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Re: A few more GNR questions we'll never have the answers too.
If the internet were never created how would that effect Guns N Roses as a band today?
^ I asked myself this and now I keep thinking of alternate timelines. Feel free to answer any of my questions, or add your own if you can think of other cool changes in the GNR timeline 
Would you still be a fan without the ability to chat online to other fans daily, read frequent updates/news/rumors?
Would you be pissed if GNR came to your town and played all of their hits but no new material every couple of years?
How would you have gotten hold of that shitty quality Rock In Rio 3 video back in 2001 to hear Madagascar, Chi Dem, Silkworms etc for the first time?
After watching Rio 3, would you be thinking to yourself that Buckethead is actually just Slash in a mask/kfc bucket?
Would Chinese Democracy have been released sooner/later/never?
Without access to leaks do you think that you/the media/general public would have been more welcoming if it suddenly appeared on store shelves in 2008?
Would Chinese Democracy still have held that mythical status, or did the internet play a large role in hyping the album despite Axl rarely mentioning it?
Would Axl be required to play ball with the press just to stay relevant?
Would Axl be better off/happier without fans daily discussions, critiques, opinions etc of his life?
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GNR have never really been "pro internet" but it's interesting to look at how the history of Guns N Roses, or your own history as a fan, has been effected by the internet boom 
Re: A few more GNR questions we'll never have the answers too.
I would say that GNR's web presence is a more curious matter than it at first may seem.
This band, effectively, shut down publicly following the release of The Spaghetti Incident in 1993. After that, two soundtracks in 15 years. The wait for CD began.
The Internet wasn't around for the early part of their career. Magazines, TV, radio, all covered them by default and were criticized by Axl in Get in the Ring. This was because the media was essentially dictating how fans would receive information. Dispensing information globally was at the hands of middlemen.
The Internet rose up as Guns went down. The media kept a firm eye on the next GNR album, because it was still a hot number throughout the 90s. Meanwhile, the fans began to gather to the Internet, and (unsurprisingly), found the band to have essentially no presence at all. So, they put up mailing lists, newsgroups, etc.
The Guns developed an "Internet following" this way. Active fans began to compensate on the lack of official information. HTGTH was around in '97, for one. Fans found similar company, flocked in, and waited on. That's the highly curious aspect of the whole group; all online fans were out there to hear news about Chinese Democracy.
In retrospect, it was what seems like a distinctly unifying concept, and became an allure to keep on waiting. The company was good, the myth was sound, there were tours or rumors of tours... The biggest band in the world had transformed into an Internet cult band, which had a fan base dutifully recording shows, sharing them and even creating and distributing promotional material in lieu of the ever-passive band.
Axl slid into that pocket with ease, if only he likened the Internet to a garbage can and called out fake insiders by name in RIR3. Later on, he complained about people downloading the leaks and complaining about setlists. We won't even go to his numerous tweets. Needless to say, be it the traditional media or the Internet, sooner or later Axl's feeling uneasy about how he's represented.
Frankly, I think Axl owes a lot of his paychecks to the existence of the Internet and the fanbase therein.
Re: A few more GNR questions we'll never have the answers too.
What I find interesting about the net and GN'R is that Axl was always someone that struck me as being progressive. He was always trying to push the musical boundaries, never content to rest on his laurels with the same formulae that had worked previously. Happy to bring in shit loads of new technology into the studio, go in new directions. Rebel against a lot of the standard music industry ways of writing and releasing songs and doing business.
Yet when it came to the net and the digital age and social media etc etc. He seems to have hated that from its infancy and never really truly engaged or embraced it. Perhaps it stems from what I see as his desire to be in control and the net etc is something that he has very little influence over.
- monkeychow
- Rep: 661
Re: A few more GNR questions we'll never have the answers too.
So many big questions there will it's really almost impossible to say.
Some thoughts from the top of my head:
1. It seems Axl has always had a tendency to care about what people say about him. In the olden days this was limited to the tv/print media and led to songs about it, and stage comments about it, and it seemed to be a topic that can actually upset him. The internet created unparalleled access for him to find out what people say about him. Foreign media, fans, forums. Assuming he remains sensitive to lies about him, differences of opinion and negative feedback (which given the censorship of HTGTH and other places I'd assume to be true) I can only dream of the extent to which the modern environment is able to make him upset.
Seems Axl was always a complex person, but there's also an argument to say the period where he was more reclusive and where the management of GNR as a band started to get wildly eccentric even for the music industry seems to coincide nicely with the technological boom...and I'm not entirely sure that's chance.
2. Assuming the music came out the same way (which is doubtful...no internet would probably also imply other non-development of PCs which would directly impact protools and Axl's recording methods)...it's interesting to think how fans would have reacted. I think the leaks harmed the album immensely to hardcores....most of us were throughly sick of most of those songs before they even came out. I think if you'd never heard a song from CD then it came out it would have been regarded better. Although there's a couple of other interesting points: Would the shock of new-axl and the changes be greater without any chance of pre-warning that the net gave us? Secondly...I think the album would have got done sooner in general...aside from Axl not getting derailed as often...if the tech was different I think there would be less ability to layer and so on...and at some point the songs would have been done sooner.
3. No internet would mean 1980s record industry. Which would mean no reliance on touring for money - and there would be more motivation for bands to make recordings, and more willingness on the part of labels to finance those recordings. Both of these things would I think have led to more frequent GNR output.
