axl "yes men" you described, I hope you're completely wrong... but that was a brilliant post. A great read man.

[jgfnsr]

As one of those self-admitted Axl "yes men" you described, I hope you're completely wrong... but that was a brilliant post. A great read man.

I agree.  As the "months go on and the years go by" it seems more and more likely that marknroses has summed it up perfectly. 

Only Axl can do anything, if there's anything left to be done, to prove otherwise....

[Warren]

SLASH.


THAT'S WHO WE NEED.

[ppbebe]

We? Not me. Yawn.

You have VR.

Leave GN'R with us.  Both are happy.

[Mr. Nik™]

We? Not me. Yawn.

You have VR.

Leave GN'R with us.  Both are happy.

 

we (and the band) need only the album released, the rest will come as consequence 

[Intercourse]

Mark N Roses,
Excellent post man., it's always a pleasure to read your submissions.

You know what? I think the problem is that Axl sought to rid himself of the controlling influences of the old band and was successful in doing so. What I think he didn't bargain for was how alienated and alone he suddenly felt up on top of the mountain they all climbed together. If you look at how somebody got to the place they are in, you can tell a lot about why they are the way they are.

No band since the Beatles caused such a swift and massive change in music. No band since the ?Fab 4? drew such a huge cross section of fans so quickly and burned a place into the history books so fast and with such vehemence. Nirvana managed to do the same 5 years later and look what happened to them, their singer is dead, the band gone.  The pressure to suddenly have to lead a billion dollar industry called your band in your early twenties must be intolerable at times. What a transition to have to make, I don't think any of us can even begin to imagine what it's like to have 500 people working for you, the world looking in your window and going through your garbage when you were just  a twenty three year old street urchin two years before.

At the end of 1995/1996 Axl got what he wanted, he got the power..."the power rewards of my vision" I think he called it. However, with great power comes great responsibility and that is what I think toppled Axls head over. It was all down to him to keep GNR relevant, to lead the musical direction, to take the shit, to go to court, to hire and fire, to manage the budgets etc. Nobody in his current line up and none of the previous temporary members were ever in his league of success. There is nobody in GNR who can really know or understand what changes Axl went through on this incredible whirlwind that was GNR 1987-1993. Tommy was a cult hero, not a stadium filler and the same goes for all the rest. From what we have seen in the last two years , despite nicknames like ?the General? etc the guys take their wage and go home, leaving Axl alone to deal with the all consuming mammoth that is the past reputation of his band and how he is to top that.

The only people who can truly identify with Axls journey are Duff, Izzy and Slash. They all loved and depended on each other at one time. They made the massive transition to global rock stars together. Slash and Axl both spoke of their deep bond early in the UYI tour as the shit about them increased; they attached and rebuffed it together. They drove the band upwards as a pair, not Axl alone, check out the interviews from the time if you don?t believe what I am saying. I think Axl needs that empathy and common bond of experience more than ever now.

VR recently spoke about getting together and looking at each other and marveling how they are all alive and successful together again. A collective triumph over adversity makes for great friendships. Scott Weiland was a clever choice of front man because Duff and Slash knew he had undergone a similar life path that they had and had fucked up all the same ways. Straight away all men would be on the same page. They had empathy and could identify with each others needs / hang ups etc. This breeds unity and strength in a band unit, with that comes confidence and creativity. Axl on the other hand pays his players like work men, they live their lives, he lives his. It is hard to build a strong and safe core to lean on in times of need from that arrangement.

It is very telling that in the Kurt Loader interview that when Axl was asked where he has been and why he has taken so long to come back, he says something along the lines of 'well, how do you build up something as big as Guns from scratch with totally new members and a totally new crew?'. I think Axl is still wondering how to do that today. I think AFD and UYI have become these sheer cliffs that Axl just cannot climb over. Nobody lets him forget his past, nobody lets him forget that it?s all down to him. There are no other big names in GNR now to absorb some of the heat and pressure if this CD album goes on it?s ass. The others can float away, claiming it was just an experiment for them and nothing more. Axl will be viewed by many as the man who gave away gold to pay for shit and for that I feel truly bad for him.

Right now, Axl needs a mentor but sadly, he doesn?t see it that way. When you?re the one who is supposed to have all the answers to massive questions and you know you don?t, it?s very hard to move forward.
Peace,
Intercourse.

[madagas]

Quit fucking psycho analyzing the guy. You guys don't know him and have no idea why he hasn't released a record. Maybe it has simply taken him a decade to figure out what kind of record HE wants to make. I love it when people say he needed or needs? Slash, Izzy, Duff, et al..he wasn't happy with what they recorded after UYI and he evidently still isn't happy with all the new material recorded. All these musicians are great-none of them are really better or worse than the others (old band vs new band). Axl simply has something in his mind that HE wants and it won't be released until HE is satisfied. He released AFD, UYI, and Lies because he was still hungry and needed to build his financial fortune. Once the UYI tour ended and he was set, no one was going to tell him what to do and no one has since.

[Intercourse]

I never said any of the musicians were better or worse than each other, my point is he has no equals in GNR anymore, nobody in the same boat.
No equals means no one to answer to except your own fears  = no album.
I never mentioned anything about getting the old members back, just pointed out how their collective experiences gave them the balls to get back out there and have each others backs.
This is not an old vs new argument its an Axl vs himself thing.
I don't see confidence in his actions, quite the opposite actually.
This is a fan forum, we can analyse the ass of Axl if we please, its a hobby, that's all. We have fuck all else to focus on anyway.
peace,
Intercourse

[madagas]

He had no equals then. He pushed those guys around all the time-holding them hostage over the name issue, coming late to concerts and the band just letting him do it. Axl simply compromised about the albums because he needed the money. I wasn't specifically talking to you Intercourse-more to Marks N Roses and others who actually think Axl needs Slash or Izzy or whoever. My point is he pushed Slash around as much as anyone in the new band. Izzy didn't put up with it, showed some balls and left. Bucket essentially did the same thing. The rest of them were/are just pawn's in Axl's game.

[Intercourse]

I see your point clearly now Madagas.
Axl really is the classic paradox and that I suppose is part of his intoxicating appeal.
I watch this saga like people watch the MJ trial, with morbid fascination.
Despite the new bands testimony to the opposite, the whole process that is GNR just seems unhealthy somehow.
13 million dollars , 10 years, all the originals on one side, him on the other..law suits, BH gone etc...it just shouldn't be this hard
It's weird that Slash & Duff will still answer questions about GNR and Tommy won't (lately anyway).

And despite all of that, here I remain a 34 year old doctor who can't grow up and can't stop watching and waiting.....sad me!!
peace,
Intercourse

[Saul]

Buckethead. 

[ppbebe]

Another mind-blowing band that arises rivalry.

[Voodoochild]

He needs to chill out and, if all the stuff is done, release the album. No matter what he do, there will be always people who bash him, dislike his songs and claim that he needs Slash.

[discobiscuit1]

As cynical as it sounds GNR needs Axl to become a man again....to become unaware of celebrity, to be his own man and fall in love with creativity, and not dwell on the fame.

They also need equally strong male components who can stand up to Axl to the point of physical threats....no yes men, no L.A drones......real guys, making a real band out of mutual respect, talent and equal imput.