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Re: Slash in CD sessions 2001? Illusions reunion in 96?
So,
do we have
Axl having issues with
Slash coming up Snakepit w/ songs Axl saw as Guns material (to be developed)
the story on 'Axl wouldn't go on stage unless he gets the name'
Slash having issues with
Axl coming on stage so bleeding late every night
Axl having too much control over the band via hangers-on or not
If it boils down so simple, it's a bit sad.
Amusingly, both complain about the other one throwing a keg into it artistically, as in 'Axl didn't like the demos', while 'Slash didn't want to hone the demos'.
Re: Slash in CD sessions 2001? Illusions reunion in 96?
The author also speaks about 2001 opportunity Slash had to work on some CD stuff, but had to admit to shit he didn't even do to be allowed to work on those songs. That is what Canter said, not me.
Yup. Clearly something many will ignore though. Whatever. They are both idiots but Canter clearly says Axl wanted Slash to apologize for stuff he never did and thats just fucked. Anyone trying to diminish that or gloss over it needs a reality check.
What I think would be fucking cool wold be to have that cathouse show on dvd/blue ray. the footage is awesome in the ISE video.
- Intercourse
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Re: Slash in CD sessions 2001? Illusions reunion in 96?
both men need a kick up the arse, Axl a little more so.
Both behaved badly but it was all so fixable...
Re: Slash in CD sessions 2001? Illusions reunion in 96?
They are both idiots but Canter clearly says Axl wanted Slash to apologize for stuff he never did and thats just fucked. Anyone trying to diminish that or gloss over it needs a reality check.
Not to diminish it, but I'd like to know what exactly Axl would like Slash to apologize for aside the myth about not going to the stage.
Canter says a lot, actually.
He just feels that Slash has burned him and told all of these lies which he hasn’t,
... Doug said that but Axl is upset that Slash went to the media and everyone else and spun it that [Axl] wouldn’t go on if [Slash] didn’t sign away the name or that [Axl] pressured or tricked them because he didn’t.
“If you apologize publicly for the things you said about me forcing you out
... about Axl allegedly blackmailing him.
... and about some things said regarding signing the name of the band over.
... if you read Slash’s book, in regards to signing over the name he says that the manager told him that he and Duff had to sign the paper or Axl wouldn’t go onstage and there would be a riot. Now, if you ask Axl he’ll say “100 % false.
... That’s partly because there’s middle men involved that people really don’t know.
... It’s really a story of miscommunication more than anything because they’re both really, honestly telling the truth but unfortunately there’s two different stories and therefore two different truths.
... Because of Doug Goldstein, their manager being that middle man they are both telling the truth. Axl didn’t say that, Doug said that and pushed that on Duff and Slash in order to get Axl off his back, and they bought it.
... Slash maintains, as does Duff, that it happened so I am sure that it did,
... in Slash’s mind it’s all true...
... Axl maintains that yes, he did want them to sign it, he wanted that control in case something bad like a death should ever happen so that control of the band would not go into the hands of wives or girlfriends but he never, ever stated he would not go onstage.
Re: Slash in CD sessions 2001? Illusions reunion in 96?
There's actually MORE to the interview than the original post, they must've taken it down temporarily to update it some.
Some people will so get their panties in a bunch on those Axl's Robin Finck comments. 
====
LRI: Yeah, I had heard that your book was supposed to have come out a long time before it did, what was the story on that?
Marc: When they first saw my book the only one who was excited about it was Axl, not that the other guys hated it but more that they really didn’t care. Axl loved my book and actually cared, he looked at it a few times and he made some constructive comments and was behind me a hundred percent, he cared about it truly.
What happened though was that at that point the band really fell apart, my agent wanted too much money as an advance and I didn’t care about landing an advance as much as I cared about really wanting to get it out there.
I know that once you get an advance all that means is that you never see any money unless you pay back the advance in full. I just wanted to release it myself and get it out but he the advance money all those agent guys love advances because then they can guarantee they get paid.
Long story short, all of this stuff led to delaying the book because publishers weren’t wanting to pay what my agent was asking unless Guns was getting ready to put out a new record or something. I finished the book in 1994 and the book came out finally in 2006 when I basically found a publisher by accident more than anything.
Back to Axl, he went from being the only one in 1994 who was excited about it to the only one really opposed to it. By that time he had started his “new” Guns and wanted nothing to do with anything that promoted the Appetite lineup or the DEVIL a.k.a SLASH.
Not only that but now there were FOUR devils many of the figures in my book that help tell the story became devils to Axl, Tom Zutaut, Vicky Hamilton their old manager who allegedly said something about Axl in the press, Robert John, their longtime photographer who apparently had some altercation and was now off limits with Axl regardless of the fact that they were all there and all important parties in the story who really had nothing but good things to say.
None of that mattered to Axl who did not want me to release my book featuring the devils because it was basically like releasing a photo book of a wedding album ten years after a nasty divorce.
He could not emotionally deal with my book coming out for two reasons, firstly because it deals with all these people from his past that he now views as enemies and secondly because he has an all new Guns N Roses to promote and would like everyone to forget the Appetite lineup.
He’s afraid that something like this having success will just pour fuel on the reunion fire but the reality is this book is just history and you wouldn’t have his new band were it not for that original history. The funny thing is when he plays gigs he does do ten or so of the Appetite songs so he does see the significance of it on some level but.
LRI: Was there any part of Axl that was still into or at least impressed by RECKLESS ROAD?
Marc: I think so because like I said, Chinese Democracy has been recorded nobody had heard it but Axl was like “Man I want you to wait and put this out well after our album comes out” and he drove me around in 2006 and played it for me and I finally heard it.
It was totally finished with vocals and mixed and everything and I wanted to be kind to him and I was like “Ok, cool, we can time it like that that will be perfect, when is the album going to come out?” and Axl was telling me that it should be ready to come out and packaged by November so I was like “Oh, ok perfect!”. Then of course, Novemeber comes and goes and there’s no CHINESE DEMOCRACY.
I was kind of like what do I do now and calling people, I called Del James and asked well when is it going to come out and he’s telling me well probably March or May. I’m getting nervous because the wheels were already in motion as far as me releasing my book.
My book was gonna be released and sure enough the book came out before CHINESE DEMOCRACY and Axl is still sort of sore about that. He told me he didn’t mind if it came out but not then, maybe at a later date and I disappointed him.
We had a little falling out but it’s okay, we will patch it up at sometime, I’m sure of it.
LRI: Are you still closest with Slash?
Marc: I’ve always remained close with Slash but believe it or not until this happened between us in 2006 I had become closer with Axl than any of them. I had a great relationship with him, if I needed anything or had any trouble or needed help he would be right there for me.
When something new would come out like I remember when DVD players first hit, Axl sent one right over to us, he was really cool like that. I probably saw Axl and hung out with him 5 times a year or so prior to the book release whereas I would probably only get together with Slash once a year. Slash was like an old best friend that got on drugs and got busy and was always somewhere else while Axl was always here in the area and always around.
He’d come to my house and drive me over to the studio and let me listen to stuff as it was happening and we still hung out and if I needed something I could really depend on Axl maybe even more than Slash. We had become really, really good friends over the years but it all came down to the book and the timing of it’s release.
Also, the fact he knew I was still obviously really good friends with Slash and now Slash was more than ever, the devil. For the longest time though, I was probably one of two people in the world who still talked to Slash AND Axl where everyone else was sort of forced to pick a side and stick to it, they understood that I was loyal to and friends with both.
I had always thought that if Axl and Slash were ever going to bury the hatchet I could serve as something of a middle man but I’ve had very little contact with Axl since the book came out. I did email him and contact him to write a little thing for the book intro like Duff and the others did but he didn’t do it, he’s just still a little sore at me. He’s really just disappointed in me, I think he knows I didn’t want to betray him.
I wanted all five of them to do the foreword and Izzy kind of disappointed me by not participating, I ended up getting Slash, Steven and Duff. I had finally had some contact with Izzy who I was the most distant with and hadn’t talked to in probably 17 years. He was really jazzed and really into my doing the book and said “That appetite period was one of the best times of my life” and he was just really happy about it coming out. We talked on a Sunday and he was gonna come over on a Tuesday and do some interviews for it.
LRI: Which begs the question then….”Where’s Izzy”?
Marc: (laughs) Well, here’s the deal John. We were doing video interviews because we wanted to use the footage for an interactive online element of the book we had planned, which I guess Izzy where he misunderstood me.
We had kept shooting all these other people we interviewed for the book on a few different backgrounds when it was time to do Izzy’s, my video guy was like, “This is getting a little same-ish looking, let’s ask Izzy if we can shoot the video at his house rather than have him come here and do them here on the same background as the others”. So I called him and asked him if we could shoot the video at his place instead and he was like “Huh, what? Video??” and I knew right then I had lost him, he was wigging out on me.
So I was like, realizing I was losing him and said “Ok, we don’t have to do the video, let’s just do the interview and he just like “Ahh, I gotta go”. So he hangs up and sends me a text and says “email me some pics or something for a comment” and he gives me his email address and he wanted me to send him a few photos for which he would give comments but other than that he was gone. He never replied to the emails.
I also think I blew it because I had honestly told him that Desi was coming to be interviewed and Desi was his heroin girl and he probably was freaking that Desi would let the cat out of the bag about whatever history they had together, even though I really wasn’t looking for that from anyone.
I was really just looking to talk about the music but she had to be there because she was important to the story, I needed her voice for the story because she was always a part of it all. She used to strip down to almost nothing and dance to “Jumpin Jack Flash” and all those songs at their gigs.
We weren’t gonna dig about the selling drugs or using drugs or any of that, we were just gonna ask her about the rock and roll but at the same time Izzy knew she was still strung out and didn’t trust her and got paranoid.
He was like “I don’t want to have the shit in my past talked about from her, I don’t want anyone to read about how deep involved it was or read about me being a druggie”. Then when the video thing happened it was just out of the question with Izzy. The oddest thing was, I bumped into him at the Heaven and Hell tour and he was all normal and talking to me like “Hey, Marc, how did that all work out with the book?” and I was like (laughs) “Well, how did it work out? You never got back to me and wouldn’t be involved when I needed your help”.
I was disappointed because I did a lot for Izzy over the years and he KNOWS I did and all I needed, all I needed, was for him to simply answer a few questions or give me a little something for the book.
To me, I was blown away by him saying that about the drugs because he knows how I feel about the drugs and number two he was SO important to the rock and roll end of things. I have the questions I was going to ask him for the book and it was all about how IMPORTANT he was.
He was so important to the look that made them famous, he really set the style because he knew that the Hanoi Rocks look was the way to go. He was just a little bit more savvy and smart than the other guys when it came to image and all that.
He really knew what looked cool image wise and always set that tone and they all kind of followed. If you look at the old pictures, pay close attention to Izzy in the beginning and then watch how the others all change as the months go on. It’s pretty clear.
I was also trying to ask him about his songwriting process and what goes through his brain and how he writes songs and these were all the questions I pre-emailed him, NONE of them had anything to do with drugs.
There was no way he was going to accidentally be trapped into a comment or something he simply could have emailed the answers back but he never did. When he never got back to me I said okay I will use some of the stuff you gave me on the phone when we first talked and you were really into the book, when you said it was the best times of your life and he emailed me back and said “No, don’t quote me”.
I was really disappointed that he left me hanging when I really needed him. I can’t really explain or fully understand where it all went south exactly or pinpoint it with Izzy.
Axl is a totally different story, he’s emotionally hurt that I disappointed him by including the devils. I mean, if I needed a body part I’m sure Axl would help me because he loves me as a person he’s just really pissed at how it all went down with the timing of the book.
It’s only a matter of time before he gets over it and things in our relationship are back to where they were because he knows that I love him as well.
LRI: I can’t imagine the undertaking not only of assembling the photos, many of which have never been seen by the public but also the interviews!!! We interviewed Steven and Alan Niven and have an upcoming one with Vicky Hamilton but when we tried to reach out to Adriana Smith, a.k.a. Rocket Queen she requested a 150 dollar deposit to her paypal account. I mean, I really would love to but I still haven’t generated enough ad revenue to pay anyone nor has anyone ever ASKED to be paid (laughs).
Marc: (laughs). Yeah, Adriana, god bless her, has tried to milk it for all it’s worth. She tried to ask us to pay her as well and I was just like “Look, if this book ever makes a profit I will, I promise” but it still hasn’t. I’m in the HOLE and that’s okay because I love the book and other people love it and I’m proud of it. Somewhere, sometime even if it’s after I’m dead, my kids will benefit from this book. It wasn’t originally planned that way.
It was going to be my stories about the time and the photos and then I started talking to Slash and Steven and Duff and it was like “Ok, maybe using some of their words would be good” and then it was like obvious that all these peripheral people around the band like Tom Zutaut or Mike Clink or Vicky Hamilton would have something to offer as well and it just kind of grew.
My ocd kicked in and thought “Well if you”re going to include them you should probably include the strippers and girlfriends and ex band members of the other bands like Hollywood Rose or Tidus Sloan or all these bands. We ended up with about ten times more than we needed and everything was reshuffled.
LRI: I know the original version of the book is genius. Now there are other versions as well right?
Marc: There are Special Edition copies with the individual band members on the cover and now there is a really, really cool version of the book put out by Classic Rock Magazine. It’s basically the book in a magazine format but it’s incredibly well done and I am so happy with the job they did.
It can be found on newsstands and online and what they did is nothing short of amazing. They managed to get almost all of the content of the book into that format and it makes sense, there’s no typos, you would almost not even be able to tell there’s any photos missing and it’s really affordable.
If someone were to only come across the Classic Rock version they would never know the difference. I’m very proud of it. Jack Lue,who is the other photographer who contributed to the book, he and I also have really cool prints of these photos that are available framed and ready to hang.
I have an ebay store if you search MarcCanter you will find it. 98 percent of my work is GNR but I shot lots of other artists over the years like Motley, Maiden, Van Halen and others. It’s cool cause they’re all pre-matted and framed gallery-style and built to last, fully archivable framing.
Unless your house burns down this is something you will always have and treasure and it will look great. I put them together and I sign them and put little details about the show that it was shot at and things like that.
I sell them very affordably, my margin is slim and most of them could be had at around 200 or 250 versus if you were to buy them at a gallery it would cost like 600 bucks at least. I wanted to keep them within the reach of something a fan might be able to afford rather than something you’d pay through traditional art forums.
Re: Slash in CD sessions 2001? Illusions reunion in 96?
LRI: I would imagine the Hall of Fame buzz would help push RECKLESS ROAD book a little bit, of course it would help if the five guys could ever get in a room together.
Marc: Yeah, just get under the same ROOF. I really thought that Duff could be a middle man to a meeting of the minds.
LRI: Slash ended up going to the Hall Of Fame but originally he put out a blurb in the press saying how the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame didn’t really mean that much to him before issuing a clarification a few days later saying he understands it’s a great honor. What’s your take on where his head was at on that?
Marc: He lies.
LRI: Huh ??!!!(laughs).
Marc: No, seriously Slash lies. (laughs).
Axl was right about that in a sense but the way that Slash lies is that he lies to make himself look cool for the most part. He’ll lie on occasion to twist out of something because every now and then he gets caught in a corner.
He of course, does care about those awards and acknowledgements and that’s why he admitted later that it was a great honor to be included and everything. That first quote also may have come as a result of him being, like I said, cornered by the press.
He was , at that time, under the assumption, like many were, that Axl and his current band would be invited and of course Slash wanted no part of that. Later, he found out that wasn’t the case and that it was only going to be the people who ended up getting asked for inclusion and it didn’t include Axl’s current band.
Once he realized that it wasn’t going to be he and Steven and Duff in one corner and Axl and Ashba and Bumblefoot in another he was okay with it all. When he realized that wasn’t happening he was like “Yeah, it’s an honor and blah, blah, blah”.
LRI: We are all still stupidly hoping that there will be a reunion someday but Axl’s letter sort of clarified that situation sadly. I realize you’ve had a falling out with him for the short term but what’s your take on Axl based on what you’ve seen in 2012?
Marc: The one thing about Axl that I have noticed, is that he really IS starting to come to terms with things emotionally and is coming off very kind and honest and approachable, it’s remarkable and a good sign.
In recent interviews whether it was on That Metal Show or even some little clips on youtube of him goofing around and talking with fans and that’s really good to see. There’s been times where we wouldn’t see or hear from him publicly or he’d perpetually be in a bad mood or whatever but we have this year and it seems like he’s in a good place and not operating under some dark cloud so that’s fantastic.
It’s not just been one or two random clips of him recently but 10 or 12 of him and he’s always in that same happy, joking and smiling demeanor. Good for him. I mean, honestly I don’t think Axl trusts Izzy or Steven to have their shit together or be on time but I think he knows that Slash and Duff are a solid commodity.
I know Steven is too because I’ve seen his band and I know what he’s capable of. Don’t get me wrong, I’m just like everyone else, I’d love to see the five of them together some day. I’d love to see a perfect scenario of a massive tour of Axl’s new band doing their full set to blow the doors off the beginning of the show.
Do a really nice hour plus set. Take a break and include a combination where they do a stripped down set every night with Steven, Duff, Slash and Izzy and then finish with an Illusions set including Gilby and Matt and that material to close things out with a bang.
LRI: Hell, they could even do a few Duff solo, Slash solo, Izzy and Steven solo spots…
Marc: Right, if they really wanted to they could just like the Eagles did. Joe Walsh did a few, Henley did, Timothy did, Glen did and then they also did the Eagles stuff.
I understand Axl not wanting to disrespect or walk away from the time, money and effort he’s invested in the new band or give up on continuing to have that be his avenue for new recordings but this could be a way to incorporate both.
I mean noone wants to see Axl unhappy or fail just to springboard a reunion. There’s better ways to go about it and this would allow his NEW band to be able to tour STADIUMS in the U.S. like they were during the Illusions era.
I think Axl knows that, he knows that as good as the new band is doing he could be doing ten times that if he incorporated the reunion. I think that’s a new realization too, I know that in the past he thought that his new band could just come out and stomp the reunion demand and just crush the pressure for the classic five.
LRI: But he’s financially well off right? He has no real urgent need to give a shit or pay any bills right?
Marc: I’m not so sure about that. I mean it costs a lot of money to have the life he has and the entourage he has.
There has to be more money coming in than going out and he’s aware that a reunion tour would bring in hundreds of millions of dollars that WOULD UNDOUBTEDLY make him well off and secure.
I guess he’s just not willing to do it because he would have to believe in the devil but I’d like him to put that aside so that he can make all that money and have all that freedom and also make all of the fans so happy.
I mean back when we were so close a few years ago we would talk for hours about that John. We would go back and forth and I would tell him “Axl nothing will ever touch the old band, the new band will be viewed as very good and an excellent thing unto itself but it will never touch the old band, they will both be different and great in different ways.”
I mean I told him I totally understand what he’s doing because there IS no old band but it just was never going to be better than the old band and he insisted that it was going to be better than the old band and that Robin Finck was his Randy Rhoads and compared it to Ozzy finding Randy.
I told him “No Robin is NOT Randy and he will be viewed as good but never better than Slash on ANY level, musically, personality wise, that was just lightning in a bottle” and we just went on and on and you get the idea (laughs).
I mean the CHINESE DEMOCRACY lineup can be great but it will be a different kind of great just like ILLUSIONS was a different kind of great. You can get together with different chefs and come up with a great new soup but it will always be DIFFERENT.
I just kept telling him that what happened was magic that can never be recreated, even if he got back together with Slash they will never write another APPETITE. I mean, I’m sure if they got together and wrote a song it could be good but you can’t expect it to ever happen the way it did in 86 again.
I mean, is anything the Stones do now or what they did in the 80s or 90s as good as what they did in the 60s or 70s? No, but there can still be some good, great moments.
LRI: I know this means a great deal to you. What specifically do you want from them as a fan and follower of the band, aside from your personal friendships?
Marc: I just want them to talk.
I want them to talk because I think that if they were just able to talk they would see that their problems are not so hard to solve or understand. Their biggest problems are actually simple so that’s what makes it so hard to believe. Duff is a stand up guy, and Axl trusts him, if there is any hope it is in Duff bridging the gap.
LRI: Do you think Axl sees any importance to what Van Halen is doing in securing their legacy with David and Eddie?
Marc: No. That doesn’t matter to Axl at all, all he thinks is “Why would I put my neck on the line and associate with these devils again?”. That’s it.
Add to that the fact that he has this army of people who are in his inner circle who personally are, of course, invested in the new lineup and basically are agreeing with him and even the segment of fans who you’ve seen siding with him.
They’re pouring gasoline in the fire and reaffirming what Axl believes to be fact even though the vast majority would love to see a reunion. The fact that others like Van Halen are doing it is meaningless to him, it would come down to Axl realizing that Slash and Steven are not as evil as he thinks.
LRI: Is Slash 100% down as far as your regular conversations with him?
Marc: Slash would do it in a heartbeat. He would do it because it was a lot of fun, the music and chemistry was great and the fact that he knows without a shadow of a doubt that it would make the fans ecstatic and be extremely successful. He knows that better than anyone.
He also doesn’t hate Axl the way that Axl hates him. If he did, such a concept would be so much more complicated than it is. It’s really only a one sided beef. There’s issues of course, there are personal issues with them but they are fairly simple and mostly based on misunderstanding and separate versions of different truths.
LRI: Would someone like a Susan Mckagen or a Perla Hudson be an issue, I know Perla is very visible in Slash’s career and Susan in Duff’s?
Marc: I know they are now but they couldn’t be in such a Reunion scenario. They would never be an issue. Wives and girlfriends are forbidden from the inner circle of GNR. I know this to be a fact. I even told Perla, “Just know that if Slash were ever to work with Axl again, you would not only not be in the same room but you’d be blocks away.” Nothing personal against them, they are wonderful, that’s just the way it’s always been.
