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- TheSundanceKid
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Re: Axl and The Boss....
I used to think of Axl as Brian Wilson esque. A harder rock version. But, Brian releases shit.
Re: Axl and The Boss....
I used to think of Axl as Brian Wilson esque. A harder rock version. But, Brian releases shit.
In the early-midway point of the saga he got a lot of comparisons to Wilson and Smile.
It initially seemed like a valid comparison but falls apart quickly once scratching the surface.
Nothing resembling striving for perfection surrounds the project. That was hardcore fan fiction that fans tried to will into reality.
The project wasn't driving him insane. In fact, he gave up on it in a few years.... coming back to it briefly later on.
It still blows my mind that other than a handful of sessions, nothing substantial was done between 2002 and 2006.
Then we found out most of the vocals are from 99-00 with another session in 2001...which is the time they were finishing the album.
It's why I don't care about anything recorded after Bucket bailed. It's already over at that point. 98-03 is the meat and potatoes of the Chinese buffet. The rest is stale fortune cookies and rotten soy sauce...like that version of Silkworms with Bumblefoot added.
Pure, unfiltered noise pollution.
The problem is their discography is absurdly small for a "touring the classics" outfit. They kind of need new material.
I remember this being an issue right before the Illusions tour got underway. The media brought it up..and rockstars such as Nuno Bettencourt criticized them for headlining even though they only had 1 full length album and 1 EP under the belt...and the fact they were so young.
It might have been a valid criticism.....
If it was any other band at the time not named Guns N Roses.
They were simply too massive. They had to headline. If they had to open in 1991, I doubt ANY band/artist would've added them to their tour.
The industry got a taste of it in 88 when several things happened with GNR as the opening act....
- They blew the headliners off the stage
- People buy tickets to see GNR...leave when the headliner hits the stage(Iron Maiden, The Cult)
- Incidents during performances...such as Axl's infamous rant at the Stones concert, Slash too drunk to stand up, etc. get all the publicity while headliners even at Stones caliber ignored by the media
It would be like asking The Beatles to open for someone in 65-66.
It's just not feasible.
Fast forward 30 years....
Yeah the discog is too small for a legacy act. It's always been their main issue IMO.
Yes they were/are amazing but as the time passes, it gets more and more difficult to include them up at the top with the likes of the Beatles, Stones, Zeppelin, Pink Floyd....and even with the next level that includes the Eagles, Fleetwood Mac, Aerosmith,etc.
They even have difficulty when comparing them with their peers and those after such as U2, Metallica, Pearl Jam, Soundgarden, hell.... even the Chili Peppers.
I'm not saying any or all of these bands are better. They just kept going....kept creating.....built a genuine legacy.
The only thing GNR has going for them that most bands from that timeframe don't is the fact that their 3 singles from their debut album were MASSIVE....and the second single (SCOM) is pretty much the snapshot of the late 80s.
The debut album so massive that they release an EP in the middle of GNR hysteria, it hits number 5 on the Billboard chart(AFD is number 1), has one successful single, then a month later it's essentially abandoned and the world keeps listening to (and buying) AFD. It's so huge that the label doesn't even bother milking it of more singles....which they could have (Nightrain, Think About You, and Rocket Queen).
If Lies hadn't been abandoned right after the Patience release, even this EP has potential to milk it of singles( Move to the City, Mama Kin, and Reckless Life). If done properly, with kid gloves, and promote it with a more humorish angle, Used to Love Her has potential. In hindsight it is shocking that the label didn't take advantage of the Aerosmith tie in and release Mama Kin.
Radio and MTV invented their own new single out of thin air in late 89....KOHD live at the Marquee for radio and KOHD live at the Ritz for MTV.
The buildup and hype for UYI was insane. Two years...felt like ten.
The tour was massive and was THE hot ticket of 1991. The band/label start releasing single after single into 92-93. Looking back, only two of its singles really caught on....
YCBM to really kick things off and of course.... November Rain.
Most of its singles....LALD, Garden of Eden, The Garden, Dead Horse, Yesterdays, and Estranged were unnecessary. They were coasting on fumes at that point in the midst of a huge culture shift.
In 93 the world gets The Spaghetti Incident...yawns....and then it's over. Cherry on top the stacks of Sympathy for the Devil in record stores nationwide in 94.
They become irrelevant and a faded memory after that and then the Chinese saga kicks off for Y2K.
16 years go up in smoke.
Fast forward to 2016 and beyond....
Everything still revolves around the monster singles from their debut album. Doesn't matter if the show is 1 hour or 4 hours.... it's all about Jungle, SCOM, PC, and the cherry on top November Rain.
It reinforces how massive they truly were late 87-mid 92 that they can sell out huge venues 25-30 years after the fact.
It also points out how little they truly accomplished and the timeframe it happened.
Go to a show, 99% of the set is 29 and 33 year old songs with some covers sprinkled in and the 1% is one or two songs from a 13 year old album no one cares about...the literal definition of piss breaks....and weren't even recorded by the band playing them.
Name me one other major act with a less diverse set list than GNR....
Like Sky Dog said....
It is what it is...
They just had so much potential back then. Their trajectory should've been similar to U2 or the Stones.
Hell....even Fleetwood Mac, a band that broke up as GNR got underway, reunited in 97 yet never recorded another new album again, have added more to their discography than GNR.
Re: Axl and The Boss....
I was checking up on music news and I saw Paul Stanley announce KISS will never release another album.
Here's the relevant quote that fits for all these bands....
Really, I'm one of those people who believes that classic bands sometimes get asked to put out new albums, but when the album comes out, you just want to hear the old classics because the new songs don't have that life experience of connecting to you in your past. They're not like a snapshot of a part of your life. No matter how good it is, you'd rather hear the classics.
This is what it boils down to in these situations in the 2020s and beyond.
Many of them are beyond caring about their resume, shoring up their discography, and legacy.
Money talks.
Unfortunately for us as fans, GNR have not taken the approach of the Metallicas and Bruce Springsteens of the world and release new material while simultaneously clearing out their vaults.
Speaking of vaults....
Seeing what Peter Jackson is doing with The Beatles and Get Back makes me wish someone at that level was a huge GNR fan and asked them to give him/her access to everything in the vault so they could tackle creating The Perfect Crime.
Re: Axl and The Boss....
Jackson is working with 56 hours of Beatles footage for the Get Back documentary.
Excluding the concerts they recorded, God only knows how much footage is in the Illusion vault.
Studio footage would be great as well as footage outside record stores when the albums were released at midnight. I remember years ago Slash saying he went to one of them to check out the insanity. I assume they had a camera there.
Would be an amazing trip down memory lane.
