Latest / Booked On Rock with Eric Senich / Use Your Illusion I & II: The Epic Gamble That Defined Guns N’ Roses [Episode 371]

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Use Your Illusion I & II: The Epic Gamble That Defined Guns N’ Roses [Episode 371] · Booked On Rock with Eric Senich

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: There was a lot of controversy in the press about it.
• 0:02
  Speaker 1: Living Color talked about it on stage, and then ultimately
• 0:05
  Speaker 1: actual comes out effectively, the band breaks up on stage.
• 0:08
  Speaker 1: He announces right there at that concert, these are going
• 0:10
  Speaker 1: to be the last Guns and Roses shows you ever see.
• 0:13
  Speaker 1: They just want to really deliver something that is mind
• 0:16
  Speaker 1: blowing and trying something totally new g and are actually delivered.
• 0:19
  Speaker 1: They hit a home run with it. To me, that
• 0:21
  Speaker 1: gave them a legacy that they wouldn't have had if
• 0:24
  Speaker 1: they had fallen apart after appetite, which I suppose could
• 0:27
  Speaker 1: have happened. Totally rock and roll, I mean, gotta leave you.
• 0:32
  Speaker 1: Joe reading Little Hens says it's time to rock and roll,
• 0:35
  Speaker 1: Rocking roll up, totally booked.
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  Speaker 2: Welcome back to book don Rock the podcast for those
• 0:45
  Speaker 2: about to read and rock. Emeric Sanitch. Before we get started,
• 0:48
  Speaker 2: I want to thank Darren and Brent from The Boga
• 0:50
  Speaker 2: Soda Show for having me on their podcast to talk
• 0:53
  Speaker 2: about the fortieth anniversary of Van Halen's fifty one fifty.
• 0:57
  Speaker 2: The Bogusda Show is it's a great seam of Higar
• 0:59
  Speaker 2: fan podcast, so check that out. You can find it
• 1:01
  Speaker 2: where we get your favorite podcasts. All right, so let's
• 1:04
  Speaker 2: get to our guests. We are going to be talking
• 1:06
  Speaker 2: about guns and roses today. Jeff Harkness is back on
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  Speaker 2: the show. He's got a book out titled Estranged Guns
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  Speaker 2: and Roses and Use Your Illusion. Jeff, Great to see
• 1:16
  Speaker 2: you again.
• 1:17
  Speaker 1: Hey, good to see you man. Thanks for having me
• 1:19
  Speaker 1: always always great to be back on the The Ultimate
• 1:23
  Speaker 1: Rock Book podcast.
• 1:24
  Speaker 2: Nice man, I was saying, I listened to your interview
• 1:27
  Speaker 2: on the Appetite for Distortion podcast. Great interview. Uh yeah,
• 1:32
  Speaker 2: this is ah, this is this is quite a quite
• 1:36
  Speaker 2: an endeavor for you. How long did it take you
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  Speaker 2: to put this one together?
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  Speaker 1: Our doorstop? Yeah, right, A couple of years of writing
• 1:43
  Speaker 1: and working on this. It's such a huge story. They
• 1:46
  Speaker 1: you know, cover such a long period of time. And
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  Speaker 1: then also the tour was, you know, almost two hundred
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  Speaker 1: shows and all these different legs and touring with different
• 1:55
  Speaker 1: bands and the co tour with Metallica. So it took
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  Speaker 1: a long time to go through it. And I did.
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  Speaker 1: I think I watched every single concert, looked at all
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  Speaker 1: the videos, you know, read a ton of stuff, and
• 2:07
  Speaker 1: you know, just spent a couple of years really deep
• 2:09
  Speaker 1: diving into the Illusion era, which was very fun because
• 2:12
  Speaker 1: I'm a huge GNR fan.
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  Speaker 2: Yeah, I remember that era very well. It was in
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  Speaker 2: high school when Appetite for Destruction came out, and then
• 2:21
  Speaker 2: just leaving high school getting into college when usual Illusion
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  Speaker 2: one and two came out and they were arguably the
• 2:27
  Speaker 2: biggest rock and roll band around at that point.
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  Speaker 1: Yeah, oh yeah, they were huge. They were. I Mean
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  Speaker 1: one of the things that I really kind of came
• 2:36
  Speaker 1: to appreciate more in this book was exactly how famous
• 2:40
  Speaker 1: Axel Rose was. I mean, he couldn't leave is apart
• 2:44
  Speaker 1: his hotel, you know, anytime he stepped out, he had
• 2:47
  Speaker 1: to have bodyguards, he had to have security, extra security.
• 2:51
  Speaker 1: They had to use decoy you know, limos and stuff
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  Speaker 1: like that. I Mean, he wasn't somebody who could just
• 2:56
  Speaker 1: go out to a club or something like that without
• 2:58
  Speaker 1: a lot of prepper really, and I don't know if
• 3:02
  Speaker 1: I realized like the level of fame that he had.
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  Speaker 2: Sure. And also you talked about in that interview about
• 3:08
  Speaker 2: how he was kind of felt like a race car.
• 3:10
  Speaker 2: I mean they had for each show, he had like
• 3:13
  Speaker 2: a team of people, chiropractors and you name it whatever,
• 3:15
  Speaker 2: just to get him ready. For each show. And he
• 3:19
  Speaker 2: also wasn't he couldn't he couldn't go out and party
• 3:22
  Speaker 2: like he maybe like the other guys in the band,
• 3:24
  Speaker 2: or maybe stay up late. He always had to be
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  Speaker 2: ready and on for each show.
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  Speaker 1: Yeah, And also, I mean, something else I don't think
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  Speaker 1: I really realized was that he's somebody who actually had
• 3:34
  Speaker 1: a lot of trepidation about going on stage. He kind
• 3:37
  Speaker 1: of had the stage right and that you know, you
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  Speaker 1: don't realize that when you see him and how confident
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  Speaker 1: he is, but you know, he had this long process
• 3:45
  Speaker 1: to prepare to get ready to go on stage, and
• 3:49
  Speaker 1: part of it was physical, part of it was psychological,
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  Speaker 1: and I think part of it was was just trying
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  Speaker 1: to sort of overcome his own his own anxiet he's
• 4:00
  Speaker 1: about going on stage and then to go out and
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  Speaker 1: deliver the kind of performances that he's so well known for.
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  Speaker 1: He came to just sort of appreciate even more how
• 4:09
  Speaker 1: how hard he worked and how much he put into it.
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  Speaker 1: He didn't he didn't want to just go out and
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  Speaker 1: play a concert. He wanted to deliver kind of like
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  Speaker 1: the albums, like the greatest concert you've ever been to.
• 4:20
  Speaker 1: And so he really you know, his preparation for going
• 4:23
  Speaker 1: on stage and his commitment to delivering you know, a
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  Speaker 1: CALA superstar caliber performance each and every show was something
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  Speaker 1: that really sit out to me too.
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  Speaker 2: I remember him talking about he wanted to destroy Appetite
• 4:38
  Speaker 2: on the next album. Yeah, he was, he was done
• 4:41
  Speaker 2: with it, wanted to move on, and that's what they
• 4:43
  Speaker 2: came up with. The introduction suggests that the band was
• 4:46
  Speaker 2: already teetering on the edge internally, with addiction and chaos
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  Speaker 2: surrounding them. The opening chapter, you describe how quickly fame
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  Speaker 2: changed the band's lives. How dramatically did success alter their
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  Speaker 2: relationships with each other?
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  Speaker 1: Oh, tremendously. I mean they were a band that lived
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  Speaker 1: together and wrote songs together and and kind of fought
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  Speaker 1: their way to the top together. It was really this team,
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  Speaker 1: you know, all for one and one for all. By
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  Speaker 1: the time we get to the very beginning of the
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  Speaker 1: Illusion era, it's starting to fall apart. They came home
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  Speaker 1: from the Appetite tour and everybody suddenly has money, and
• 5:19
  Speaker 1: so they could go get their own place. For the
• 5:21
  Speaker 1: first time, they could get as many drugs as they wanted.
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  Speaker 1: They could. They became sort of isolated, from one another
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  Speaker 1: off into their own individual things, and I think by
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  Speaker 1: the time they got together in Chicago at the beginning
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  Speaker 1: to try to write songs for the Illusion album, it
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  Speaker 1: was just a completely different kind of vibe going on.
• 5:44
  Speaker 1: Steven of course, was having some major problems, and you know,
• 5:48
  Speaker 1: we see that at the beginning of the era, you know,
• 5:51
  Speaker 1: the incredible drummer for GNR was just not able to
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  Speaker 1: deliver the type of the type of playing that he
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  Speaker 1: was famous for. And so one of the first problems
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  Speaker 1: they had was trying to figure out how to replace
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  Speaker 1: somebody who was so important to their sound, and also
• 6:06
  Speaker 1: who was who was a brother. You know, he and
• 6:08
  Speaker 1: Slash went to high school together, they grew up together,
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  Speaker 1: and so I think there were some real difficulties in
• 6:15
  Speaker 1: coming together and reformulating the group and sort of getting
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  Speaker 1: on the same page. By the time they get out
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  Speaker 1: on tour, things that really, you know, they were kind
• 6:24
  Speaker 1: of were, you know, living in separate camps so to speak,
• 6:27
  Speaker 1: and with their own security teams and in their own
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  Speaker 1: kind of world. So yeah, it was a different, a
• 6:34
  Speaker 1: very different era for them than the Appetite era, and
• 6:37
  Speaker 1: also everything that led up to it, when they were
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  Speaker 1: really you know together and you know, a true team.
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  Speaker 2: I think one of the interesting things in the book
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  Speaker 2: that that I was I was I was not aware of.
• 6:50
  Speaker 2: But Axel Well, I knew he had songs going back,
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  Speaker 2: way back ways. I know that November Rain was something
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  Speaker 2: that was on the early demos, but he had been
• 6:59
  Speaker 2: thinking about well basically the scale of usual illusion around
• 7:03
  Speaker 2: the time of Appetite, right, he was already thinking about that,
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  Speaker 2: thinking ahead absolutely.
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  Speaker 1: I mean even in interviews you see in the in
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  Speaker 1: the early stages of Appetite, he was already talking about
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  Speaker 1: songs that they had set aside for the second album,
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  Speaker 1: and even talking about songs they were planning to use
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  Speaker 1: on the third album. So one of the things that
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  Speaker 1: I knew about November Rain and Don't Cry, he kind
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  Speaker 1: of says. And it's funny and the when they first
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  Speaker 1: went out on tour that we get this huge applause
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  Speaker 1: for November Rain because it was so heavily bootlegged. Everybody
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  Speaker 1: already knew the song, they knew all the words and
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  Speaker 1: everything else. And this is before the albums are even out.
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  Speaker 1: So definitely there were some songs like November Rain which
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  Speaker 1: had been around and heavily bootlegged. There was Don't Cry,
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  Speaker 1: which they played in clubs for years and demoed and
• 7:51
  Speaker 1: so they you know, back Off Bitch. Some of these
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  Speaker 1: other songs had been around, but I was surprised to
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  Speaker 1: learn at all the songs that I didn't know were
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  Speaker 1: dated back that far. You know, even things like Perfect
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  Speaker 1: Crime or dead Horse that I assumed were newly written
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  Speaker 1: for the Illusion albums, but you know, a lot of
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  Speaker 1: material went back, and of course there was stuff like
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  Speaker 1: Yesterday's that that was also the Garden. You know, these
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  Speaker 1: are all songs that had been around in the wheelhouse
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  Speaker 1: for a while. I think one of the things that
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  Speaker 1: actual decided to do was like, let's just record everything
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  Speaker 1: everything we got. You know, if there's an old song,
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  Speaker 1: let's resurrect it, let's bring it back, let's record it,
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  Speaker 1: and we'll just put everything out there. Rather than pick
• 8:33
  Speaker 1: and choose, let's just you know, kind of dump it all. Now.
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  Speaker 1: For me, as a fan, I really like that. I
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  Speaker 1: don't think there was a lot of filler on those albums,
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  Speaker 1: but certainly part of the plan was if there's a song,
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  Speaker 1: and whether it's an old song or a new song,
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  Speaker 1: let's record it and let's try to include it on
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  Speaker 1: this project.
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  Speaker 2: Go back to that Chicago timeline. That's when they started
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  Speaker 2: to work on this album. You paint a pretty wild
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  Speaker 2: picture of Slash, Duff, McKagan and Steven. Now they're partying
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  Speaker 2: every night while the band was supposed to be running
• 9:06
  Speaker 2: a record And read that section, it almost feels like
• 9:09
  Speaker 2: there's two bands existing at the same time. You got
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  Speaker 2: one trying to write ambitious music, you know, Axel, another
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  Speaker 2: living the rock and roll party life.
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  Speaker 1: Yeah. Absolutely, Well, it was Axel's idea for them to
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  Speaker 1: go to Chicago. He said, we need to go back
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  Speaker 1: to our appetite methodology, where we all live together, write
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  Speaker 1: songs together, collaborate around the clock, and basically become a
• 9:33
  Speaker 1: band again. So this was Axel's idea. Everybody else was
• 9:37
  Speaker 1: sort of like, all right, they went along with it,
• 9:39
  Speaker 1: but they probably wasn't what they had in mind, you know,
• 9:43
  Speaker 1: for their second album. But everybody agreed and there was
• 9:46
  Speaker 1: some sense of like, all right, we really do want
• 9:48
  Speaker 1: to top appetite and make this happen. So Slashed up
• 9:52
  Speaker 1: and Steven get out there first and actually doesn't show up,
• 9:56
  Speaker 1: so they're sort of waiting for him, and they're rehearsing,
• 9:59
  Speaker 1: and you know, and hitting the bars every night. And
• 10:01
  Speaker 1: they're incredibly famous now too. And they're in Chicago, you know,
• 10:05
  Speaker 1: my one of my one of my second hometowns, and
• 10:08
  Speaker 1: so they're they're party and having a great time, and
• 10:11
  Speaker 1: you know, eventually the partying starts to get out of control.
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  Speaker 1: Izzy was already pretty disengaged at this point. He was
• 10:17
  Speaker 1: traveling around Europe. Eventually Axel shows up and they try
• 10:21
  Speaker 1: to get to work, but they had brought a few
• 10:23
  Speaker 1: songs they had. Civil War was a relatively new song
• 10:27
  Speaker 1: they had started working on at the very end of
• 10:29
  Speaker 1: the Appetite tour, but there there was not a lot
• 10:33
  Speaker 1: of new material generated. In Chicago. Axel was working on
• 10:37
  Speaker 1: November Rain and trying to get that going. But yeah,
• 10:41
  Speaker 1: I mean they started to have problems right then, and
• 10:43
  Speaker 1: and by the time Izy finally shows up, you know,
• 10:48
  Speaker 1: things were already kind of falling apart, and so Izzy
• 10:51
  Speaker 1: was just like, I'm out of here. You know. Axel
• 10:53
  Speaker 1: ended up leaving eventually too, and and Slash, but Slash
• 10:57
  Speaker 1: Slash just said I've had enough, I can't do with
• 11:00
  Speaker 1: this and went back to La. So, yeah, Chicago was
• 11:03
  Speaker 1: an attempt to, you know, to get things going and
• 11:07
  Speaker 1: to get the songs begun, but you know, ultimately it
• 11:10
  Speaker 1: was kind of an experiment that didn't work out, just
• 11:13
  Speaker 1: because they couldn't get on the same page. And then
• 11:16
  Speaker 1: of course they returned to LA and play this disastrous
• 11:20
  Speaker 1: Stones concert.
• 11:21
  Speaker 2: Too, right, talk about that.
• 11:23
  Speaker 1: I was at that concert. That was my very first
• 11:25
  Speaker 1: Guns and Roses show, which is kind of a crazy
• 11:28
  Speaker 1: show to go to, but it was the opening night
• 11:30
  Speaker 1: of their concert and opening for the Rolling Stones in LA.
• 11:34
  Speaker 1: It was the biggest hometown show they had ever played,
• 11:37
  Speaker 1: one of the largest audiences they had ever played in
• 11:40
  Speaker 1: front of, and there was so much excitement about that concert,
• 11:44
  Speaker 1: but also a lot of controversy at that time. And
• 11:47
  Speaker 1: you know, this was over the song one in a Million.
• 11:49
  Speaker 1: I don't really retry the song in the book or
• 11:52
  Speaker 1: talk too much about the Lies project, but this was
• 11:56
  Speaker 1: certainly something that was affected those concerts a lot, because
• 12:00
  Speaker 1: there was a lot of controversy in the press about it.
• 12:02
  Speaker 1: Living Color talked about it on stage, and then ultimately
• 12:06
  Speaker 1: Axel comes out and starts not only talking about that,
• 12:09
  Speaker 1: but effectively the band breaks up on stage. He announces
• 12:13
  Speaker 1: right there at that concert, these are gonna be the
• 12:15
  Speaker 1: last Guns and Roses shows you ever see because there's
• 12:19
  Speaker 1: too many people dancing with mister Brownstone. So it was
• 12:22
  Speaker 1: an electric concert. I you know, being there in the audience,
• 12:26
  Speaker 1: it really felt like, this is the most dangerous band
• 12:29
  Speaker 1: in the world. You know, the Rolling Stones were at
• 12:32
  Speaker 1: one point the most dangerous rock band in the world. Well,
• 12:35
  Speaker 1: now here's the new most dangerous band. The Stones were great,
• 12:38
  Speaker 1: but by comparison, you know, they were much more professional.
• 12:41
  Speaker 2: That was a Steel Wheels era.
• 12:43
  Speaker 1: Yeah, that was the Steel Wheels Tour. First time I
• 12:45
  Speaker 1: saw the Stones too, So I think the Stones actually
• 12:49
  Speaker 1: did influence Axel a lot. Though not long after that,
• 12:52
  Speaker 1: he and Izzy played with the Rolling Stones in Atlantic
• 12:55
  Speaker 1: City on their pay per view event, and I think
• 12:58
  Speaker 1: that Axel seeing what a big megatur looked like professionally
• 13:02
  Speaker 1: run a bunch of musicians on stage. Hey, the Stones
• 13:05
  Speaker 1: have backup singers, they've got horn players, they've got multiple
• 13:09
  Speaker 1: keyboard players, they have a you know, big production, big sound,
• 13:13
  Speaker 1: and they sound great. And I think that that influenced his,
• 13:17
  Speaker 1: you know, wanting those same things on the Illusion Tour
• 13:20
  Speaker 1: for himself, even the pay per view event which they
• 13:23
  Speaker 1: did from Paris.
• 13:24
  Speaker 2: So how soon after that did they go to Rumble
• 13:26
  Speaker 2: Recorders in Canoga Park, California.
• 13:28
  Speaker 1: So that begun that that was sort of an attempt
• 13:31
  Speaker 1: to go back to the Appetite studio, and they started
• 13:33
  Speaker 1: doing that not long after the Stone shows. But you know,
• 13:38
  Speaker 1: they get there and you know, again, something that I
• 13:41
  Speaker 1: didn't realize was that Stephen actually recorded quite a bit
• 13:44
  Speaker 1: of stuff with them, quite a bit of material for
• 13:46
  Speaker 1: illusion I think Duff said they recorded eighteen of the
• 13:49
  Speaker 1: Illusioned songs with Steven. We think of him as only
• 13:52
  Speaker 1: doing Civil War, but they did record all these songs
• 13:55
  Speaker 1: with him. It just they said they didn't sound good.
• 13:58
  Speaker 1: They you know, he was in a complete stupor the
• 14:00
  Speaker 1: whole time and they just couldn't get it together. You know,
• 14:03
  Speaker 1: this is in the spring of nineteen ninety and so
• 14:06
  Speaker 1: they were working in there, but eventually they had to
• 14:09
  Speaker 1: get rid of Steven, you know, they well, they tried
• 14:12
  Speaker 1: to work it out with him, but eventually they you know,
• 14:14
  Speaker 1: after the Farm Aide shows, they just that was it.
• 14:17
  Speaker 1: You know.
• 14:18
  Speaker 2: They brought back Mike Clink as producer, which is interesting
• 14:21
  Speaker 2: because I just thought maybe with Axel wanting to go
• 14:24
  Speaker 2: in a different direction, maybe he brings somebody else in.
• 14:27
  Speaker 2: How did his role change on these albums. Did it
• 14:30
  Speaker 2: Because now we're talking about some leverage. Axel has some
• 14:33
  Speaker 2: more power, would thinks, so he did he have more
• 14:35
  Speaker 2: of the decision making.
• 14:37
  Speaker 1: I think so. But you know, they trusted Mike Clink
• 14:40
  Speaker 1: a lot. You know, he was They had tried all
• 14:42
  Speaker 1: these different producers on Appetite and finally he was Stanley,
• 14:45
  Speaker 1: who yeah, right, yeah, Paul Stanley incredibly you know. So
• 14:51
  Speaker 1: finally they they you know, get Mike Clink and he's
• 14:53
  Speaker 1: the one who's able to deliver this. So I think
• 14:55
  Speaker 1: there was some trust there. I mean, one of the
• 14:59
  Speaker 1: things that I thought was so fascinating was their process
• 15:01
  Speaker 1: of recording, where you know, they go in and record
• 15:05
  Speaker 1: as a as a band without Axel, but the band
• 15:07
  Speaker 1: records the song. It's got to be one take live
• 15:10
  Speaker 1: with the band. I mean, if they mess up, if
• 15:13
  Speaker 1: one note's played wrong, they just throw it out and
• 15:16
  Speaker 1: do it again. But they didn't do it again that day.
• 15:19
  Speaker 1: They only would play like one or two takes a day,
• 15:21
  Speaker 1: even working very slowly and deliberately to try to find
• 15:25
  Speaker 1: like this magic moment. You know. So I think that
• 15:28
  Speaker 1: they trusted Mike Klink. What was crazy to me was
• 15:31
  Speaker 1: that is, after that process of all the recording, Slash
• 15:35
  Speaker 1: then erases all of his guitar parts and goes back
• 15:38
  Speaker 1: and re records everything that he played, which again I
• 15:42
  Speaker 1: didn't know that when I was researching the book. Quite
• 15:45
  Speaker 1: a process to you know, to put together songs and
• 15:49
  Speaker 1: to put together an album. And then after all the
• 15:51
  Speaker 1: music was done, finally they bring in you know, Axel
• 15:54
  Speaker 1: comes in and starts working on his vocals. And that
• 15:57
  Speaker 1: was a crazy story too, because he moved into the say.
• 16:03
  Speaker 2: Well, they had about thirty songs ready and span their
• 16:07
  Speaker 2: entire career pretty much like you mentioned, Don't Cry, You
• 16:10
  Speaker 2: Could Be Mine had been around for years start with
• 16:13
  Speaker 2: You Could Be Mine. If songs like November Rain represent
• 16:17
  Speaker 2: that grand cinematic side of the illusion albums, could you
• 16:20
  Speaker 2: Could Be Mine be seen as the bridge back to
• 16:22
  Speaker 2: that early GNR sound that fans first fell in love with.
• 16:26
  Speaker 1: Oh yeah, I think so. I mean, there were definitely
• 16:29
  Speaker 1: a lot of songs that dated back to those days,
• 16:31
  Speaker 1: and there's a lot of like hard rock songs on
• 16:35
  Speaker 1: those albums. I mean, Axel wanted to deliver the most
• 16:39
  Speaker 1: incredible album of all time, but for him, I think
• 16:42
  Speaker 1: that included all kinds of different music as well, so
• 16:45
  Speaker 1: you have, you know, everything from like You Ain't the First,
• 16:48
  Speaker 1: which is like an acoustic pirate song too, you know, hardcore,
• 16:53
  Speaker 1: straight up rockers like Perfect Crime you Could Be Mine,
• 16:57
  Speaker 1: which dated back to the Appetite era. You know, even
• 17:00
  Speaker 1: had the lyric from you Could Be Mine written on Appetite.
• 17:03
  Speaker 1: You know, there was the line about with your bitch
• 17:06
  Speaker 1: slap rapping and your cocaine tongue, you get nothing done.
• 17:09
  Speaker 1: The lyric from you Could Be Mine was printed in
• 17:11
  Speaker 1: the liner notes of Appetite Destruction for Destruction. Nobody knew
• 17:15
  Speaker 1: at the time what it was, but then when that
• 17:17
  Speaker 1: song came out, it's like, oh, that's where that comes from.
• 17:20
  Speaker 1: So certainly that song was a bridge back to that world.
• 17:23
  Speaker 1: And I don't think it's a surprise it ended up
• 17:26
  Speaker 1: getting used as a kind of a I mean, it
• 17:28
  Speaker 1: wasn't the first single and the first piece of music
• 17:31
  Speaker 1: to come out from the project, but it was kind
• 17:34
  Speaker 1: of their introduction to the album. They wanted to put
• 17:37
  Speaker 1: that song out and get it out to the world,
• 17:39
  Speaker 1: and I think it's it's definitely one of the you know,
• 17:42
  Speaker 1: ten out of ten great songs on that album.
• 17:45
  Speaker 2: Knocking in Heaven's Store. We know, a cover of the
• 17:48
  Speaker 2: Dylan track, but Livin Ledaie a cover of the Paul
• 17:51
  Speaker 2: McCartney track. What made that song a good fit for
• 17:53
  Speaker 2: gn R during that era?
• 17:55
  Speaker 1: What they said was that they Axel and Slash really
• 17:59
  Speaker 1: felt like that song fit their attitude. You know, I
• 18:03
  Speaker 1: think if you dig into the lyrics like well, live
• 18:05
  Speaker 1: and let live, you know, if somebody does something we
• 18:08
  Speaker 1: don't like, live and let live. But for them it's like, no,
• 18:11
  Speaker 1: if somebody upsets us, then it's live and let die.
• 18:14
  Speaker 1: You know. That was sort of directed at the haters
• 18:17
  Speaker 1: and the enemies, and so they felt like that song
• 18:19
  Speaker 1: was a good fit for them. I think also, though,
• 18:22
  Speaker 1: and I think you get this in the book, that
• 18:25
  Speaker 1: Axel really wanted to align Guns N' Roses with not
• 18:29
  Speaker 1: the heavy metal bands that they were sort of peers
• 18:32
  Speaker 1: with when they came out, but the classic rock legends
• 18:36
  Speaker 1: like Bob Dylan, like the Rolling Stones, like Paul McCartney.
• 18:40
  Speaker 1: You know, they brought Aerosmith and Jeff back to be
• 18:42
  Speaker 1: guests with them. I think, and this is something Matt
• 18:45
  Speaker 1: Soren told me when I interviewed him. He said, you know,
• 18:48
  Speaker 1: Axel was such a smart guy. He really had this
• 18:51
  Speaker 1: whole thing worked out with the two albums and how
• 18:54
  Speaker 1: I couldn't be a double CD because he had worked
• 18:56
  Speaker 1: at Tower Video and he understood the double CDs or
• 19:00
  Speaker 1: put behind the counter, and he wanted people to be
• 19:02
  Speaker 1: able to touch the product. And also, Matt said, you know,
• 19:06
  Speaker 1: he wanted to align us with these classic rock legends,
• 19:10
  Speaker 1: and it's sort of you are who you hang out with,
• 19:12
  Speaker 1: and you know, Freddie Mercury would be another one. You know,
• 19:15
  Speaker 1: I'm playing the tribute to Freddie Mercury and things like that.
• 19:18
  Speaker 1: So I think the use of Bob Dylan and Paul
• 19:22
  Speaker 1: McCartney on the album was just another way of kind
• 19:24
  Speaker 1: of furthering this goal he had positioning Guns N' Roses
• 19:29
  Speaker 1: in the in the class of you know, hard rock,
• 19:33
  Speaker 1: hard rock and classic rock legends, rather than heavy metal
• 19:36
  Speaker 1: bands and heavy metal legends. I think that was very
• 19:39
  Speaker 1: much deliberate on Axel's part.
• 19:41
  Speaker 2: Let's talk about Matt Sorum. So he had been playing
• 19:44
  Speaker 2: with the cult, Yep, what qualities did he bring that
• 19:48
  Speaker 2: Axel and the band felt that they needed at that moment.
• 19:51
  Speaker 1: Yeah, it's a good question. He he was a professional drummer,
• 19:55
  Speaker 1: he was in a big band. They had just put
• 19:58
  Speaker 1: out Sonic Tempole, which was a big hit album that
• 20:02
  Speaker 1: had you know, some firewoman a big hit song. So
• 20:07
  Speaker 1: and they had been out on tour and toured the
• 20:09
  Speaker 1: world on that album. So Matt Soorm was a professional
• 20:13
  Speaker 1: first and foremost. He could step in and from day
• 20:15
  Speaker 1: one do the job. He wasn't going to be awed
• 20:18
  Speaker 1: by playing in front of big crowds. This wasn't his
• 20:20
  Speaker 1: first rodeo. He could record, he could do it all.
• 20:23
  Speaker 1: So I think they really appreciated that. They had also
• 20:27
  Speaker 1: seen him Slash and Duff saw him perform with the
• 20:31
  Speaker 1: Colt went to that concert, were very impressed by him.
• 20:34
  Speaker 1: So he was somebody who I think was kind of
• 20:37
  Speaker 1: on their radar anyway of like, yeah, this guy could
• 20:40
  Speaker 1: actually step in and do the job. They had played
• 20:42
  Speaker 1: with a few other people. They played with Martin Chambers
• 20:45
  Speaker 1: from The Pretenders for example, and said, yeah, just it
• 20:49
  Speaker 1: didn't fit. You know, some people we tried, we couldn't
• 20:51
  Speaker 1: find the right fit. Matt comes in and he's like
• 20:55
  Speaker 1: one of the guys. Immediately they could just not only
• 20:58
  Speaker 1: could he play and do everything, but he could also
• 21:02
  Speaker 1: you know, sort of hang out and become one of
• 21:04
  Speaker 1: the gangs, so to speak, and I think they look
• 21:06
  Speaker 1: they were looking for something like that too.
• 21:08
  Speaker 2: How would you describe his sound, I'm trying to you know.
• 21:11
  Speaker 2: When I listen to him, he's just he's got a
• 21:12
  Speaker 2: massive bottom like sound. Also that's the production, but he's
• 21:17
  Speaker 2: just rock solid, like a machine.
• 21:20
  Speaker 1: Yeah. I mean, if you hear like locomotive or something.
• 21:22
  Speaker 1: I think that's a good example of the kind of like,
• 21:25
  Speaker 1: you know, he's he's really like he is like a
• 21:28
  Speaker 1: machine or something like that. His his feel is very
• 21:31
  Speaker 1: different from Steven Adler, and he's been criticized for that
• 21:34
  Speaker 1: quite a bit, and I think it definitely changed the
• 21:37
  Speaker 1: band's sound. There are some some tapes that you can
• 21:40
  Speaker 1: hear of Steven Adler rehearsing with the group on some
• 21:43
  Speaker 1: of these songs, and it's like wow, you know, it's
• 21:46
  Speaker 1: it's really pretty amazing sounding and what could have been.
• 21:50
  Speaker 1: But by the same token, I think that Matt's gave
• 21:53
  Speaker 1: them a more cinematic style that really fit in with
• 21:57
  Speaker 1: what Axel had in mind. I mean Matt's drumm on
• 22:00
  Speaker 1: November Rain, which there I described in the studio in
• 22:03
  Speaker 1: how Actual came in and worked those parts out with
• 22:06
  Speaker 1: him on November rain on Don't Cry and on Estranged
• 22:09
  Speaker 1: and said, this is going to be a trilogy. You
• 22:12
  Speaker 1: got to use the same fill on every one of
• 22:14
  Speaker 1: these songs, and I want this symbol here and this
• 22:18
  Speaker 1: to go here. And Axel and Matt very much worked
• 22:22
  Speaker 1: out all the parts to that, you know, in a
• 22:24
  Speaker 1: studio one night, and I think that ultimately he was
• 22:27
  Speaker 1: able to deliver exactly what Axel had in mind. You know,
• 22:30
  Speaker 1: he wanted this grand sort of Elton John Don't let
• 22:33
  Speaker 1: the Sun Go Down on Me sweeping sound, very cinematic,
• 22:37
  Speaker 1: very large. It's different. It doesn't swing like Steven did.
• 22:41
  Speaker 1: It doesn't have all his little hooks and turnarounds that
• 22:43
  Speaker 1: he's so famous for. But it did give the group,
• 22:47
  Speaker 1: I think, what Axel was looking for. And you know,
• 22:50
  Speaker 1: I've been listening to these albums for thirty plus years
• 22:54
  Speaker 1: and I still think the song's hold up. I still
• 22:56
  Speaker 1: think they're great, and I think Matt, you know, you
• 22:58
  Speaker 1: have to give him credit for are his work on
• 23:01
  Speaker 1: these albums. If I'm still listening to these songs and
• 23:04
  Speaker 1: still like them, then it can't be like, oh yeah,
• 23:06
  Speaker 1: I'm not sitting there going oh man, I like these
• 23:09
  Speaker 1: But if only Stephen were on this song. It's like, no,
• 23:13
  Speaker 1: these are still great songs. You got to give him credit. Now.
• 23:15
  Speaker 2: It feels it feels right that he's on these tracks.
• 23:17
  Speaker 2: But I'm glad you mentioned the fact that Axel sat
• 23:20
  Speaker 2: down with him and said these three songs, there's a
• 23:23
  Speaker 2: theme here of consistency, because I feel like I owe
• 23:26
  Speaker 2: Matt sore Matt, if you're listening to this, I owe
• 23:28
  Speaker 2: an apology because a lot of fans were getting on
• 23:31
  Speaker 2: him for what's up with this same drum film boom
• 23:33
  Speaker 2: boom boom boom, and you just I remember thinking myself like,
• 23:38
  Speaker 2: come on, man, what's what's the deal? You can't mix
• 23:40
  Speaker 2: it up right? And then I read an interview with
• 23:43
  Speaker 2: him he says, no, Axel wanted that.
• 23:45
  Speaker 1: Yeah, that he wanted this this sort of a theme.
• 23:48
  Speaker 1: And I agree, we all owe matt'sare him a bit
• 23:50
  Speaker 1: of a broad because we've all said this, you know,
• 23:53
  Speaker 1: had this critique of him. But I was also again
• 23:56
  Speaker 1: part of the process. You know, he went in, they
• 23:59
  Speaker 1: had the song ready, and they say he learned a
• 24:01
  Speaker 1: song a day for thirty days. They went into the
• 24:03
  Speaker 1: studio and knocked him out in three weeks and He's
• 24:06
  Speaker 1: got to not only record the parts for thirty new songs,
• 24:10
  Speaker 1: but they got to do it in one take. He
• 24:11
  Speaker 1: can't go back and overdub or fix something. It's got
• 24:14
  Speaker 1: to be a perfect take that he delivers too. So
• 24:17
  Speaker 1: that he was able to learn those songs, go in
• 24:20
  Speaker 1: and record him in three weeks in single takes was
• 24:23
  Speaker 1: astonishing to me. I definitely didn't know that, you know,
• 24:28
  Speaker 1: so I feel like a lot of us so Matt
• 24:31
  Speaker 1: sorem an apology or at least as you know, he
• 24:33
  Speaker 1: deserves more credit than he's probably been given over the years.
• 24:36
  Speaker 2: A song like Locomotive, like you listen to the intro,
• 24:39
  Speaker 2: you know that's just it's just massive sun, It's like bottom.
• 24:43
  Speaker 2: But also that's the production too.
• 24:45
  Speaker 1: Oh for sure. Yeah he was he Yeah in some ways.
• 24:48
  Speaker 1: I mean he was just driving the band like a
• 24:51
  Speaker 1: good drummer does. And you know, again, his style was different,
• 24:54
  Speaker 1: his sound was different. But I was just amazed at
• 24:57
  Speaker 1: how he was able to go in and deliver so
• 24:59
  Speaker 1: much in such a short period of time, go out
• 25:02
  Speaker 1: on tour. I mean they said he saved the band.
• 25:04
  Speaker 1: You know, we wouldn't have been able to do this
• 25:06
  Speaker 1: without him.
• 25:06
  Speaker 2: And why was any part of this reunion with Slash
• 25:09
  Speaker 2: and Duff, the new one, Yeah, the recent reunion from
• 25:13
  Speaker 2: you know the now it's been ten years, I think.
• 25:16
  Speaker 1: Oh yeah, yeah, well I think that. You know, for
• 25:20
  Speaker 1: whatever reason, Axel always saw him as kind of an
• 25:25
  Speaker 1: employee or a hired hand, and you know, I think
• 25:29
  Speaker 1: at the end of the tour Axel everything was off
• 25:32
  Speaker 1: the table. You know, Gilby was gone, Matt was gone.
• 25:37
  Speaker 1: He was trying to decide what to do with Slash
• 25:40
  Speaker 1: and Death and it's kind of amazing. Dizzy hung on
• 25:43
  Speaker 1: for all those years too, but Matt did get into
• 25:46
  Speaker 1: the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame with the rest
• 25:48
  Speaker 1: of the band, and you know, I think he was
• 25:50
  Speaker 1: an important part of their story for sure.
• 25:53
  Speaker 2: Jeff Hartner is the author of Estranged Guns N' Roses
• 25:56
  Speaker 2: and Use Your Illusion. November Rain and a Strange pushed
• 26:00
  Speaker 2: G and R into much more elaborate musical territory. Many
• 26:03
  Speaker 2: fans associate these epic songs with Axel's vision. November Rain
• 26:08
  Speaker 2: had actually existed in a demo. We talked about this
• 26:11
  Speaker 2: for years and the fans knew about it. Why did
• 26:15
  Speaker 2: it take so long for the band to finally record it?
• 26:18
  Speaker 1: He saved November Rain. He saw that, as you know,
• 26:21
  Speaker 1: there was kind of some thinking about deciding between Sweets,
• 26:25
  Speaker 1: How the Mine and November Rain, and everybody thought, let's
• 26:29
  Speaker 1: save November Rain. Let's keep this for the second album
• 26:31
  Speaker 1: because it's such an epic, amazing song, we want to
• 26:36
  Speaker 1: really record it properly. I think Axel always wanted it
• 26:38
  Speaker 1: done with a full orchestra, which eventually a few years
• 26:42
  Speaker 1: ago he got it done, you know, with an entire orchestra.
• 26:45
  Speaker 1: But I think for him it was just such an
• 26:47
  Speaker 1: important song that he wanted to save it and make
• 26:50
  Speaker 1: sure that it got the care and treatment that he
• 26:53
  Speaker 1: wanted it to have.
• 26:54
  Speaker 2: So it definitely wouldn't have worked on Lies then because
• 26:57
  Speaker 2: Lies was more stripped down.
• 26:59
  Speaker 1: Yeah right, I mean, I love Lies just because he
• 27:02
  Speaker 1: doesn't like double and triple his vocals. He's not, you know,
• 27:06
  Speaker 1: it's not like a ton of stuff on those tracks.
• 27:08
  Speaker 1: It's very clean and you really hear his voice come through.
• 27:11
  Speaker 1: It's probably some of his like purest singing in some
• 27:14
  Speaker 1: ways on the Lives tracks. But yeah, I think for him,
• 27:18
  Speaker 1: he wanted this to be one of the center pieces
• 27:21
  Speaker 1: of the greatest sophomore album of all time.
• 27:25
  Speaker 2: A strange is one of the longest and the most
• 27:27
  Speaker 2: musically ambitious songs Guns and Roses ever recorded. It's I
• 27:31
  Speaker 2: think it's my favorite song off of the entire album.
• 27:35
  Speaker 2: And Slash's guitar work on it, especially the second half
• 27:38
  Speaker 2: of it, with those guitar swells at the end and
• 27:40
  Speaker 2: all that. It's just it's beautiful. The structure almost feels
• 27:43
  Speaker 2: like a mini rock opera. The lyrics feel extremely personal
• 27:47
  Speaker 2: and reflective. How much of the song reflects what Axel
• 27:51
  Speaker 2: Rose was ex experiencing emotionally during the Illusion era.
• 27:55
  Speaker 1: That song was one of his songs. I mean, he
• 27:59
  Speaker 1: is the one who brought a lot of that to
• 28:01
  Speaker 1: the project. You know, everybody else is he brought his
• 28:04
  Speaker 1: songs that are very easy sounding, and you know, Slash
• 28:07
  Speaker 1: had like the rip that Don't Damn Me and Bad
• 28:10
  Speaker 1: Apples and some things that sound very much like Slash's
• 28:13
  Speaker 1: guitar playing. But it was Actual who brought in, you know,
• 28:16
  Speaker 1: these big epic songs like November Rain and Estranged, and
• 28:20
  Speaker 1: he wrote the lyrics and I think that they were
• 28:23
  Speaker 1: incredibly personal, personal and meaningful to him. You know, he
• 28:27
  Speaker 1: even talked about writing Coma. The lyrics to Coma, which
• 28:30
  Speaker 1: Slash wrote the music to that that actual wrote the lyrics,
• 28:33
  Speaker 1: and he said, like putting himself into it and the
• 28:37
  Speaker 1: work he had to do. He actually like almost passed out,
• 28:40
  Speaker 1: you know when he was finally writing this and finally
• 28:43
  Speaker 1: it came out in this sort of cathartic thing. But
• 28:45
  Speaker 1: he spent I think he said, he spent six months
• 28:48
  Speaker 1: or nine months, you know, trying to get the words
• 28:50
  Speaker 1: to coma just right. You know. His commitment to the
• 28:54
  Speaker 1: art and the artistry was something that I don't think
• 28:57
  Speaker 1: I appreciated until I really did their you know, researching
• 29:01
  Speaker 1: on this project and how much work he put into it.
• 29:05
  Speaker 1: I had like an Excel spreadsheet with everybody's contributions, and
• 29:10
  Speaker 1: of the twenty eight original songs, we're gonna exclude the
• 29:13
  Speaker 1: Wings song and the Bob Dylan song. Of the twenty
• 29:16
  Speaker 1: eight original songs on the album, Axel was a writer
• 29:20
  Speaker 1: on twenty two of them. So more than anybody else,
• 29:24
  Speaker 1: he really was invested and invested himself. He put so
• 29:27
  Speaker 1: much time and energy and creativity into this project. I
• 29:31
  Speaker 1: mean he moved into the studio for you know, a
• 29:34
  Speaker 1: couple of months to record his vocals. He was very
• 29:38
  Speaker 1: committed in ways that I don't know if I fully
• 29:41
  Speaker 1: appreciated or understood, and I think he was as committed Slash.
• 29:45
  Speaker 1: I think was also very committed to the project and
• 29:47
  Speaker 1: did amazing work in the studio. But I think, you
• 29:50
  Speaker 1: know Axel's work ethic and desire for perfection and ambition
• 29:57
  Speaker 1: to make this not just an album, not just the
• 30:00
  Speaker 1: second album, but like one of the greatest albums of
• 30:03
  Speaker 1: all time a sweeping epic was something that really, you know,
• 30:07
  Speaker 1: stood out to me as I was doing the research,
• 30:09
  Speaker 1: and I think this really comes out in the book.
• 30:11
  Speaker 2: Too, Knocking on Heaven's Door. Usually when you cover a
• 30:17
  Speaker 2: song by a legendary songwriter like Bob Dylan, there's always
• 30:21
  Speaker 2: a risk of comparison. Yeah, do you think that they
• 30:25
  Speaker 2: transformed it into something uniquely their own?
• 30:28
  Speaker 1: That's a great question. Being the big fan that I am,
• 30:32
  Speaker 1: you know, to me, when they played that in nineteen
• 30:35
  Speaker 1: eighty eight on the Ritz and many people like me,
• 30:38
  Speaker 1: for the first time I knew Bob Dylan, I didn't
• 30:40
  Speaker 1: know that song, and it was mind blowing that performance.
• 30:44
  Speaker 1: This is Appetite era of course on the Ritz when
• 30:47
  Speaker 1: they first played that song was like so amazing, and
• 30:51
  Speaker 1: that version they played was so good. It was such
• 30:53
  Speaker 1: a revelation to me, I was kind of disappointed in
• 30:57
  Speaker 1: the studio version that they put on Illusion. If they
• 31:00
  Speaker 1: were going to redo it, I think they probably If
• 31:02
  Speaker 1: they were going to put it on there, I think
• 31:04
  Speaker 1: they probably should have just used that live version from
• 31:06
  Speaker 1: eighty eight to the Ritz, because I don't think it
• 31:09
  Speaker 1: gets better or raw than that version. I think I think,
• 31:13
  Speaker 1: you know, one one critique that many have of Illusion
• 31:16
  Speaker 1: is the production at times could be a little busy
• 31:19
  Speaker 1: and a little slick, and to me, their version that
• 31:22
  Speaker 1: ended up on Illusion was, you know, something that didn't
• 31:25
  Speaker 1: kind of live up to the greatness that they had
• 31:29
  Speaker 1: had made in that song. I think they transformed it
• 31:30
  Speaker 1: in eighty eight, but I think by the time they
• 31:32
  Speaker 1: were doing Illusion, it was like, yeah, this is this
• 31:36
  Speaker 1: is not the It wasn't that. It was never the
• 31:38
  Speaker 1: song that for me, I was excited to go here
• 31:40
  Speaker 1: because it had kind of already been around for several years.
• 31:43
  Speaker 2: The people had been talking about it for a few
• 31:46
  Speaker 2: years before usual Illusion. I mean that was that was
• 31:48
  Speaker 2: a well known performance by them, and you're right, I
• 31:50
  Speaker 2: think that's a better version of it, although the studio
• 31:54
  Speaker 2: version is still solid. But I think sure, but I
• 31:57
  Speaker 2: think you could say, I mean, they're with Hendrickson all
• 32:00
  Speaker 2: along the Watchtower. There are people that prefer the G
• 32:04
  Speaker 2: and R version over the Dylan version.
• 32:06
  Speaker 1: I certainly do, but I'm just going to go to
• 32:08
  Speaker 1: that eighty eight version, you know, from Ris. But I
• 32:11
  Speaker 1: definitely think that their version is in some ways much
• 32:14
  Speaker 1: more iconic than Dylan, certainly for our generation. I think
• 32:17
  Speaker 1: it is like I said, it wasn't a Dylan song.
• 32:19
  Speaker 1: I knew, I knew his big, you know, popular songs,
• 32:22
  Speaker 1: But when G and R did that, it was like, Wow,
• 32:25
  Speaker 1: what is this? And you know, suddenly I'm going to
• 32:28
  Speaker 1: look up the Bob Dylan version and I think it
• 32:31
  Speaker 1: appeared on it, sort of appearing on his greatest Hits
• 32:33
  Speaker 1: albums all of a sudden, It's worked. They revived that
• 32:36
  Speaker 1: song in some ways, and I do think that they
• 32:40
  Speaker 1: they sort of outmatched the master on that one.
• 32:43
  Speaker 2: Don't Cry one of the oldest songs in the Guns
• 32:46
  Speaker 2: and Roses catalog, written long before the Illusion albums. What's
• 32:49
  Speaker 2: the story behind how Axel and Eazy Stradlan came up
• 32:53
  Speaker 2: with the song.
• 32:54
  Speaker 1: That was one of their oldest songs, that was one
• 32:56
  Speaker 1: of the first songs that they wrote for gn R.
• 32:59
  Speaker 1: You know, they were very influenced by Hanoi Rocks, and
• 33:02
  Speaker 1: I think you really hear it and don't cry, especially
• 33:05
  Speaker 1: if you go back to like the demo versions that
• 33:07
  Speaker 1: predated Appetite for Destruction. It's really in some ways it's
• 33:12
  Speaker 1: reminiscent of like don't You Ever Leave Me and and
• 33:15
  Speaker 1: some other things that Hanoi Rocks did. I personally love
• 33:19
  Speaker 1: that song. I think it's absolutely amazing. Uh, even the
• 33:23
  Speaker 1: demo version. When you hear it, you hear how a
• 33:26
  Speaker 1: what a great song it is and b what a
• 33:29
  Speaker 1: great singer actual was, because even on the oldest demos,
• 33:33
  Speaker 1: he really delivers an amazing vocal performance. And so I
• 33:38
  Speaker 1: I was thrilled that they ended up putting that on
• 33:40
  Speaker 1: the song on the on the album and making a
• 33:43
  Speaker 1: video out of the song too. It's it's an old,
• 33:46
  Speaker 1: an old song, but it definitely deserved a place on
• 33:49
  Speaker 1: the on the record, and it doesn't surprise me that
• 33:53
  Speaker 1: they issued a video for that in a single early
• 33:57
  Speaker 1: on and it.
• 33:57
  Speaker 2: Did really well. What's the story behind the altis.
• 34:00
  Speaker 1: So and I'm not a fan of that. If there's
• 34:03
  Speaker 1: there are a few songs that I think I would
• 34:06
  Speaker 1: personally take off of Illusion if I was making the cuts.
• 34:10
  Speaker 1: Not many, but that's that would probably be one of
• 34:13
  Speaker 1: the that that would be one of the ones that
• 34:15
  Speaker 1: I would take off. Axel in the studio one night
• 34:18
  Speaker 1: came up with a completely new version of it. He
• 34:21
  Speaker 1: had a different melody, he had different lyrics. He said
• 34:24
  Speaker 1: it just came to him like instantly in this inspiration.
• 34:27
  Speaker 1: So he says, you know, to the engineers and Mike Clink,
• 34:31
  Speaker 1: let's let's record this. Let's do this. He lays it
• 34:33
  Speaker 1: down over the existing music. So the backing track is identical,
• 34:37
  Speaker 1: it just has a different melody and different lyrics. And
• 34:40
  Speaker 1: I think it's cool. It would have made a great
• 34:42
  Speaker 1: B side. But to me to put two versions of
• 34:46
  Speaker 1: the same song on on the same album, I know
• 34:48
  Speaker 1: they were on different Illusion albums, but on the same project,
• 34:52
  Speaker 1: to me was that's an example of like, yeah, we
• 34:54
  Speaker 1: probably could have lost that and it wouldn't have cost
• 34:56
  Speaker 1: us anything.
• 34:57
  Speaker 2: I'm a huge Bland Melon fan. Shannon, who Yeah, one
• 35:01
  Speaker 2: of my favorites. So he's on Don't Cry, he is
• 35:05
  Speaker 2: on Living with Die, He's on November Rain, You Ain't
• 35:07
  Speaker 2: the first in the Garden actually co lead vocals on
• 35:11
  Speaker 2: Don't Cry Right. So, yeah, this is the story is
• 35:14
  Speaker 2: interesting because his Axel sister knew Shannon Hoon. They're both
• 35:18
  Speaker 2: from Indiana.
• 35:19
  Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, they He.
• 35:21
  Speaker 2: And Shannon just kind of showed up in LA and said, Hey,
• 35:23
  Speaker 2: I'm trying to make it in the business, and don't
• 35:26
  Speaker 2: you come on it.
• 35:27
  Speaker 1: Yeah. Well, Axel would occasionally go back to Lafayette, Indiana,
• 35:30
  Speaker 1: where they were both from, and through his sister got
• 35:34
  Speaker 1: to know Shannon Hoon a little bit. They actually did
• 35:36
  Speaker 1: karaoke one night in a bar together in Indiana, and
• 35:40
  Speaker 1: I think he said to him, hey, you know, at
• 35:42
  Speaker 1: this point, Shannon Hum was already singing in a band.
• 35:45
  Speaker 1: I think he said, hey, kid, if you ever come
• 35:46
  Speaker 1: to LA, look me up. And Shannon Hum was like,
• 35:49
  Speaker 1: I'm going to book my ticket tomorrow. So Shannon does
• 35:52
  Speaker 1: come out to LA. Axel does take him under his wing.
• 35:56
  Speaker 1: He gets him a job with Ricky Rockman and his
• 35:58
  Speaker 1: production company, and he starts bringing him into the studio.
• 36:02
  Speaker 1: He's introducing him to everyone around town, and Shannon puts
• 36:06
  Speaker 1: together Blind Melon. They write five songs and get a
• 36:09
  Speaker 1: major label record deal, you know, just because of the
• 36:12
  Speaker 1: connection to Axel Rose and so yeah, I think that.
• 36:17
  Speaker 1: I think Axel always saw him as a bit of
• 36:19
  Speaker 1: a protege, as a younger version of himself. He understood,
• 36:24
  Speaker 1: you know, what it was like to be a kid
• 36:26
  Speaker 1: from Indiana with a big dream. And I think that
• 36:29
  Speaker 1: I think definitely Axel identified with Shannon Hun and wanted
• 36:33
  Speaker 1: to help him in any way he could. And I
• 36:34
  Speaker 1: think you very much see his generosity in doing that
• 36:38
  Speaker 1: and recognizing Shannon Hun's talent, but also in helping to
• 36:42
  Speaker 1: introduce him, get him a job, hook him up with
• 36:44
  Speaker 1: an apartment. You know, eventually he gets a deal. Gen
• 36:47
  Speaker 1: R brings him out on tour. You know, he was
• 36:49
  Speaker 1: really uh, you know, anytime they were in the same city,
• 36:53
  Speaker 1: he would bring him on stage. You know Channon video. Yeah, yeah,
• 36:58
  Speaker 1: he's in the Don't Cry video, so iconic on top
• 37:00
  Speaker 1: of the building. Amazing. So yeah, I think that there
• 37:04
  Speaker 1: was a real friendship there, and Shannon repaid that. You know,
• 37:09
  Speaker 1: Axel was struggling and happening a really hard time after
• 37:12
  Speaker 1: his divorce from Aaron Everley. He was isolated. He was
• 37:15
  Speaker 1: living in the studio, and Shannon moved in there for
• 37:18
  Speaker 1: a while and lived with him and just made sure
• 37:20
  Speaker 1: he was doing Okay, so there was a real bond
• 37:23
  Speaker 1: and a real friendship there. I mean, I it comes
• 37:27
  Speaker 1: a little later than this book covers, but I really
• 37:30
  Speaker 1: wonder how hard that must have been for Axel when
• 37:34
  Speaker 1: Shannanhan passed.
• 37:36
  Speaker 2: Yesterday's is one of the best on this double album,
• 37:40
  Speaker 2: co written by Axl Rose, West Arkeene and Del James.
• 37:44
  Speaker 2: So who are who are west Arkeen and Del James
• 37:46
  Speaker 2: And how did that whole collaboration come together?
• 37:48
  Speaker 1: These are old friends of the band. Wes Arkeen was
• 37:52
  Speaker 1: a musician who they knew from the club days, and
• 37:55
  Speaker 1: same thing with Del James. Del James was a writer
• 37:59
  Speaker 1: and he actual wrote the short story that they turned
• 38:02
  Speaker 1: into the trilogy of videos for Don't Cry to Member
• 38:05
  Speaker 1: Rain and Estrange. They're based on a short story called
• 38:09
  Speaker 1: Without You by Dell James. And I think that Wes
• 38:14
  Speaker 1: Arkin co wrote it so Easy. So he was a
• 38:17
  Speaker 1: musician and a writer, and they said, hey, it's so
• 38:20
  Speaker 1: easy was a great song. What else do you have?
• 38:22
  Speaker 1: And he had yesterday is that he had the Garden
• 38:25
  Speaker 1: And so I think that they wanted to record those
• 38:28
  Speaker 1: partially because they had success with one of his previous songs,
• 38:32
  Speaker 1: and also they just they were looking for anything and
• 38:36
  Speaker 1: everything to put on this album. So those two had
• 38:39
  Speaker 1: written that song. It was another one that goes back
• 38:41
  Speaker 1: a long time. You know. There's footage of actual singing
• 38:44
  Speaker 1: it and I think nineteen eighty nine in a club
• 38:47
  Speaker 1: in New York and killing it. You know, so that
• 38:50
  Speaker 1: song had been around. I love it too. I think
• 38:52
  Speaker 1: it's a great, great song and a great video. I
• 38:54
  Speaker 1: didn't realize again something that was new to me. The
• 38:58
  Speaker 1: same day that they recorded the video for Yesterday's they
• 39:02
  Speaker 1: recorded the video for Gardener Beaten in the same same location,
• 39:06
  Speaker 1: same director. They were just like, hey, let's do a
• 39:08
  Speaker 1: second video really quick, and a few takes later they
• 39:11
  Speaker 1: produced a second one. So there's the same microphone. You
• 39:14
  Speaker 1: can tell it's the same mic.
• 39:15
  Speaker 2: I don't think I've ever seen Garden of Eden video.
• 39:17
  Speaker 1: Oh yeah, it's great. It's very It's like this like
• 39:20
  Speaker 1: stop motion thing. It's very cool. Well, the director, Andy
• 39:24
  Speaker 1: Morihan loved the video, loved the song, and he said, man,
• 39:28
  Speaker 1: let's just do a video for it real quick. And
• 39:31
  Speaker 1: unlike November Rain and these kind of like Michael Jackson
• 39:34
  Speaker 1: level thriller videos that they did, this was done in
• 39:37
  Speaker 1: like just a few takes late one night after they
• 39:40
  Speaker 1: had already shot another video. They put it together and
• 39:43
  Speaker 1: it's killer. It's in some ways it's just as iconic
• 39:47
  Speaker 1: as the other ones, even though it's very you know, short,
• 39:50
  Speaker 1: and was done in kind of like what one take. Basically,
• 39:53
  Speaker 1: you know there's they use. I think they used one take.
• 39:58
  Speaker 2: Thanks so much for checking out the book on Rock podcast.
• 40:01
  Speaker 2: If you've just found the podcast, welcome. If you've been listening,
• 40:05
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• 40:07
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• 40:09
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• 40:13
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• 40:15
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• 40:25
  Speaker 2: the full episodes on video, along with video highlights from
• 40:28
  Speaker 2: episodes on the Booked on Rock YouTube channel. Find it
• 40:31
  Speaker 2: at Booked on Rock. Thanks again for listening. Now back
• 40:35
  Speaker 2: to the show. I've been listening to both of these
• 40:38
  Speaker 2: albums a lot since since I started reading the bok
• 40:41
  Speaker 2: getting ready for the interview, But I really I had
• 40:43
  Speaker 2: forgotten about a lot of those tracks, and I remember
• 40:45
  Speaker 2: I thought, again, maybe I need to apologize, But I
• 40:49
  Speaker 2: I loved all the songs on the radio, and I
• 40:51
  Speaker 2: liked a few of the other ones that weren't on
• 40:53
  Speaker 2: the radio, And I said, you know, I wasn't. I
• 40:55
  Speaker 2: was kind of lukewarm on the others. But now listening
• 40:57
  Speaker 2: back to it years later, maybe I just needed time
• 40:59
  Speaker 2: away from and I realized, I'm like, well, this stuff
• 41:01
  Speaker 2: is there's a lot of good stuff in here.
• 41:03
  Speaker 1: Oh yeah, ton a great material for putting out, you know,
• 41:08
  Speaker 1: two and a half hours of music, you know, I
• 41:10
  Speaker 1: mean almost all of it is just outstanding.
• 41:13
  Speaker 2: The chapter title itself, Where's Is? He suggests, how central
• 41:19
  Speaker 2: is he straddling had been to the band? What led
• 41:22
  Speaker 2: to his departure? He just lost interest, didn't he?
• 41:24
  Speaker 1: Yeah. I think he just didn't want to be in
• 41:27
  Speaker 1: a giant, mega band, you know. He wanted something more
• 41:30
  Speaker 1: like the Juju Hounds that he put together afterwards, something
• 41:33
  Speaker 1: just we can go play clubs and it's all low key.
• 41:36
  Speaker 1: I think he didn't like traveling on a jet airplane
• 41:39
  Speaker 1: like they did. He didn't like the large yests, he
• 41:42
  Speaker 1: didn't like the excess. I mean, at the beginning of
• 41:45
  Speaker 1: the book is he's still partying with the rest of
• 41:48
  Speaker 1: the band. But you know, famously he got arrested for
• 41:52
  Speaker 1: urinating on an airplane and and you know, part of
• 41:57
  Speaker 1: his court terms was that he was going to be
• 42:00
  Speaker 1: drug tested on a regular basis for like a year,
• 42:03
  Speaker 1: so he had to give up drugs completely. And I
• 42:07
  Speaker 1: think that that was a big change for him. I
• 42:09
  Speaker 1: think he said it was very difficult to be around
• 42:12
  Speaker 1: this band as somebody wasn't using drugs. You know, it's
• 42:15
  Speaker 1: not just like, oh, yeah, you do you and I
• 42:18
  Speaker 1: do me. You know, he shows up for rehearsal and
• 42:20
  Speaker 1: they're offering him some cocaine and stuff like that, and
• 42:23
  Speaker 1: he's like, guys, I'm gonna like literally be in jail
• 42:27
  Speaker 1: if I get busted again. So I think partially it
• 42:31
  Speaker 1: was sobriety really changed things for him. But I think
• 42:35
  Speaker 1: also just what the band became, which he writes about
• 42:38
  Speaker 1: and pretty tied up. You know, once there was this
• 42:41
  Speaker 1: rock and roll band rolling on the street, time went
• 42:44
  Speaker 1: by and it became a joke and you know, what
• 42:46
  Speaker 1: a punch in the face line. But I think that's
• 42:49
  Speaker 1: really how he saw it, Like we were this great
• 42:52
  Speaker 1: street level rock and roll band, and we turned into
• 42:56
  Speaker 1: you know this this kind of cliche of a rock
• 42:59
  Speaker 1: and roll band with all all the drugs and all
• 43:01
  Speaker 1: the groupies and all the sacks and the jet airplanes
• 43:03
  Speaker 1: and you know, so on and so forth. I think
• 43:05
  Speaker 1: it just wasn't for him.
• 43:07
  Speaker 2: Well, I guess that answers the question as to why
• 43:10
  Speaker 2: he didn't rejoin Axel Stuff and Slash when they reunited.
• 43:14
  Speaker 1: Yeah, well, there seemingly was a lot of water under
• 43:17
  Speaker 1: the you know, bad, bad, bad water under the bridge. Interestingly,
• 43:23
  Speaker 1: and this, you know, I remember this from the time.
• 43:25
  Speaker 1: But you know, he did reunite with the band during
• 43:28
  Speaker 1: the Illusion Tour. After he left, he came back and
• 43:32
  Speaker 1: played five dates with them. Gilby Clarke broke his hand
• 43:35
  Speaker 1: in a motorcycle wreck. They needed somebody to fill in,
• 43:39
  Speaker 1: who are we gonna get? Let's get? Is he? And
• 43:42
  Speaker 1: he agreed to it. So he played five shows with
• 43:44
  Speaker 1: them in Europe, you know, much later in the Allusion tour,
• 43:49
  Speaker 1: and and by all accounts, that didn't go well either.
• 43:52
  Speaker 1: The band was upset. They felt like he didn't prepare
• 43:56
  Speaker 1: and that he you know, even you know, they were
• 43:58
  Speaker 1: playing their old songs. But he hadn't sat down and
• 44:01
  Speaker 1: worked on him at all, so he wasn't really up
• 44:03
  Speaker 1: to speed, and and you know, they felt like he
• 44:06
  Speaker 1: didn't really give a great performance. When he went back,
• 44:09
  Speaker 1: he said, nothing's changed. You know, these guys are still
• 44:11
  Speaker 1: on drugs. They're practically living on another planet. He said,
• 44:14
  Speaker 1: If anything, it's only gotten worse since I was with
• 44:17
  Speaker 1: the band. So I think that was part of the
• 44:19
  Speaker 1: reason too, that he always felt like there were money issues.
• 44:24
  Speaker 1: But they did this this short reunion, and you know,
• 44:27
  Speaker 1: it's interesting five shows that they did together. But I
• 44:30
  Speaker 1: think in some ways that really was the end, you know,
• 44:33
  Speaker 1: for if he he has, you know, joined the band
• 44:36
  Speaker 1: here and there, but those were the last full shows
• 44:38
  Speaker 1: he ever played with the band.
• 44:40
  Speaker 2: Yeah, that explains why in twenty sixteen, I was just
• 44:44
  Speaker 2: looking twenty sixteen, I guessed correctly ten years ago was
• 44:46
  Speaker 2: that reunion right in this lifetime tour that I don't
• 44:50
  Speaker 2: know if they even asked him. It was just it
• 44:52
  Speaker 2: was just a foegun conclusion. He's not gonna want to
• 44:54
  Speaker 2: do it anyway, so let's.
• 44:56
  Speaker 1: I think they did ask him, but you know, he
• 45:00
  Speaker 1: he just he didn't like the money they were offering.
• 45:03
  Speaker 1: Is kind of work.
• 45:03
  Speaker 2: Okay, so they did, Okay, Yeah, it would have been
• 45:06
  Speaker 2: great to see him up there.
• 45:07
  Speaker 1: I agree. I'm a huge Easy fan. I love Izzy,
• 45:10
  Speaker 1: and you know, if you're a Guns n' Roses fan
• 45:13
  Speaker 1: from the Appetite days, it's hard not to be a
• 45:15
  Speaker 1: huge Easy fan too.
• 45:17
  Speaker 2: When the two Illusion albums were released on the same
• 45:19
  Speaker 2: day in nineteen ninety one, I remember critics they were divided.
• 45:23
  Speaker 2: Some of them praised the ambition, others thought the albums
• 45:26
  Speaker 2: were bloated. Why do you think the reviews are so
• 45:28
  Speaker 2: mixed at the time and have opinions changed over the
• 45:30
  Speaker 2: years by critics, Well, I.
• 45:32
  Speaker 1: Mean double albums are often criticized for that reason. You know,
• 45:36
  Speaker 1: there's so much material, and you know, inevitably somebody's gonna
• 45:40
  Speaker 1: think there's spiller on it, even me, who's like, I'm
• 45:43
  Speaker 1: a huge fan of these, I think their masterpieces. I
• 45:46
  Speaker 1: would even say, yeah, probably a couple of songs that
• 45:48
  Speaker 1: I might cut off of there. So I think double
• 45:52
  Speaker 1: albums always get nailed with that critique of there's just
• 45:55
  Speaker 1: too much. It should have been cut down to a
• 45:57
  Speaker 1: single album. They couldn't, you know, make any decisions or
• 46:01
  Speaker 1: rain themselves in. And then also I think that the
• 46:04
  Speaker 1: production was very different on these albums, something that again
• 46:08
  Speaker 1: when I was going back and really deeply listening to
• 46:12
  Speaker 1: them again and LEAs listening to Appetite Lies, also I realized,
• 46:17
  Speaker 1: you know, as much as people talk about Matt so
• 46:19
  Speaker 1: or I'm changing the band's sound, I think it was
• 46:22
  Speaker 1: Dizzy Reed who really changed the band sound more than
• 46:24
  Speaker 1: anything else. And he didn't play all the piano. Axel
• 46:27
  Speaker 1: played the piano on some of those songs, but bringing
• 46:30
  Speaker 1: in a piano and bringing in also keyboard and organ
• 46:34
  Speaker 1: synthesizers and strings and all that kind of stuff. All
• 46:37
  Speaker 1: of these keyboard instruments that they brought in I think
• 46:41
  Speaker 1: really changed the band's sound more than anything else. And
• 46:44
  Speaker 1: so I think for some people fans and critics that
• 46:47
  Speaker 1: was off putting, like this doesn't sound like the same band.
• 46:51
  Speaker 1: They often blamed Matt for that, but I think also,
• 46:54
  Speaker 1: you know, one of the big differences was just using
• 46:57
  Speaker 1: so much piano. Even a song like Bad Obsession, which
• 46:59
  Speaker 1: is like a rocker, it's got this, you know, I think,
• 47:03
  Speaker 1: really good piano on it, this kind of stonesy piano.
• 47:06
  Speaker 1: There's nothing like that on Appetite for Destruction, And so
• 47:10
  Speaker 1: you don't get that, you know, punch you in the
• 47:11
  Speaker 1: face hard rock band that was the Appetite era band.
• 47:16
  Speaker 1: You get an expanded version of that with a lot
• 47:19
  Speaker 1: more piano and a lot more organ and stuff like
• 47:22
  Speaker 1: that on the track. So I think for those two reasons,
• 47:25
  Speaker 1: you know, one, there's just a lot of material here
• 47:28
  Speaker 1: and double albums are always criticized for that. And then
• 47:31
  Speaker 1: too the change in the band's sound, you know, I think,
• 47:35
  Speaker 1: which was Matt Sa Dizzy Reed and all of the
• 47:39
  Speaker 1: piano instruments, and just the largeness of the production there was,
• 47:43
  Speaker 1: you know, I said, in some ways, Slash and Axel
• 47:46
  Speaker 1: as they wanted this to be amazing, and it was.
• 47:49
  Speaker 1: In some ways they almost over delivered at times. It's like, yeah,
• 47:52
  Speaker 1: you maybe didn't need to put, you know, seventy eight
• 47:55
  Speaker 1: guitar tracks on this one song. The just mixing all
• 47:58
  Speaker 1: of the tapes and trying to figure it out was
• 48:01
  Speaker 1: quite a project. They could almost not find a studio
• 48:03
  Speaker 1: that would handle the amount of material they had recorded
• 48:06
  Speaker 1: on all the tracks. You know, you might have twenty
• 48:08
  Speaker 1: four vocal tracks from Axel and then you know another
• 48:12
  Speaker 1: twenty four guitar parts would Slash and the basic tracks
• 48:15
  Speaker 1: and so trying to cram all of this material onto
• 48:20
  Speaker 1: you know, a single song. Sometimes it came across as
• 48:23
  Speaker 1: a bit overstuffed compared to you know, especially lies, but
• 48:28
  Speaker 1: also appetite too.
• 48:31
  Speaker 2: Find the Bookdo on Rock website at bookdown rock dot com.
• 48:35
  Speaker 2: There you can find all the back episodes of the show,
• 48:37
  Speaker 2: the latest episode in video and audio links to all
• 48:40
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• 48:43
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• 48:48
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• 48:51
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• 48:54
  Speaker 2: hot rock book releases, and before you go, check out
• 48:57
  Speaker 2: the booked on Rock online store. Pick up some book
• 49:00
  Speaker 2: rock merch. It's all at booked on rock dot com.
• 49:04
  Speaker 2: In fairness, Axle made it clear to the fans it's
• 49:07
  Speaker 2: not going to be an appetite. Part two. He said
• 49:09
  Speaker 2: that back in like nineteen eighty nine, I remember an
• 49:12
  Speaker 2: interview interview so but and commercially it was a huge success,
• 49:16
  Speaker 2: and you look at usual illusion two had most of
• 49:19
  Speaker 2: the hits on it. So I would think be interesting
• 49:22
  Speaker 2: to see the sales of one and two. I would
• 49:23
  Speaker 2: think two sells more. It's got you could be Mine,
• 49:26
  Speaker 2: knocking on Heaven's door, Yesterday's Civil warn or Strange however
• 49:30
  Speaker 2: one has less hits per se, but it's got November
• 49:35
  Speaker 2: raina on there Don't Cry the first Don't Cry also
• 49:38
  Speaker 2: on the right, Yeah, don't Cry, Live and let Die
• 49:41
  Speaker 2: No rain are they singles on their new.
• 49:44
  Speaker 1: Well when they came out, Too answered the charts at
• 49:47
  Speaker 1: number one, and the Red and Yellow entered the chards
• 49:51
  Speaker 1: at number two, So two did sell a little bit
• 49:55
  Speaker 1: better originally. I think in the end it probably evened
• 49:58
  Speaker 1: out over the years.
• 50:00
  Speaker 2: But they did, like Springsteen did with Human Touch and
• 50:03
  Speaker 2: Lucky Town, separate, you didn't have to buy them together.
• 50:05
  Speaker 1: Less successfully I would say, well, but you know, combined
• 50:10
  Speaker 1: they sold thirty five million copies you know, around the
• 50:12
  Speaker 1: world over the years. So it was definitely a success
• 50:17
  Speaker 1: for them. The record company earned back their money, and
• 50:20
  Speaker 1: in the end, I think everybody was happy, and they
• 50:24
  Speaker 1: made history when they did that. You know, when Springsteen
• 50:26
  Speaker 1: did that, he was pulling a GNR, you know, and
• 50:29
  Speaker 1: so never in history had a band put out two
• 50:33
  Speaker 1: complete albums on the same day, you know, as completely
• 50:37
  Speaker 1: separate projects like that, And that was Axel's idea one
• 50:40
  Speaker 1: hundred percent. He was a record company certainly didn't want that,
• 50:44
  Speaker 1: and everyone questioned it and said, why are we doing this?
• 50:46
  Speaker 1: But he made history when he did it, and I
• 50:49
  Speaker 1: think he was vindicated for that.
• 50:50
  Speaker 2: Well, you mentioned money. So one of the striking themes
• 50:54
  Speaker 2: here is that despite selling millions of records and filling arenas,
• 50:58
  Speaker 2: the band actually didn't make as much money from the
• 51:00
  Speaker 2: tours people might expect the massive scale of the Illusion tour.
• 51:04
  Speaker 2: How did that create its own problems?
• 51:06
  Speaker 1: Well, they just spent so much money. You know, they
• 51:09
  Speaker 1: had a huge entourage. They flew around in a jet.
• 51:13
  Speaker 1: They everybody in the band had their own bodyguard. They
• 51:16
  Speaker 1: brought a masseuse, they brought a chiropractor, they brought a
• 51:20
  Speaker 1: psychiatrist on the tour with them. Axel's brother and sister
• 51:26
  Speaker 1: were on the tour. So they have a jet airplane.
• 51:28
  Speaker 1: They're staying in the finest hotels in the world. They
• 51:31
  Speaker 1: have a massive stage production with a huge crew. They
• 51:36
  Speaker 1: were having one hundred thousand dollars parties every night, you know,
• 51:39
  Speaker 1: they were on the on the Metallica tour. Axel gave
• 51:43
  Speaker 1: his brother a budget one hundred thousand dollars a night.
• 51:46
  Speaker 1: I want you to throw the most amazing parties backstage
• 51:49
  Speaker 1: they have ever been seen. Each one had their own theme.
• 51:51
  Speaker 1: You know, we have a casino night, We're gonna have
• 51:54
  Speaker 1: a sixties night, We're gonna have a disco night. And
• 51:58
  Speaker 1: you know, when you spend that kind of money on
• 52:00
  Speaker 1: the road, you know, when you you know, tab add
• 52:04
  Speaker 1: it all up at the end, there's just not a
• 52:07
  Speaker 1: lot left, you know, And so they were kind of
• 52:09
  Speaker 1: surprised that at the end of it.
• 52:11
  Speaker 2: Yeah, but it does sound like a lot of fun.
• 52:15
  Speaker 1: A yeah, yeah, it was the most amazing. You know,
• 52:20
  Speaker 1: this is one of the one of what the things
• 52:22
  Speaker 1: that drew me to writing this book is what a story.
• 52:24
  Speaker 1: You know, you've ever done anything like this? And Axel said, hey,
• 52:28
  Speaker 1: wait a minute, this doesn't look like the Rolling Stones.
• 52:31
  Speaker 1: You know, we need parties. I want I want, you know,
• 52:34
  Speaker 1: money for people to gamble. I want you know, slot machines,
• 52:37
  Speaker 1: and I mean the amount of money that they spend,
• 52:40
  Speaker 1: you know, giant feasts every night and you know a
• 52:43
  Speaker 1: crew of almost two hundred and everybody's on a jet
• 52:46
  Speaker 1: airplane and everybody's staying at the Four Seasons, and you
• 52:50
  Speaker 1: know it was the amount of money that they spent
• 52:52
  Speaker 1: was insane. They made a ton of money, but man,
• 52:55
  Speaker 1: they burned through a lot of it too.
• 52:56
  Speaker 2: Sure do you see anything in the Illusion sessions, particularly
• 53:01
  Speaker 2: Axel pushing for the orchestration, the technology, the massive arrangements
• 53:05
  Speaker 2: that foreshadows the direction that he would eventually take with
• 53:08
  Speaker 2: Chinese democracy, Because I think I know what you're going
• 53:11
  Speaker 2: to say here. I have a particular song that.
• 53:14
  Speaker 1: Yeah, well that's first of all, that's a great question,
• 53:18
  Speaker 1: and yes, I think My World is the one that
• 53:20
  Speaker 1: really looks forward to Chinese democracy. But he was also
• 53:25
  Speaker 1: in there with these banks of synthesizers doing all the strings.
• 53:29
  Speaker 1: You know, he would spend hours picking out like the
• 53:31
  Speaker 1: perfect you know string sound. And he was very into
• 53:35
  Speaker 1: the synthesizers and the keyboards, not just on My World,
• 53:39
  Speaker 1: but on these other tracks. That's how My World came
• 53:42
  Speaker 1: to be. He was working in there on these you
• 53:46
  Speaker 1: know electronic you know, instruments, and that was all him.
• 53:49
  Speaker 1: And he said, well, let's put together you know a
• 53:52
  Speaker 1: little kind of nine inch nails faith no More epic NWA,
• 53:58
  Speaker 1: you know, mash up, and and that became My World.
• 54:01
  Speaker 1: It was really done as a lark.
• 54:02
  Speaker 2: But I always liked it.
• 54:05
  Speaker 1: I did too. I always thought I liked it.
• 54:07
  Speaker 2: Yeah, it's only like a minute in twenty five seconds.
• 54:09
  Speaker 1: It's very short. You know. If you don't like it,
• 54:11
  Speaker 1: you can ignore it. It comes at the very end.
• 54:13
  Speaker 2: And that's it. At the very end, kind of like
• 54:16
  Speaker 2: like a hint, like is where I'm going next?
• 54:18
  Speaker 1: Right? Yeah? Right? Well, in some ways you could you
• 54:21
  Speaker 1: could foreshadow where he was going. And you know, I'm
• 54:25
  Speaker 1: a big fan of the Chinese Democracy Project. I think
• 54:28
  Speaker 1: his singing, you know, on that album is incredible if
• 54:32
  Speaker 1: you're a fan of actual singing. In some ways, some
• 54:35
  Speaker 1: of the stuff he does on that album, like STREETA
• 54:38
  Speaker 1: Dreams for example, is as good as anything he ever did.
• 54:41
  Speaker 1: And he did write one song this I Love on
• 54:44
  Speaker 1: the Illusion tour. They played it, not the entire song,
• 54:48
  Speaker 1: but they they played. He would go out and play
• 54:50
  Speaker 1: on the piano and played some of that a few
• 54:53
  Speaker 1: times in the last shows. So he had written this
• 54:56
  Speaker 1: I Love for Stephanie Seymour on the Illusion to and
• 55:00
  Speaker 1: that eventually came out on that album, so you could
• 55:03
  Speaker 1: see some hints of where he wanted to go. He
• 55:05
  Speaker 1: was a big nine inch Nails fan. He brought them
• 55:08
  Speaker 1: on tour before anybody had really heard of them, and
• 55:12
  Speaker 1: he loved I think he really loved Faith No More
• 55:14
  Speaker 1: because one they used a keyboard, and then two like
• 55:19
  Speaker 1: if you listen to something like Epic, which was their
• 55:21
  Speaker 1: huge hit, you know it was really bringing in you know,
• 55:24
  Speaker 1: you have keyboard, you have heavy metal, you have rap
• 55:27
  Speaker 1: going on in there, a little bit of everything. It
• 55:29
  Speaker 1: was such an innovative song. So I think that he
• 55:33
  Speaker 1: was very much wanting to get away from, you know,
• 55:37
  Speaker 1: the classic hard rock kind of thing that Slash did,
• 55:41
  Speaker 1: or even as he did with the Juju Hounds, and
• 55:43
  Speaker 1: I think he was looking he wanted to bring in
• 55:45
  Speaker 1: Dave Nabarro as the guitar player for the band. Even
• 55:49
  Speaker 1: when they got Gilby, he was really wanting Dave Nabarro
• 55:51
  Speaker 1: and wanting to go in in that direction of like,
• 55:55
  Speaker 1: you know, cutting edge music. I think was what he
• 55:59
  Speaker 1: wanted to do.
• 56:00
  Speaker 2: When people talk about the Golden Age of Guns and Roses,
• 56:02
  Speaker 2: they almost always mean the Appetite and Illusion years. I
• 56:06
  Speaker 2: guess what comes to mind looking back on that on
• 56:09
  Speaker 2: that era, the particularly the Illusion years, because you've written
• 56:12
  Speaker 2: a book about it, So what what do you think
• 56:14
  Speaker 2: about those years in terms of rock history.
• 56:18
  Speaker 1: Well, that's what gave them their legacy, that's what put
• 56:21
  Speaker 1: them in the status of the true legends, and I
• 56:24
  Speaker 1: think accomplished what Actual wanted to do, which was they're
• 56:29
  Speaker 1: like I mean, especially today, they're like a Queen or
• 56:32
  Speaker 1: an Elton John or Rolling Stones. You know, they're They're
• 56:36
  Speaker 1: not the same thing as let's say, I'm not like Crewe,
• 56:39
  Speaker 1: you know, for example, who also came out of the
• 56:41
  Speaker 1: Sunset Strip and is a legendary band as well, but
• 56:45
  Speaker 1: wouldn't probably be in that same conversation as the you know,
• 56:49
  Speaker 1: sort of classic rock legends that Actual wanted to join.
• 56:52
  Speaker 1: I think it was illusion that enabled that because of
• 56:56
  Speaker 1: the artistry, the scope, the huge songs, the epic ballads,
• 57:02
  Speaker 1: the you know, the strings, the incredible music videos. You know.
• 57:06
  Speaker 1: I see these articles about like we're gonna look at
• 57:10
  Speaker 1: this batshit crazy four million dollar video GNR recorded back
• 57:14
  Speaker 1: in the day, and I'm always like, you should be
• 57:18
  Speaker 1: like giving props to that incredible video instead of like,
• 57:23
  Speaker 1: you know, making fun of it. You know, to me,
• 57:26
  Speaker 1: it's like this is incredible. No, but you know, you
• 57:28
  Speaker 1: don't see bands do anything like this now, As you said,
• 57:31
  Speaker 1: like even that tour you know, when they're not one
• 57:34
  Speaker 1: hundred thousand dollar parties, it's like nobody does what they
• 57:37
  Speaker 1: did anymore. You know, these kind of like that level
• 57:41
  Speaker 1: of rock and roll whatever you want to call it, artistry, creativity,
• 57:46
  Speaker 1: a band swinging for the fences and connecting. You know.
• 57:49
  Speaker 1: I love it when a great band swings for the fences.
• 57:51
  Speaker 1: You know, sometimes they hit it out of the park
• 57:53
  Speaker 1: and sometimes they don't.
• 57:55
  Speaker 2: But we had you on for your YouTube, Polos.
• 57:57
  Speaker 1: Like I said, it reminds me of YouTube. They just
• 58:00
  Speaker 1: want to, you know, really deliver something that is, you know,
• 58:04
  Speaker 1: mind blowing and trying something totally new. I think, you know,
• 58:08
  Speaker 1: probably the difference here is G and R actually delivered.
• 58:10
  Speaker 1: They hit a home run with it, you know, and
• 58:13
  Speaker 1: to me, that gave them a legacy that they wouldn't
• 58:15
  Speaker 1: have had if they had fallen apart after appetite, you know,
• 58:18
  Speaker 1: which I suppose could have happened, you know, it could
• 58:21
  Speaker 1: have been a different story. But because of illusion, they're
• 58:26
  Speaker 1: they're in that conversation of the legendary I think, classic
• 58:30
  Speaker 1: rock bands instead of the legendary heavy metal bands.
• 58:33
  Speaker 2: And I think it's also because of its success that
• 58:36
  Speaker 2: was the big what if? What if they I mean
• 58:38
  Speaker 2: Spaghetti Incident didn't come out shortly after, but we saw
• 58:41
  Speaker 2: the band dissolve and it just ended. And what could
• 58:45
  Speaker 2: have been, you know, if they stayed together.
• 58:47
  Speaker 1: Right and and I mean also the Spaghetti Incident's part
• 58:50
  Speaker 1: of this book and part of this story and part
• 58:52
  Speaker 1: of the Illusion era. You know something, I maybe kind
• 58:56
  Speaker 1: of knew this, but I didn't appreciate how much that
• 58:58
  Speaker 1: album percent of it was recorded during the Illusion era.
• 59:02
  Speaker 1: A lot of it was recorded during the recording of
• 59:05
  Speaker 1: User Illusion. They would just go into the studio and
• 59:07
  Speaker 1: bang out these covers for fun without anybody kind of
• 59:10
  Speaker 1: looking or paying attention, and they started collecting them and
• 59:14
  Speaker 1: then as they're out on tour, they would book a
• 59:15
  Speaker 1: studio and go in somewhere. Eventually Actual ordered that all
• 59:20
  Speaker 1: of Izzy's guitar tracks be erased, which is unfortunate, and
• 59:24
  Speaker 1: Gilby went in and in one day replaced them all
• 59:27
  Speaker 1: and added himself to the project. So we hear Gilby
• 59:31
  Speaker 1: on an album too, and that came out at the
• 59:34
  Speaker 1: very end, right after the tour. But I included the
• 59:38
  Speaker 1: Spaghetti incident in this book because it is also part
• 59:41
  Speaker 1: of the same story, and so you can't talk about
• 59:45
  Speaker 1: the spaghetti incident without talking about user illusion, because all
• 59:49
  Speaker 1: of those tracks were recorded either in the studio at
• 59:51
  Speaker 1: the same time or later on the tour, and one
• 59:54
  Speaker 1: hundred percent of it was done by when they got
• 59:56
  Speaker 1: back Slash just mixed it and they put it out.
• 1:00:01
  Speaker 2: The Book Down Rock podcast is part of the Boneless
• 1:00:04
  Speaker 2: podcasting network. If you're a fan of classic rock and
• 1:00:06
  Speaker 2: classic film like I am, go to Boneless dot lovable
• 1:00:10
  Speaker 2: dot app to find over twenty great shows there that's
• 1:00:13
  Speaker 2: Boneless down Lovable dot app, or just go to bookdown
• 1:00:16
  Speaker 2: Rock dot com the Boneless podcasting network. It is what
• 1:00:20
  Speaker 2: you want to be listen with confidence. Well, congratulations is
• 1:00:26
  Speaker 2: another home run book. Here a strange guns n' roses
• 1:00:29
  Speaker 2: and use your illusion. It's out now. Find ou wherever
• 1:00:32
  Speaker 2: books are sold, right, look forward to the nearest bookstore. Absolutely, yeah,
• 1:00:36
  Speaker 2: independent bookstores, so hopefully they have one there. Go to
• 1:00:38
  Speaker 2: bookdown Rock dot com to find your nearest independent bookstore
• 1:00:42
  Speaker 2: and people can find you online.
• 1:00:43
  Speaker 1: Jeff ware, Well, there is a Facebook page for the book,
• 1:00:46
  Speaker 1: so come there sign up. One of the things I
• 1:00:49
  Speaker 1: did was put together a YouTube playlist chronological with every
• 1:00:53
  Speaker 1: single video, every demo, every out take, every weird newscast,
• 1:00:57
  Speaker 1: every single show on the tour. It's three D plus
• 1:01:00
  Speaker 1: videos in chronological order. So come on to my Facebook page.
• 1:01:05
  Speaker 1: There's a link there. You can watch the videos and
• 1:01:07
  Speaker 1: watch all this crazy stuff. Axel giving Away is condo
• 1:01:11
  Speaker 1: and MTV while you are reading the book, and so
• 1:01:15
  Speaker 1: come on there and join the party. It'd be great
• 1:01:18
  Speaker 1: to see everybody.
• 1:01:19
  Speaker 2: Yeah, thanks for letting know. I'll find the link, I'll
• 1:01:21
  Speaker 2: sign up, and then I'll put it in the show
• 1:01:23
  Speaker 2: notes for people to access it a lot easier. Jeff
• 1:01:26
  Speaker 2: Arkness always love having you on man, you always you
• 1:01:29
  Speaker 2: always give great interviews. The enthusiasm for these these artists,
• 1:01:32
  Speaker 2: it comes through. And like you've said in your interviews,
• 1:01:35
  Speaker 2: if you're going to do a book, it's got to
• 1:01:36
  Speaker 2: be on a band you love, that you have a
• 1:01:38
  Speaker 2: passion for, and it comes through.
• 1:01:39
  Speaker 1: Well, thank you so much. And yeah, so if I'm
• 1:01:41
  Speaker 1: going to spend a couple of years, you know, digging
• 1:01:43
  Speaker 1: in on this level, it's got to be a band
• 1:01:45
  Speaker 1: that's just near and dear to my heart. And I
• 1:01:47
  Speaker 1: always knew I would write a book about GNR, and
• 1:01:49
  Speaker 1: I'm so glad that I did. And it's great to
• 1:01:52
  Speaker 1: come on here and talk about it with you too.
• 1:01:53
  Speaker 1: I'm excited to be here, so thank you so much
• 1:01:56
  Speaker 1: for having me. That's it, it's in the box.