What do they bring to the table? (The new album)

[Waldorf]

Spirit, here's something about the writing of If The World, from http://www.nrhz.de/flyer/beitrag.php?id=13269 

Q- Concerning songwriting: As the rumors go, you wrote the guitar
parts for 'If The World', the new Guns track that appears in Ridley
Scott's movie "Body Of Lies". Is that true? What was the recording
like and how did you get the idea?

CP- Like a lot of things i write, it started with my old 12 string
guitar that sits by my couch. i bought it years ago at a pawn shop
for $50, and have never changed the strings on it. That way is has a
very bass heavy sound. And I just started
this riff that suggested a cool vocal. Being weird that I am, i
recorded that straight into a drum machine sampler, MPC2000, and
manipulated the riff till it sounded almost mechanical. Then I wrote
the Drums with a kind of
Dub/Reggae beat, where i swing the 2 and the 4 beat real heavily.
Afterwards i went into my studio and added Strings, Piano, Bass,
Echo Guitar, Synth and Sub. This all took about 2 hours to write the
arrangement. I then gave those Tracks to Axl,
and he did likewise, laid down the vocals himself in one night.
When I heard what he had done with it, I was completely blown away,
just floored by it.
I had never heard a song like that before or since. We later
added guitar solo's for more flavoring.

I think the great thing about this band is that each of them got so many styles 

[Voodoochild]

Great story, thanks for posting it. Id love to know more about the writing on CD songs.

[One.In.A.Million]

Spirit, here's something about the writing of If The World, from http://www.nrhz.de/flyer/beitrag.php?id=13269 

Q- Concerning songwriting: As the rumors go, you wrote the guitar
parts for 'If The World', the new Guns track that appears in Ridley
Scott's movie "Body Of Lies". Is that true? What was the recording
like and how did you get the idea?

CP- Like a lot of things i write, it started with my old 12 string
guitar that sits by my couch. i bought it years ago at a pawn shop
for $50, and have never changed the strings on it. That way is has a
very bass heavy sound. And I just started
this riff that suggested a cool vocal. Being weird that I am, i
recorded that straight into a drum machine sampler, MPC2000, and
manipulated the riff till it sounded almost mechanical. Then I wrote
the Drums with a kind of
Dub/Reggae beat, where i swing the 2 and the 4 beat real heavily.
Afterwards i went into my studio and added Strings, Piano, Bass,
Echo Guitar, Synth and Sub. This all took about 2 hours to write the
arrangement. I then gave those Tracks to Axl,
and he did likewise, laid down the vocals himself in one night.
When I heard what he had done with it, I was completely blown away,
just floored by it.
I had never heard a song like that before or since. We later
added guitar solo's for more flavoring.

I think the great thing about this band is that each of them got so many styles 

Wow never read that before, Chris sure does know how to write songs. It's funny though because if I never knew Pitman wrote the music for If The World. And you had to guess which song was, I would always go with If The World.

It has that electro/synth feel that you can only attribute to Chris, I really hope he keeps this sort of songwriting up for future songs.

[Halo69]

Awesome Story! Thats why If The World is probably my second favorite song on the record! First one is Catcher in the Rye of course and third Better.

[Spirit]

Wow, got the answer to my little wondering straight away! Thanks for posting that Waldorf, haven't seen that one before.

So Chris pretty much wrote everything except the lyrics and guitar solos on the song, even cooler that it only took him a couple of hours! Also a fun little insight that Chris does most of his writing with the guitar, not the keys.

[Voodoochild]

Street Of Dreams is a song I'm a little curious who wrote the piano parts. We know Dizzy plays them live, but so does he with everything except November Rain. Dizzy is credited for the song, so I assume he wrote parts (or all) of the piano for the song. It's a great piece, so he definitly got skills in the writing department as well.

Spirit, I remember I read something here (can't tell if it was a proper interview or just people from CD.com who went backstage at the Paris 2006 gig) about this. Dizzy would have said that Axl wrote the intro and he wrote the rest of the piano parts, with everyone adding their own stuff later. He even adressed SOD as being one of the first songs wrote "as a band".

I think the Chinese Democracy tab book also credits SOD for Robin, if I'm not mistaken.

[Liquor & Whores]

Dizzy Reed - Cheers to Oblivion

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6o7NdrBl_c4

[gnrjanus]

also listen to the air by Dizzy Reed

So beautifull

It's on his myspace
http://www.myspace.com/dizzyreedmusic

[Spirit]

Street Of Dreams is a song I'm a little curious who wrote the piano parts. We know Dizzy plays them live, but so does he with everything except November Rain. Dizzy is credited for the song, so I assume he wrote parts (or all) of the piano for the song. It's a great piece, so he definitly got skills in the writing department as well.

Spirit, I remember I read something here (can't tell if it was a proper interview or just people from CD.com who went backstage at the Paris 2006 gig) about this. Dizzy would have said that Axl wrote the intro and he wrote the rest of the piano parts, with everyone adding their own stuff later. He even adressed SOD as being one of the first songs wrote "as a band".

I think the Chinese Democracy tab book also credits SOD for Robin, if I'm not mistaken.

Thanks for the info. 

Dizzy Reed - Cheers to Oblivion

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6o7NdrBl_c4

also listen to the air by Dizzy Reed

So beautifull

It's on his myspace
http://www.myspace.com/dizzyreedmusic

The songs are indeed great. The band today has such a good mix of players bringing in different styles yet overlapping eachother enough to achieve that must-have chemistry they display in concert.


Frank Ferrer
Not quite on the level as Brain or Freese from a technical viewpoint, but this doesn't matter at all when this guy got the groove and is as solid as he is. Very energic playing style which fits perfectly with GN'R music. All that counts is having a drummer that can fit in and bring something to the song, Frank is definitely there. I'm not favouring any of the three drummers mentioned as I think they're all great.

When it comes to writing, I have no idea really. He's played with Love Spit Love and the Furs, right? Don't think he had any writing credits there. One of the other projects of his are Untouchable, which I might think he had some credits as writer.

http://www.myspace.com/ghettometo

Some cool songs there with a vibe that might suggest Frank had some influence. Don't know what genre to put it in, it's hard rock with elements of rap/ hip-hop/ funk.

[One.In.A.Million]

Frank was also in a band with Richard Fortus called Honky Toast.

http://www.myspace.com/honkytoastrock

Not sure whether Frank contributed to the writing of the songs, as well as the drumming. But they do rock, a chance to see 2 members of GN'R in another band, before GN'R was even on their radar. 

[Z?phyr]

What do they bring to the table? (The new album)

A kick-ass album followed by a kick-ass tour and a few million smiles...

[One.In.A.Million]

also listen to the air by Dizzy Reed

So beautifull

It's on his myspace
http://www.myspace.com/dizzyreedmusic

This is such a cool song, Dizzy's voice sounds very Bowiesque sometimes. His and Chris's style, reminds me of early British rock, like androgynous and classic sorts.

[carmiedisco12]

After listening to Village Gorilla Head and some of the Dizzy stuff and watching the semi acoustic gigs GNR have done recently I just wish to God that they recorded a semi live album with minimal manipulation based on a very small venue style. EG....live band play each song 20 times and keep the best cut....and virtually no overdubs a little more raw and pure. Now THAT would be awesome. CD for me was like a great artwork that had been laminated.

[peter7411226]

Its hard to say what everyone will bring to the band once they start recording. You can have the most talented bunch of guys in the recording studio but it means nothing if you lack the chemistry to create magic. Just because they have it live doesnt mean that it will transcend into the studio. Trust me im in a band and have tried recording songs outside of my band with other musicians and it doesnt always work as well as you think it will. 

[svdv22]

Are there any solo songs released by Dizzy (except for the air), Richard, or any other band member?
I'm familiar with Tommy's vgh and Bumblefoot's work.

[Halo69]

I think they're gonna bring an album full of Hits again, if you ask me 

I cant Fuckin wait! 

[One.In.A.Million]

Are there any solo songs released by Dizzy (except for the air), Richard, or any other band member?
I'm familiar with Tommy's vgh and Bumblefoot's work.

Dizzy does have some other songs, they used to be on his myspace. But he took them down a couple of years ago, I think he may be preparing them for release, who knows.

[Marion68]

Great story, thanks for posting it. Id love to know more about the writing on CD songs.

Me too thanks

[Spirit]

I'm bringing back this topic. It was created about 5 years ago, and since then there's a bunch of new members here there's probably some new viewpoints as well.


There's surfaced some new information since the time the thread was created, such as Ron not having taken part in any songwriting so far. We don't know the status there, so let's not go there (in this thread).

Richard has released stuff with The Compulsions.

Tommy released another solo album in 2011.

Dj has released a couple of albums with Sixx:AM and some solo stuff for Eli Roth.


What do you guys think of the song writing capabilities within the band today?

What sort of sound could we potentially get from this group?


Personally I think they have kept the musical diversity to a certain extent. It was greater in 2002, but still, there's people with vastly different backgrounds in the group. I think this still encourages a potential for some unique sounding music.

[rebelhipi]

I wonder what happened to One.In.A.Million ? 


Frank is a member of The Compulsions too.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1WZAFtQU0IU This jam that Bruno Poeys posted here is Amazing.

I have no worries whatsoever about the bands song writing skills.