What's in a Name?

Axl mentions in this months classic rock:

Picture of (old) Axl and characters of GNR whited out in front of the GNR logo.

(Header) Guns N' Roses without Slash, Duff or Izzy; The Who without Moon or Entwistle; The Sensational Harvey Band withouth Alex...You can't call any old Cola Coke, so why should bands be allowed to trade under a tried and truested name when it's obvious they're no longer the real thing?

Paragraph 4

'The message isn't getting through. Axl Rose has commandeered the name of Guns N' Roses, but has done nothing except drag it through the dirt'

Paragraph 11

The last remaining 'real' member of Guns N' Roses, Axl Rose perhaps has every right to retain the name. But with a bunch of hired hands, the singer embarked on a catastrophe-srewn tour (eventually pulled), and has spent (and continues to do so) the equivalent of a small nation's debt in creating an album called Chinese Democracy.

With his own tyrannical behaviour having caused his band Twisted Sister's break-up in 1987, Dee Snider is both perplexed and amused by Axl's 'stewardship' of Guns N' Roses. "He swapped a cool looking guy with a top hat [Slash] for a dick with a bucket [former guitarist Buckethead]!" he hoots in bewilderment. 'And his tour was sold out, but he didn't turn up, I mean, what the fuck?!"

With Axl more reclusive than ever, and Slash, Duff McKagan and Matt Sorum finding success with Velvet Revolver, other ex Gunners have come out of the woodwork. Their former drummer Steven Adler toured as Adler's Appetite, and most recently teamed up with LA Guns / Brides of Destruction guitarist Tracii Guns (Slash's GNR predecessor) for a string of shows in the Far East, billed as Guns N' Roses revisited.

Axl has yet to comment on this, but has his hands full with a lawsuit from Slash and Duff who allege the singer sold their share of the band's publishing rights without consent. 'Suffering an apparent attack of arrogance and ego...Rose recently decided that he is no longer willing to acknowledge the contributions of his former partners and bandmatesin having created some of rock's greatest hits,' the legal papers claim.

The hair metal world is becoming ever more matted - not to mention incestuous. Ex-Love/Hate and LA Guns singer Jzzy Pearl now fronts the reunited RATT, while original Ratt singer Stephen Pearcy uses the name Stephen Pearcy & The Rat Bastards. Earlier this year, Pearl went out with Steven Adler as the singer with Adler's Appetite, who released an independent EP and played a repetoire compromised of almost all Guns songs.

"Why would Axl try to stop me?" Adler told Classic Rock. "I'm just one original member of Guns N' Roses now playing with a bunch of new people. He's doing exactly the same thing."

We're now going back to the same cities, and people have our CD," Pearl enthused. "Its a testimony to our energy and hopefully our quality. Yes, this set has lots of Guns N' Roses songs, but people want to hear 'The Shit' and we intend to give it to them. It's no great burden. I'd rather sing these songs than Foreigner ones."

Adler "Or songs by Ratt!" (Ouch!)

"Anyway how can we be a covers band if the songs are mine?" Adler protested. "I wrote them with Slash, Duff and Izzy. But I'm having more fun playing them with these guys. Who's to tell me that what I'm doing is wrong?"

Well, the fact that Pearl has since jumped ship and had Adler banned from a Ratt dressing room may tell us much of what we needed to know.

.....goes on about Skid Row

Although Skid Row and Bach's band share a nucleus of songs in their set list, a re-union is about as likely as...er Chinese Democracy coming out next week and Axl playing a gig?