Guns n Roses: Critical Rehab

Now, see, I thought ILM was supposed to be against this kinda loaded-with-assumption, I-think-they-suck-therefore-they-suck-and-everybody-else-must-think-they-suck-too shit. You're getting into Amy Phillips/Pitchfork territory here. (Sorry for all the hyphens.)

sorry I get all evangelical abt. LP

Yeah, blame Patrin for that one.

Sorry, I wasn't trying to piss anyone off/lead folk on a G'n'R suck crusade. What I think I was trying to say was that I thought the two Illusions were rubbish, but so grand in scope that they were unforgettable. (I'll drop that 'of course' bit in future)

I am totally the kind of tart who thought ew, Guns n Roses, how awful when they first hit and now likes them. But then I had some kind of taste when they first hit and now I like anything. By about 1990 I thought "Sweet Child O'Mine" was brilliant and Appetite followed hotly on its heels.

count me out

But I like L.A. Guns better anyway, because they really are more of the druggie-degenerates I usta fear.

Mark I really really hope you only mean Axl c. '89, because otherwise this is about as "err?" as saying you wanna fuck Liz Taylor.

[silence]

that's what I thought

My response was going to be something like "?!?!?!?!?!?!?!!?" but I think I'll just stick with what you said: I don't hear it, but if you do, more power to you. (I guess.)

(More PUNK in POISON????)

Axl's junkie-for-the-camera schtick sucks all the fun right out of the junkie-rock-star pose -- all that's less is dull romanticization of a figure that's only romantic in the hands of a really capable actor like Reed, or Thunders, or whoever else. Whereas Skid Row had all their ducks lined up. "Youth Gone Wild" sounds better now than most anything outta the GnR catalogue, and Sebastian Bach is a way funnier stage name than "Axl Rose." To say nothing of "W. Axl Rose," yeesh.

PS what does this "method not implemented" screen that comes up every so often when trying to post?

"Youth Gone Wild" is OK. It's the Steve Forbert of that sorta thing. It doesn't really do much musically; it's loud but kinda flaccid.

In "Talk Dirty To Me" alone, if nothing else. Unless you buy into punk being about a spirit instead of a sound or something like that. And even then, why G'n'R instead of Poison? [OT: What is this spirit that punk is always supposed to be about? Any time I hear it explained it always just sounds like basic principles of self-assertiveness that institutional authority figures prescribe to you when you're 10. Or else petty childish selfishness. Or some hybrid of the two. It's more interesting if it's a specific approach to sound.]

I don't think the Bon Jovi/country, Loverboy/disco, or Hysteria/experimentation connections really need explanation beyond a quick listen to side 2 of New Jersey, "Turn Me Loose", or "Rocket". Most of these bands weren't necessarily worth all that much (I don't intend to sit through a whole Poison album anytime soon) but neither was G'n'R AFAIC.

Welllllllllllllllllllllllllllll, it sorta sounds like it could be a Dictators song, albeit not a very good one. Most of the music historically defined as "punk" was not that sexist, though, unless we're talking about crap like Hatebreed.

"You know I call you, I call you on the telephone
I'm only hopin' that you're home
So I can hear you
When you say those words to me
And whisper so softly
I've gotta hear you
Cause baby we'll be..."

that's the real shit!

"You never act the way you should" -- Bret Michaels likes his girls slutty, but he knows that it's not the way they should act.

If some guy told me I wasn't acting the way I should, I'd fucking smack him. But it's entirely possible I'm not attuned enough.

I'm gonna go out on a limb and say that I consider fag-bashing a sexist act -- against men not acting the way they should.

Ah, but he doesn't say that!

(I meant no sarcasm with "It's entirely possible I'm not attuned enough" BTW.)

So how come the critical makeover stateside?

I always remember them being somewhat critically acclaimed back in the late-80's, early 90's (positive comparisions to the Stones and Dolls, Slash as a highly praised guitarist, considered to have made a "credible" power ballad, etc.), so I don't see this critical "makeover" yr talking aboot. The only reason they lost their critical backing after UYI was because Nevermind came out the next week. If anything, I think they've fallen out of favour with critics over the last 12 years because of Axl's Hughes-like disappearence for years, and Shields-like inability to create a follow-up album.

What I mean is that even if you can argue for more blatant examples like the Crue's "Girls Girls Girls" as not having explicitly sexist content within the lyrics themselves, mentally it's hard to separate the song from the images of going-to-seed Vince Neil ogling chicks doused in water.

But charges of sexism may be disingenuous coming from a man, so I'll say no more on the subject. Just throwing the idea out there.

More importantly, whatever your feelings about GnR's style/songs/media profile, the problem with comparing them to Bon Jovi, Loverboy and Poison is that those bands didn't/couldn't rock, and Guns 'N' Roses, at least on Appetite, did.

I remember GnR having a near universal appeal in 1988: Jane's Addiction fans, pop heads, Nietzsche-reading hipsters all loved them. As a highschool senior, I remember seeing a GnR tee shirt (on a metal girl in Madison, Wisconsin) that made me shudder: an illustration of a woman who's just been gang-raped (wasn't this the original cover art for Appetite?). But by the time I was a college freshman in D.C. the same year, I was having long drunk argumenents with new friends about which was better: Appetite or It Takes a Nation of Millions. Both were consensus picks in dorm rooms across the country.

I don't know that this is a defense of GnR using that image, but I'm almost completely sure it was a pre-existing work of art by Robert Williams that Axl picked for the album insert. I'm no expert, but a lot of Williams' stuff is similarly ugly in theme. There was contraversy at the time, and the image was pulled from subsequent pressings, I belive.

This may betray some of my cultural prejudices at the time, but the painting just screamed YAY RAPE! to me when I saw it connected to a heavy metal band. Now I don't know what it screams. I do remember being turned on by the metal girl wearing it...

Of the bands I listed BOC's the only one I really care about so I won't press the comparisons. (And Agents Of Fortune blows away Appetite while getting 17% of the press IMO - Does it rock as much? I don't know and don't know that I care.) All I wanted to say was that I don't think Guns'n'Roses was unique for an 80s hard rock band in terms of the breadth of their influences. I don't hear much other than bad Aerosmith.

Read this.

this is even funnier that that recording guy's journals! (except i guess it's not)

Granted, the tide of good press retreated almost as soon as Axl put out an album with bigoted lyrics, though the Use Your Illusion albums got pretty good reviews and sold well.

Again, where's the revisionism? There is definitely interest by the mainstream press to cover a band that sold tens of millions of records ten years ago, but that's a perfectly legitimate story when the context of what has happened publically to the band. Just giving this incarnation of GnR a lot of press is NOT revising the critical assessment of their music. If that's being done, I haven't seen it.

(I live in Montreal, and am from Boston, so I'm not coming at this from a European sensibility). All the coverage I see of them this in this day is how Axl has a band together made up of various odd parts, and he doesn't quite know what he wants to do with it (Industrial? Moby producing?). And before he did those live New Year's shows a few years back, all the talk was "Does he still have it? Is he really fat and bald now?" I don't think this is critical rehab (unless you consider 1993-now critical rehab for Michael Jackson).

I'm saying this from the topic question "So how come the critical makeover stateside?" doesn't make any sense, because they were always held pretty high in the press ("Sure Axl comes to the stage three hours late, but is there a better album intro than 'Welcome To The Jungle'?"), and someone else, since I posted, put up examples showing this.

Point taken, and I wasn't trying to confuse things. My statement just came from the fact that I personally don't see "GnR as genre synthesis" among their main strengths, although others have furthered that argument. I'd agree at best their style is largely a straight Aerosmith rip, maybe bringing in the Stones and Zep (the two bands Aerosmith was a rip of anyway).

I was trying to shift things toward "rock bands are supposed to rock; that's what GnR did and did well." It's fine to like the lite-weights you mentioned better, but there's a category in which they can't even compete with GnR. BOC did rock. I've not heard Agents (perhaps I'll have to pick it up), but as you've admitted you're comparing very different bands from different eras. Not that one can't do that; BOC just seems to be a random choice that doesn't really get to the heart of whatever's at issue here.

Compared to Axel's appearance?

Izzy played with Axl's GnR off-and-on between 2006 and whenever, but only when he felt like it. Most likely his reasons for not doing this tour are that he hates touring.

Remarkably, Izzy has released 11 solo albums, plus a live album.

It's fairly obvious that Izzy is a guy who does pretty much exactly what he wants, and only exactly when he wants to.

Cue thread for people who have figured out how to live.

http://assets.rollingstone.com/assets/images/video/izzy-stradlin-reunites-with-guns-n-roses-in-las-vegas-20121126/izzy-306x306-1353965308.jpg

Healthiest-looking gnr veteran.

Wow. Good for you, Izzy. Figured out how to live, indeed.

Looks like a slimmer Ronnie O'Sullivan.

has he recorded anything since the juju hounds album? i love that so much

lord help me but I might go to this reunion tour

xpost I wasn't kidding, he's released 11 solo albums!

I'd go to a JuJu Hounds reunion.

I wish Izzy had joined the G N' R reunion - maybe then folks would finally admit the Ju Ju Hounds album is no better than any random Ron Wood solo disc.

Ju Ju Hounds album has at least two really excellent tracks and a handful of pretty good ones. If I could count on that from a Ron Wood solo disc I'd be delighted.

Izzy's 117 Degrees, which was his last album on Geffen, is even better than the JuJu Hounds record. There was a time (GN'R pun intented) you could find it for a dollar at any FYE in America.

Not many people bought Izzy's albums, but everyone who did formed a band that sounded a little like the Faces.

Never expected to say this ever again, especially 40 years after their first show, but holy shit this GNR set at the final Sabbath show totally rips

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vr-bhWp4cBE

when a rock band over 50 has a fit/hungry young drummer it can be a beautiful thing

Video gone already :/

ah crud, i knew i shoukdve watched right away

Still some clips out there

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kGGdmFnWgk8

Why the heck is Axl completely off the tempo in the last section?

Yeah the band were great but Axl did not sound amazing (maybe better on the livestream) in person and was well off his timing, not just for the Sabbath covers - man oh man if you can't get the timing right on songs from appetite something is up. In ear monitor delay? Old man brain?

Cool to see him do the little axl-isms tho, like when he puts up his hand in a “stop right there” gesture while singing. And his fascinating helmet of fake / replaced hair

I like Charlie Benante standing sidestage wearing a Missing Persons t-shirt.

I assume Slash's hair is of a piece (so to speak) with his hat.

Duff’s too prob

set was passable, but it was cool to see a pretty lively Axl so that was fun/notable.

i dug their choice of Sabbath covers! I think you could totally make a case that “Never Say Die” unofficially birthed the basic sound & style of GNR

and i can totally picture a teenaged Slash obsessively woodshedding the “sabbath bloody sabbath” solo

This band is playing at the Atl. Braves stadium in September so I will be seeing this same commercial for the show several times per game for the next four months. It's hilarious -- there are absolutely no shots where Axl's face is shown clearly. All long shots, shots from behind, shots with his hand and the mic in front of his face. He must be really scary looking now!

I dunno, seems like as of last year he was looking this. Reminds me a bit of Kevin Bacon, sorta? Might just be me.

https://www.instagram.com/reel/DK2l7l1xd_j/

yeah no he actually looks better than he has in a long while

And he seems happy!

Interesting -- not showing his face in the commercial definitely seemed like a conscious choice. I assumed he looked like Mickey Rourke or something.

Axl seems like a good example of therapy working