So, as usual, on the latest Bombcast, Dan said some inflammatory shit. While there might be many interpretations of what that may be, to me the most ridiculous of the bunch was how Axel Rose (of Guns' N Roses) was a "genius".
Let me preface this with saying I love "classic" rock. My taste in music from 5-13 years old is basically the same as Dan's current taste--I liked the Who a hell of a lot more than him though. So I basically jut listened to older rock music, until I had really great people turn me onto modern rock, hip hop, and punk. But up until that point I was all AC/DC, Zeppelin, and some more folk/obscure stuff thanks to my dad's taste.
To me the 80's were the epitome of shitty rock--they still are, though I've come around on a lot of other music from then. But, GNR was always the light at the end of that glittery tunnel. They were the legit band of that era to me. They were never Zeppelin, Who, or Hendrix level though (to Dan they obviously are).
So after hearing Dan talk them up so much, and Jeff trying to put them in, his idea of, their place, on the last podcast, I thought I should go back and listen to some of their stuff.
At first I wanted to listen to all of the main entries in their catalogue: Appetite for Destruction, Use Your Illusion 1 & 2, and Chinese Democracy. But this idea soon became tiresome and I jsut started skipping around their catalogue, from unknown to known as a palette cleanser. And here are some thoughts:
Appetite is still a great album and in the top debut albums ever. They combined the MTV look of their time with hard rock chops that a lot of their contemporaries sold for big budget music videos. It's by far their strongest effort, and for obvious reasons when you get into the personal lives/band dynamics.
Now at this point in their timeline you would need to get into Axel being...well a flake and a shitty band member, yes it did start this early. There are a bunch of ways I could relate this to issues found on their records and their overall chemistry, but I really don't want to because it really just comes down to Axel being a pre-modonna.
So after an EP they released their first full length album, which happened to be a double album. And as Jeff so perfectly pointed put on the podcast, like most double albums, it should have been one album.
The Use Your Illusion albums are my least familiar GNR records, I was mostly an Appetite man. I remembered liking 1 better than 2, but I couldn't name which song came off of which. I know this would sound like blasphemy to Dan, but I was born 1 year after the albums release and most people my age only know the singles off the first record because everything after that was much too bloated for classic rock radio in the 21st century.
So here's my first issue with the idea of Guns' N Roses, and more Axel Rose, being considered genius. There only follow up, while two records, to their first album are way way worse. They are a pair of the biggest let downs in rock. They are bloated, like Jeff said, but they are also a much softer arena rock sound than their debut.
When GNR debuted they were a long awaited edge to the make up raddled, hair metal scene. But by the time they came out with their follow up, 4 years later, the music scene changed, and GNR tried to keep up with it while simultaneously keep their hair metal roots, which caused Slash's riffs to become tamer, his solos were still strong, imo. To be honest I just became tired of this post, I'm listening to Use Your Illusion 1 and it is very boring.
My point is the follow up to one of the greatest first albums ever is a 2 albums worth of fluff and an album worth of decent material (yes they could release the two albums in 3 parts=2 bad and 1 good).
Chinese Democracy is a mess of noise, whenever there is a moment of decent music a second later Axel adds one to three unnecessary layers to the song. While Buckethead is a more proficient guitarist, Slash knows how to make a more listenable riff, so doesn't that make him "better"?
None of Axle's lyrics are that impressive, and the only album--Chinese Democracy-- that he's made without Duff McKegan helping him is garbage, there's no reason thinking this guy is a genius, other than Dan exaggerating the idols from his childhood.
Sorry about this long post, and all it's shitty punctuation. I'm drunk and like music a lot. I will end with saying every time I stopped listening to GNR, I started listening to Graham Parker and the Rumor; They are a fantastic pub rock band with new wave influences.
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