and maybe the drums weren't AS gated as poison's, but they're still fucking late '80s as can be. People are ignoring the commonalities because G'n'R didn't revel in some of the flaws of hair metal. Like saying Children of Men isn't a sci-fi movie because, yeah it's a dystopian movie set in the future based around a scientific fantasy, but they don't call money "spacebucks."
― da croupier, Thursday, 12 April 2012 19:30 (twelve years ago) link
when GNR broke they were definitely teasing up their hair and dressing more glam, then it seemed like once they got big Axl went for the longhair/headband look...cfe: how he looks in welcome to the jungle vs. paradise city videos
― Mississippi Butt Hurt (upper mississippi sh@kedown), Thursday, 12 April 2012 19:31 (twelve years ago) link
maybe it's actually kind of common for the tail end of an era to define it, the way the 2nd half of the Beatles catalog has become way more culturally ubiquitous than the 1st half.
― some dude, Thursday, 12 April 2012 19:33 (twelve years ago) link
g'n'r was a strong enough band, musically and aesthetically, to influence their peers, but let's not pretend their peers weren't named tracii and bret.
― da croupier, Thursday, 12 April 2012 19:34 (twelve years ago) link
and Adler is? gtfo
I'd definitely say Adler's closer, yeah. He gets the mid-tempo swing/swagger happening in a way that Mars never really could. Also, for the faster stuff, Adler lays back like Jones, whereas Mars is on top of/ahead of the beat -- that's not a bad thing by any means, and it was great for the 'mats, but a solid Jones disciple it does not Mars make.
― Dancing with Mr. T (Tarfumes The Escape Goat), Thursday, 12 April 2012 19:35 (twelve years ago) link
But Cinderella were practically AC/DC copyists!
― EveningStar (Sund4r), Thursday, April 12, 2012 7:18 PM (15 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink
yeah I shouldn't have said Cinderella, they mixed it up a bit. "Shake Me" is definitely hair though.
― Matt Armstrong, Thursday, 12 April 2012 19:35 (twelve years ago) link
yeah, i don't get the "sleaze rock" / "hair metal" distinction at all. guns 'n roses kept their sound gritty & raw, made the connections to stuff like skynyrd, aerosmith, the stones, the dolls and hanoi rocks a little bit more explicit, but the basic approach isn't all that different from early motley crue or w/e. m@tt otm.
― BEMORE SUPER FABBY (contenderizer), Thursday, 12 April 2012 19:36 (twelve years ago) link
― da croupier, Thursday, April 12, 2012 3:34 PM (53 seconds ago) Bookmark
GNR was influential on later bands sure but their peers? i mean i guess Dr. Feelgood and Slave To The Grind were in some way responses to the post-Appetite landscape but Guns came along so late in the game that i feel like the other big bands were probably looking at them more like competition than an influence.
― some dude, Thursday, 12 April 2012 19:37 (twelve years ago) link
early motley crue isn't hair imo
― Matt Armstrong, Thursday, 12 April 2012 19:37 (twelve years ago) link
motley crue switched styles 2 or 3 times depending on whom they wanted to rip off
― Matt Armstrong, Thursday, 12 April 2012 19:38 (twelve years ago) link
you're making a rather limited definition of "influence" there, sd.
― da croupier, Thursday, 12 April 2012 19:38 (twelve years ago) link
didn't motley crue and GnR pretty much hate each other? i think like somebody pulled somebodies pants down at the troubador or some shit i can't quite remember
― Mississippi Butt Hurt (upper mississippi sh@kedown), Thursday, 12 April 2012 19:38 (twelve years ago) link
yeah dude, GET IN THE RING MOTHERFUCKER
― Matt Armstrong, Thursday, 12 April 2012 19:39 (twelve years ago) link
i guess, it was kind of a tangent to the main point of your post anyway so nevermind (xpost)
― some dude, Thursday, 12 April 2012 19:39 (twelve years ago) link
I definitely think Patience influenced bands-- guys we need an acoustic ballad
― Matt Armstrong, Thursday, 12 April 2012 19:40 (twelve years ago) link
i'd say hair went through stages.
― BEMORE SUPER FABBY (contenderizer), Thursday, 12 April 2012 19:43 (twelve years ago) link
also, i think it's weird to talk about who "should" be in the R&RHOF as a product of what we happen to like (unless, you know, we're members of the voting body). i think that kiss and the red hot chili peppers make sense as inductees because they were hugely popular and influential and are well-remembered. they helped shape and keep alive the general american sense of what "rock and roll" is all about - as embodied by the hard rock cafe, harley ads and dive bar playlists.
The Monkees aren't in the hall of fame either and they have more good songs than KISS
― Matt Armstrong, Thursday, 12 April 2012 19:45 (twelve years ago) link
maybe now that one is dead the hall will forgive them for being pre-fab
― da croupier, Thursday, 12 April 2012 19:46 (twelve years ago) link
yeah totally. i look at the HOF and the Grammys and other things like that as, well, of course they're kind of silly and not wholly merit-based, but you can at least pretty easily triangulate what the canon they're trying to form is, and critique or comment on how close or far off the mark they get. (xpost to contenderizer)
― some dude, Thursday, 12 April 2012 19:48 (twelve years ago) link
Did you deliberate quote Axl Rose from "Welcome to the Jungle" there? According to Nick Kent's "the Dark Stuff": "FUCKIN' MOTLEY CRUE GAVE FUCKIN' STEVIE FUCKIN' AJAX TO SNORT! FUCKED HIM UP!!"
― Poliopolice, Thursday, 12 April 2012 20:26 (twelve years ago) link
Oops, that was a quote from "Paradise City"-- my mistake
― Poliopolice, Thursday, 12 April 2012 20:34 (twelve years ago) link
This showed up on Longform today:http://www.heretodaygonetohell.com/articles/showarticle.php?articleid=62
― the hairy office thing (Eazy), Friday, 13 April 2012 21:09 (twelve years ago) link
that article paints a charming portrait of Axl Rose, at least at the beginning.
― Poliopolice, Friday, 13 April 2012 22:06 (twelve years ago) link
"Who cares?" Ian McLagan of the Faces said when asked about Rose's slight.
― Dancing with Mr. T (Tarfumes The Escape Goat), Saturday, 14 April 2012 20:38 (twelve years ago) link
i don't care!
― scott seward, Saturday, 14 April 2012 20:42 (twelve years ago) link
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/entertainment-arts-17721376
― Cheggers Plays Populous (snoball), Sunday, 15 April 2012 17:41 (twelve years ago) link
saying he felt neither "wanted or respected".
So is this Brit grammar, bad BBC grammar, or misquoting Axl's bad grammar? Because if Axl doesn't know it's neither/nor, not neither/or, I'll be very sad.
― Josh in Chicago, Sunday, 15 April 2012 17:52 (twelve years ago) link
Bad BBC grammar. Pretty sure that, for all his faults, Axl can speak English proper.
― Cheggers Plays Populous (snoball), Sunday, 15 April 2012 17:58 (twelve years ago) link
I was just listening to "One in a Million." In my mind, the controversy about the lyrics were totally overblown, but shit, these are still shocking.
― Poliopolice, Sunday, 15 April 2012 18:42 (twelve years ago) link
yeah, it's pretty hideous. too bad the tune and vocal are so great.
― BEMORE SUPER FABBY (contenderizer), Sunday, 15 April 2012 19:48 (twelve years ago) link
Yeah, it's an acoustic juggernaut, if only the lyrics were different. I read a grip of gnr biographies andeverybody's take onit is different. Duff and slash both purported to accept axl's explanation of a fictional narrator for the song, while being embarassed in their private lives and relationships. I think Adler says he believed that axl's http://kkkorner.files.wordpress.com/2009/05/nbomb5.jpg?w=350&h=259 was onlyon referenceto certain kinds of black people.
― beachville, Sunday, 15 April 2012 22:34 (twelve years ago) link
Huh. Niceautoreplace.
Also, please note that my opinion of adlers opinion is that he should walk off a fucking cliff.
― beachville, Sunday, 15 April 2012 22:35 (twelve years ago) link
Backstage at a Rolling Stones show in 1989 that GNR and Living Colour were both opening, Rose supposedly approached a visibly pissed Vernon Reid and said, "Hey, I didn't mean that YOU guys were n*ggers!"
― Dancing with Mr. T (Tarfumes The Escape Goat), Sunday, 15 April 2012 22:36 (twelve years ago) link
Parts of the song that are unassailable:
1,2,1,2,3,4(Whistling and modulating rhythm guitar)Guess I needed sometime to get awayI needed some piece of mindSome piece of mind that'll staySo I thumbed it down to Sixth and L.A.Maybe a Greyhound could be my way
and then it gets completely and totally assailable.
and then it launches into
ou're one in a millionYeah, that's what you areYou're one in a million, babeYou're a shooting starMaybe someday we'll see youBefore you make us cryYou know we tried to reach youBut you were much too high
which is just basically fucking awesome.
then the telegraph piano and vamping in the last minute or so of the song.
God, that fucking hillbilly chickenshit.
― beachville, Sunday, 15 April 2012 22:49 (twelve years ago) link
Oh yeah, here from 4:37 - 4:57
http://youtu.be/r_2jSPQYlLY
― beachville, Sunday, 15 April 2012 22:59 (twelve years ago) link
beachville otm, the rest of the song is so fucking good that i get so mad he had to add that happy horseshit to ruin it
― heated debate over derpy hooves (jon /via/ chi 2.0), Sunday, 15 April 2012 23:02 (twelve years ago) link
Was this the last E-grade Christgau gave?
G N' R Lies [Geffen, 1988]Axl's voice is a power tool with attachments, Slash's guitar a hype, the groove potent "hard rock," and the songwriting not without its virtues. So figure musical quality at around C plus and take the grade as a call to boycott, a reminder to clean livers who yearn for the wild side that the necessary link between sex-and-drugs and rock-and-roll is a Hollywood fantasy. Anyway, this band isn't even sex and drugs--it's dicking her ass before you smack up with her hatpin. (No wonder they want to do an AIDS benefit.) "One in a Million"--"Immigrants and faggots/They make no sense to me/They come to our country/And think they'll do as they please/Like start some mini-Iran/Or spread some fucking disease/They talk so many goddamn ways/It's all Greek to me"--is disgusting because it's heartfelt and disgusting again because it's a grandstand play. It gives away the "joke" (to quote the chickenshit "apologies" on the cover) about the offed girlfriend the way "Turn around bitch I've got a use for you" gives away "Sweet Child o' Mine." Back when they hit the racks, these posers talked a lot of guff about suicide. I'm still betting they don't have it in them to jump. E
― Dancing with Mr. T (Tarfumes The Escape Goat), Sunday, 15 April 2012 23:09 (twelve years ago) link
"Anyway, this band isn't even sex and drugs--it's dicking her ass before you smack up with her hatpin."
wtf
― charlie h, Monday, 16 April 2012 01:07 (twelve years ago) link
I'm not ever sure what that means, but somehow he seems right... even though Appetite is all about sex and drugs
― Poliopolice, Monday, 16 April 2012 01:16 (twelve years ago) link
The compilation Ultimate Worship Music got an E in 2004, and Wow Hits 2003 got an E+ in 2002.
― da croupier, Monday, 16 April 2012 01:23 (twelve years ago) link
Smacking up with a hatpin? WAT
― Respectfully, Tyrese Gibson (Nicole), Monday, 16 April 2012 01:25 (twelve years ago) link
he means shooting up, not assaulting
― ┗|∵|┓ (sic), Monday, 16 April 2012 01:30 (twelve years ago) link
ass my dick up, smack my pin up
― some dude, Monday, 16 April 2012 01:35 (twelve years ago) link
is disgusting because it's heartfelt and disgusting again because it's a grandstand play.
this has always struck me as one of the most nonsensical things I've ever read in any piece of music criticism.
― Matt Armstrong, Monday, 16 April 2012 03:34 (twelve years ago) link
Fuck all of these bands. Kraftwerk isn't in .
― Reality Check Cashing Services (Elvis Telecom), Monday, 16 April 2012 04:02 (twelve years ago) link
then the telegraph piano and vamping in the last minute or so of the song
Holy shit, seriously, I've had piano-fade stuck in my head a lot over the past five or so years, and I could never remember where it was from, just that it was at the end of something exhausting (in a good way). Love the whole second side of Lies, "I Used to Love Her" not as much as the others though. Love the electric guitar on "One in a Million."
― the hairy office thing (Eazy), Monday, 16 April 2012 04:11 (twelve years ago) link
E+ !
― Josh in Chicago, Monday, 16 April 2012 13:50 (twelve years ago) link
Gentleman's E