Kerrang! article ? Return To The Jungle

[Spirit]

RETURN TO THE JUNGLE

It?s been over 20 years since Axl Rose, Slash and Duff McKagan shared a stage. Now, the reunion they said would never happen finally is. Kerrang!?s Ian Winwood celebrates the return of ?The Most Dangerous Band In The World??

On Saturday, August 20, 1988, 107,000 pairs of eyes in Donington, England, were trained on four musicians and one frontman. The band onstage were known as Guns N? Roses, a collective that were unknown just one year earlier to almost all of the crowd now gathered before them. But today, everybody knew the group?s name, and knew what they stood for: Danger.

?I watch MTV and it?s hard not to throw shit at the TV set because it?s so fucking boring?, guitarist Slash told this magazine in 1987. ?Even the bands here in LA are the same way, [as is] the whole music industry. It?s new to us, this business, and we meet these people and they say, ?Do this, do that?. And we go, ?Fuck it, fuck you!? Because it?s just not us. We do whatever we want to do?.

?Rock?n?roll has sucked a big fucking dick since the Sex Pistols?, was rhythm guitarist Izzy Stradlin?s considered opinion.

On this overcast day on the final weekend of the summer, Guns N? Roses were performing at the Monsters Of Rock festival, an annual one-day-jamboree of rock and metal held at Donington Park. At the time of their booking earlier in the year, GN?R were the perfect fit for their lunchtime, second-act-of-the-day slot. But by the time late August rolled around, Guns N? Roses, armed with their debut album, Appetite For Destruction, had exploded into the sky like so much dynamite. As summer faded into autumn, the group?s profile was virtually ubiquitous.

?The buzz got out, and we kept getting invited out to see these idiots?, Slash told Kerrang!. The idiots to whom the guitarist referred, by the way, were the people who work for American record companies. Eventually the group threw in their lot with the Geffen corporation. Thirteen months after the release of Appetite For Destruction, the band?s record label hired billboards all over Europe to announce that this debut album had sold more than 15 million copies.

[Spirit]

Over the course of four years, Guns N? Roses were one third of a triumvirate of groups that would shift the tectonic plates upon which rock?n?roll stood. Along with Metallica and Nirvana, in this pursuit they were a force for universal good. In their articulate rage, not to mention the impression that they would sell your soul for hamburger meat, alcohol and heroin, these feral and deeply unpredictable characters had turned a fire hose on the fraudulent pop-metal of their adopted home city, and much else beside.

The sea of faces at Donington Park may not have yet known that such change was underway, but they knew that something was up. Such was the clamour to see the band play that the situation was fast becoming dangerous. The event mat have been headlined by Iron Maiden ? ?I hope not?, answered frontman W. Axl Rose when asked if his own group had anything in common with Maiden ? but at least as much interest was paid to the visiting Americans. This reporter was at the event, standing towards the front of the crowd, and even now can recall the acute sense of fear of everyone around him as the constriction of scores of thousands of people became a thing of which to be rightfully frightened. Footage from the event can be seen ? alongside that filmed at Giants Stadium in New Jersey, NY ? on the video to Paradise City, where the surging crowd resembles a mad stampede. By the time the group had finished their set, two people had been tragically trampled to death.

Kerrang! once labelled Guns N? Roses as being ?The most dangerous band in the world?. On more levels than one, we were right.

At their best, Guns N? Roses were brilliantly controversial: incendiary, unpredictable, volatile, confrontational, destructive, not to mention self-destructive. The sense was that anything could happen, and often it did. Slash is on the record as having overdosed on heroin backstage, only to be resuscitated and still play the show. Bassist Duff ?King Of Beers? McKagan pancreas literally exploded from his insatiable appetite for booze. Backstage at concerts, the group would issue laminate passes labelled DFA ? ?Does Fuck All?. There were late appearances, riots, fistfights. This was rock?n?roll decadence expressed to a dizzying degree.

?These last four years of madness sure put me straight?, sang Izzy Stradlin in 1991, on the song 14 Years, as the group began to slowly implode.

But before this slow-motion demise, the band attained greatness, and did so without apparent effort. As with the Sex Pistols? Never Mind The Bollocks?, Appetite For Destruction makes its point in volume and conviction, as well as blockbusting songs. Four years later, Use Your Illusion volumes I & II attained both the Number Two and Number One spots respectively on the U.S. Billboard album chart on the day of their dual release, with a bounty of songs that were grand and, in many cases, sophisticated. This body of work is sufficiently strong that Guns N? Roses are as popular today as they were a generation ago.

And now, this most wild of circuses is back.

As everyone knows, Guns N? Roses have been touring the world for more than a decade now, in the form of Axl Rose backed by a procession of faceless musicians, a presentation that has been widely derided for its inauthenticity and, well, for its cheek in insulting the memory of everything the real Guns N? Roses had achieved. But this new year, that real Guns N? Roses were confirmed as being set to return ? or at least, almost. In a curiously worded press release issued last week, it was announced that the ?iconic line-up? of Guns N? Roses are set to headline the Californian Coachella festival in April. Confirmed to be onstage on the weekends of April 16 and 23 are W. Axl Rose, Slash and Duff McKagan ? which as far as nucleuses go, is not a bad one at all.

The smoke signals that preceded this announcement had been visible for some time now. Last spring, Slash confirmed to both Swedish and American television that he had met with Axl Rose ? a man who six years ago had described the guitarist as being ?a cancer? ? in order ?to sort out some of that negative stuff that had been going on for so long?.

On the subject of a possible reunion, the guitarist strayed from his usual stone-walling of the suggestion, and became grandly equivocal.

?I?ve got to be careful what I say there?, he said. ?If everybody wanted to do it, and do it for the right reasons, I think the fans would love it. I think it might be fun at some point to try and do that?.

For his part, Duff McKagan said of a possible reunion that ?it would be wonderful, one day, if we reconciled, first and foremost. That alone would be cool?.

Maybe it would. But what of that phrase ?iconic line-up?? An iconic line-up is not necessarily the same as an ?original line-up?. So, who else may join Axl, Slash and Duff onstage in California?

[Spirit]

Might original rhythm guitarist Izzy Stradlin sign up to the cause? The odds on this are perhaps not as long as they may at first appear. For while the seeds of the guitarist?s original discontent can be heard as far back as 1991?s Use Your Illusion sets, where, on the song Pretty Tied Up, he sang of how ?Once there was this rock?n?roll band rolling on the streets ? time went by and it became a joke?, he has appeared onstage, and even toured as part of, newer incarnations of Guns N? Roses on numerous occasions since handing in his notice.

Another musician that got out ? or was spat out, even ? of Guns N? Roses was the band?s original drummer, Steven Adler. Held in thrall for years to truly monstrous drug habits, the debilitating effects of which can be both seen and heard in his manner and speech, it is difficult to imagine him once again taking up his original station on the drum stool. More likely, it would seem, would be for a pair of drum sticks to be offered to Matt Sorum, Steven Adler?s replacement in Guns N? Roses, as well as Slash and Duff?s bandmate in Velvet Revolver. As yet, though, as with so much to do with this tentative reunion, the situation remains unclear.

Reviewing the options facing Guns N? Roses, not to mention the litany of potential players at the group?s disposal, is to be reminded of just how quickly things turned to shit back in the day. Just five years after the release of the taut and twitching Appetite For Destruction, the ranks of Guns N? Roses had swelled from a tight five-piece to a sprawling touring band of 13 players and singers.

?I?m getting more and more confused as to who?s in Guns N? Roses?, quipped Faith No More keyboardist Roddy Bottum in 1992. ?There?s Dizzy and Iggy and Lizzy and Tizzy and Gilby and Giddy? Shit, man, onstage now there?s a horn section, two chick back-up singers, two keyboard players, an airline pilot, a basketball coach, a couple of car mechanics??

Of course ? ahem ? it?s so easy to be sarcastic, cynical, pessimistic and dismissive of the return of Guns N? Roses. This, after all, is the band who would saunter onto the stage hours late, who would cause riots in St. Louis and Montreal, and who after dispensing with four-fifths of their original line-up, would, over a decade, work on an album, Chinese Democracy, that upon its eventual release would be met with a distinct lack of enthusiasm by its waiting public.

But if this is the case for the prosecution, the case for the defense provides stronger medicine still. This is the group that has put its name to armfuls of songs that are classics of the rock age. From Appetite For Destruction alone, one may feast upon Welcome To The Jungle, Rocket Queen, It?s So Easy, Sweet Child O? Mine, Mr. Brownstone and Paradise City. These are songs that have aged not a day since they were recorded. The fruits from Use Your Illusion parts I & II ? the sprawling two-album set released in the summer of 1991 ? are almost equally bounteous, with tracks such You Could Be Mine, Civil War, Coma, Locomotive, Dead Horse, Get In The Ring and November Rain being as good as any in the field of modern rock music.

It would, of course, be naive to deny that one of those ?right reasons? for reuniting of which Slash speaks will be money, and pots of it ? $3 million per show are being demanded, if reports are to be believed. But it will also be a matter of profile, about once being top of the bill and on the tip of everyone?s tongue. Guns N? Roses have it in their power to be the world?s perfect rock band, or perhaps a noisy and melodramatic car-crash. Come April, they could be either, or they could be both. This is why, some 31 years after forming in Hollywood, their name still carries so much magnetism, It is why, at Coachella, the eyes and ears of the rock world will be upon them.

Once again, it?s welcome to the jungle. This being Guns N? Roses, you can bet your life that they?ve still got fun and games.

[zombux]

procession of faceless musicians what a moron wrote this, Mick Wall?

thanks for rewriting this, Spirit!

[Spirit]

procession of faceless musicians what a moron wrote this, Mick Wall?

Haha, yeah that would fit.. 

It was by Ian Winwood however.

[norway]

helluva cd-mention

[HBK]

procession of faceless musicians what a moron wrote this, Mick Wall?

thanks for rewriting this, Spirit!

aAJjaJHAJjaA, Thanks Spirit

 

[Spirit]

While the band Axl had for the past 15 years aren't as well-known or legendary as Slash and Duff, I think the writer could've done without putting down that band. Had he taken the time (which I doubt he did) and made an effort to look at who these people are and how good musicians they really are, he could easily have included that in the article while still maintained the position that Slash and Duff's return is a good thing.

It should be noted that there's a part of the article (sort of a small article-within-the-article) that takes a look at the different "empty" positions in the band right now. It does mention Frank, Richard and Dizzy as likely candidates.

They also give a shout out to Tracey and Roberta in case there will be back-up singers.

[HBK]

While the band Axl had for the past 15 years aren't as well-known or legendary as Slash and Duff, I think the writer could've done without putting down that band. Had he taken the time (which I doubt he did) and made an effort to look at who these people are and how good musicians they really are, he could easily have included that in the article while still maintained the position that Slash and Duff's return is a good thing.

It should be noted that there's a part of the article (sort of a small article-within-the-article) that takes a look at the different "empty" positions in the band right now. It does mention Frank, Richard and Dizzy as likely candidates.

They also give a shout out to Tracey and Roberta in case there will be back-up singers.

IDEM

[C0ma]

While the band Axl had for the past 15 years aren't as well-known or legendary as Slash and Duff, I think the writer could've done without putting down that band. Had he taken the time (which I doubt he did) and made an effort to look at who these people are and how good musicians they really are, he could easily have included that in the article while still maintained the position that Slash and Duff's return is a good thing.

It should be noted that there's a part of the article (sort of a small article-within-the-article) that takes a look at the different "empty" positions in the band right now. It does mention Frank, Richard and Dizzy as likely candidates.

They also give a shout out to Tracey and Roberta in case there will be back-up singers.

I think what you are seeing is a writer coming at the subject from the court of popular opinion... What he is saying is not an unpopular opinion.

There is a morning show on sports radio in Boston on the station that used to be WBCN (Boston Rock Station) and these were the same morning guys when they were a rock station. Anyway... they were speaking about the reunion today because one of them is going to the second weekend of Coachella specifically to see GnR (he is a fan, but of 80's-90's GnR) and he said how he is pissed that what he thought was the 2nd show is actually going to be the 4th show and he is nervous that the wheels are going to fall off before Coachella because of how unpredictable and hard to work with Axl is. He then told the story about how when he worked in Atlanta back in 2002 he got tickets to the Philly show to see (as he called them) "Axl and a bunch of guys not named Slash" but it never happened because he no showed... This is coming from a music guy who loved the classic band and played in bands all his life. No one knows who was in this band in the 2000's, and pay even less attention when the lineup seemed to be ever changing. Why would a writer who may be limited in the number of words he gets in his article going to waste any time on 'the guys not named Slash'.

[Spirit]

I'm just saying, in my book you come off as more respectable if you avoid such "tabloid opinions". I don't think anyone would have been up in arms if he had shown an inkling of more respect for the people working with Axl for the past years.

I think that should be expected from a music journalist especially.

[C0ma]

I'm just saying, in my book you come off as more respectable if you avoid such "tabloid opinions". I don't think anyone would have been up in arms if he had shown an inkling of more respect for the people working with Axl for the past years.

I think that should be expected from a music journalist especially.

I get what you are saying and to a point agree, we all know what Paul, Bucket, Robin, Tommy, Bumble, DJ, and Brain (and to a lesser extent Josh Freese and the other people who were in and out before we ever saw them) did for this band. Even if they aren't your 'cup of tea' (for me Bucket is not mine) you have to respect their place in the bands history.

BUT Kerrang! isn't exactly the New York Times, it is pretty much a Rock Tabloid... The average rock fan who isn't invested in the last 20 years of this bands history know it' a bunch of guys who were in and out that aren't named Slash, Duff, or Izzy (and to a lesser extent Steven).

[Spirit]

I can agree with that. It's not Billboard or Rolling Stone Mag.

[kyrie]

While the band Axl had for the past 15 years aren't as well-known or legendary as Slash and Duff, I think the writer could've done without putting down that band. Had he taken the time (which I doubt he did) and made an effort to look at who these people are and how good musicians they really are, he could easily have included that in the article while still maintained the position that Slash and Duff's return is a good thing.

It should be noted that there's a part of the article (sort of a small article-within-the-article) that takes a look at the different "empty" positions in the band right now. It does mention Frank, Richard and Dizzy as likely candidates.

They also give a shout out to Tracey and Roberta in case there will be back-up singers.

I think what you are seeing is a writer coming at the subject from the court of popular opinion... What he is saying is not an unpopular opinion.

There is a morning show on sports radio in Boston on the station that used to be WBCN (Boston Rock Station) and these were the same morning guys when they were a rock station. Anyway... they were speaking about the reunion today because one of them is going to the second weekend of Coachella specifically to see GnR (he is a fan, but of 80's-90's GnR) and he said how he is pissed that what he thought was the 2nd show is actually going to be the 4th show and he is nervous that the wheels are going to fall off before Coachella because of how unpredictable and hard to work with Axl is. He then told the story about how when he worked in Atlanta back in 2002 he got tickets to the Philly show to see (as he called them) "Axl and a bunch of guys not named Slash" but it never happened because he no showed... This is coming from a music guy who loved the classic band and played in bands all his life. No one knows who was in this band in the 2000's, and pay even less attention when the lineup seemed to be ever changing. Why would a writer who may be limited in the number of words he gets in his article going to waste any time on 'the guys not named Slash'.

As someone who has written professionally and is used to word counts, deadlines, and the like - there's kowtowing to popular option, and doing a proper job getting all the facts, and all sides of the story, across. If you have time to quote the keyboard player from Faith No More from 1992, you have time to talk a little about just who has and hasn't been in GN'R over the years, and what their credentials are. Unless you have a particular bias, or agenda, or have been told to have one (which is very common: negative articles sell more/get more clicks, and I've seen editors dole out assignments based on this).

[D-GenerationX]

But what do you owe those guys?

They are gone, not coming back, and never made enough of an impact to even warrant a second thought about printing the comment the way it was.

Think about it.  You could never use a dismissive comment like that if these guys were even given the chance to connect with the fanbase, which they never were. 

I know we have no shortage of people that caught a guitar pick from DJ or ran into Ron at the hotel bar.  These are anecdotal stores from hardcore fans that took the time to seek these guys out.  The average person still could not tell you who was ever in that band.  Their best guess would actually probably still be Buckethead.  A dude that cashed out 2 years into all of this.

[Nikki_Sixx]

This is a procession of faceless musicians 

[jarmo]

I wouldn't expect too much from Kerrang! magazine....

Have you seen the kind of bands they write about? Tommy Stinson, for example, isn't exactly part of that scene so the average Kerrang! reader wouldn't have a clue.



/jarmo

[Mysteron]

I wouldn't expect too much from Kerrang! magazine....

Have you seen the kind of bands they write about? Tommy Stinson, for example, isn't exactly part of that scene so the average Kerrang! reader wouldn't have a clue.



/jarmo

Kerrang was exciting 25/30 years ago, but I don't think I have read one for about 20 years now

[Continental_Drift]

Tommy (well-respected in his scene), Dj (modern rock success with Sixx: A.M.), Buckethead (b/c of the "visual" at a minimum) and Josh Freese (APC, work with NIN and the 'mats, etc.) are all something above "faceless" for the average rock fan IMHO. When you strip it down a little further though- Dj never appeared on any released original material (to date), Bucket did indeed leave early on-and Josh left even earlier, is much more known for his post-GNR efforts and never played a live gig with GNR, etc. So that really only leaves Tommy getting "slighted" here IMHO- and as a 'mats veteran... that's probably the kind of thing he wears as a "badge of honor" anyway. HAHA.

Regardless of the "cultural impact" the Chinese Lineup(s) may or may not have had though- I think the talent level through the years is pretty unassailable. History should at the very least record that Axl didn't just plug-in five dudes from the Sunset Strip...   

[EmilyGNR]

I wouldn't expect too much from Kerrang! magazine....

Have you seen the kind of bands they write about? Tommy Stinson, for example, isn't exactly part of that scene so the average Kerrang! reader wouldn't have a clue.



/jarmo

Kerrang was exciting 25/30 years ago, but I don't think I have read one for about 20 years now

Nor have I, think the last time I bought one was around 1992 or so

I can remember magazines, periodicals and MTV-VH1 as being very vital to keeping up with what bands were up to at that time.