BangoSkank

This points to the Village Leaks actually influencing something being released. If it's material like this, from those sessions, with Slash and Duff on it, then hell yes.

They even changed the name! Which means they actually worked on it.

I'm fucking psyched. This song is heavy, interesting, and crazy. It's what I loved about GNR from '99 - '09. 

This is only a great sign. It means this is probably one of the songs Slash and Duff added to in the studio along with Hard School (providing that actually happened).

Amazing how even just the acknowledgement of new-ish music, even old new-ish music, helped turn my outlook around. If they keep going with things like this I'm interested again. 

It was never going to happen.

11 minutes ago, James Bond said:

It's not the lack of rasp that's been the hot discussion from this particular show though, it's that he was clearly trying to push it out but just couldn't get anything to sound. It sounded painful and unnatural. I do believe that "Mickey" is a conscious choice but this show was something else.

I do see what you mean. I watch a few videos from this show and he really noticeably struggled at times. I wonder if this is from aging or just lack of preparedness. 

I know people rip his voice, but I don't think it's that he can't sing with rasp, but rather that he chooses not to. Basically he had said in an interview that he knows fans don't like it, but it's just so much easier for him, doesn't hurt, etc.

That's why he turned it on for the AC/DC shows, but less so now. Idk, it's disappointing, but it is what it is.

So

Do I drop dough on MetLife based on the chance they play Hard School?

17 hours ago, slim26 said:

I just scanned the article, but I saw no suggestion of masks being required in an outdoor stadium next week.

There article was mostly for context. I heard the rumor from a friend of mine who works for the NJ state. Here's another article for more context where it says Murphy is thinking about it: https://nj1015.com/nj-gov-murphy-ponders-mask-mandates-after-new-cdc-guidance/

Again, just pondering. I have no clue what will happen. Just thinking, hypothetically, a mask mandate comes and the three NJ shows are already underselling pretty significantly it could just be another blow. 

Rumors of a mask mandate coming back to NJ. Wonder how this will affect the three shows here (that already are selling poorly).

https://www.nj.com/coronavirus/2021/07/will-nj-indoor-mask-mandate-return-following-latest-cdc-guidance-change.html

40 minutes ago, SAU3R said:

I’m expecting the same but I’d love to be proven wrong. Maybe he really did some work with a vocal coach and while his voice was really worn out from 2018 onwards, now he had 1,5 years to recover some of it. Age is of course also a factor sadly but I think with some practice and a setlist adapted to his abilities we could get a good show. A man can dream 

I'm a mindless Axl supporter, but you're gonna have to keep dreaming. All history points to him doing zero rehearsing. I doubt he'll even do vocal warmups.

3 hours ago, allwaystired said:

I would doubt whether it has ever even seriously been discussed really. I'm of the view now that a new album is just total fantasy. Until I see or hear concrete proof to the contrary (by this I mean photos from a recording studio/new music/a release date....not vague and elusive comments in interviews about other topics) that would seem to be, given past experiences, the only thinking people should have. Anything else is either wilfully delusional or wishing thinking. 

 

Yeah - they may have messed around in the studio together or something, but I doubt it was ever even in the cards. While they may be getting along now their creative differences probably still remain. I just can't see Axl wanting to do a straight ahead rock album and I can't see Slash wanting to make a heavy, industrial-inspired album. 

12 hours ago, ShadowOfTheWave said:

This worries me because some of the heavier/Bucket material like Shackler's has been dropped live since Slash returned. Axl may pick out songs like Hardschool/Atlas and leave songs like Soul Monster in the vault, never to be heard because they don't fit Slash's style.

Ugh, that is a scary thought. 

3 minutes ago, Trin9498 said:

I’m with you….history is on our side too

I can believe that Slash & Duff maybe put some parts down on things that were already recorded, but I do not believe at all that they started on something fresh and recorded together. 

I'm gonna go one step further than some of you and say they haven't even recorded yet.

They are so overly controlling. I bet they think they're protecting Axl, but Christ, from WHAT?

1 minute ago, Tom2112 said:

What is a productive thing that can be done here? seems like spamming their socials would be a waste of time, and realistically TB hate Mygnr as much as they hate Brando so any mod reaching out is not going to be talked to or listened to. 

It's a crazy thing that they keep trying to prevent all this free promotion. And yes, even the negative stories about GNR are promotion. TB should more concerned about the abysmal selects they released. If anything is doing damage to GNR in 2020/2021 it's those. TB would write off the critical comments though as "haters". Also, if there was any doubt about the balance of power in GNR there needn't be. Axl is the boss and Slash and Duff are clearly his pets now. Very sad that they don't have the balls to say "I'm going to do the interviews I want". Is Axl going to fire Duff because he goes on a podcast, tells a few UYI stories he's told a million times, then evades any sort of question about new music? I highly doubt it. Crazy!

Fernando on Reddit seems like the best bet. If he even replies. 

9 hours ago, eggers said:

I wish Axl took signing lessons. Not a dis, just wish he had a coach to help him get back what he had.

I'm the same way. I'm a big Axl supporter and I just wish he could do something to get the rasp back in the voice. 

He's said before it hurts him to sing that way though. I also remember a post from a vocal coach on HTGTH years ago saying that that was probably an unhealthy way to sing. Sadly, I think it may be gone forever. Might be too much of a physical strain to do it.

2 hours ago, RussTCB said:

The intro jam is just the bridge of the song. It's the groove under the part right before "I never wanted you to be so full of anger" bridge. 

Wow, had no idea.

I love the intro and thought Slash added/wrote it. 

Waiting for Atlantic City ticket prices to get cut

Prices getting cut - nosebleeds at MetLife are now $30 as opposed to $50.

It just hit me that they're playing there. I saw Dylan at that venue a few years ago and it is small. Yikes.

That said, I've always wanted to do GA for GNR. If prices get cut I'd go.

Honestly, I have to think we'd have more music and tours. Axl still would have been Axl and fucked things up by being late and delaying things, but he wouldn't have had the resistance from the label and the press. CD would have probably come out in the early 2000s and been labelled Axl's Crazy Solo Project and wouldn't have been met with "It's not Guns N' Roses," "Where's Slash?" "It's shit". 

8 hours ago, jekylhyde said:

If he would've gone solo, he would've been more free to do music he wanted to do. The label apparently rejected the first version of Chinese Democracy, because they didn't think it was on par with Guns N' Roses' commerciality. But if that album would've been an Axl Rose solo album, they probably would've released the first version, because a) the label wouldn't have given Axl so much money for a solo album that they did for Gn'R album and b) it didn't need to sound like a Gn'R record.

In that scenario everyone would've won, I think. Axl, the label and the fans. Axl could've reinvented himself (because he would've had the self-confidence and the drive after the successful release of the first solo album) and we might have gotten more records. The label would've made more money on smaller investments.

Keeping the Guns N' Roses -name and getting way too much idle money ruined everything.

This is a really important point that I think a lot of people are forgetting. The labelled obviously wanted the album, but they also didn't like the direction. According to Chinese Whispers, Jimmy Iovine said, "It's not GNR without Slash" - so you can imagine him not being hot on the industrial sound Axl was going in.

Remember the reaction we all had to the Rough Master leaks? People freaked and said it was great and that "Axl was right all along." This was the album that was done in Axl's mind in 1999/2000 that Bob Ezrin said had "three good songs". This could have come out then because Axl thought, "it just needed mixing". Then they spent years adding layers, adding parts, adding players and, lo and behold, when it came out, it was fundamentally the same tracks as eight years prior.

I'm not saying Axl bears no blame because he obviously does. His bizarre work habits, his showing up late (or not at all) to shows, strictly playing AFD songs in concert and not adding anything new to the setlist, not promoting the album upon release - but I just don't think it's all on him. 

He never helps his case either because he just says nothing and truly believes everyone is against him - the press, the public, the old band - and after seeing some of the awful shit said about him, it's hard to not see why.

21 minutes ago, GnR Chris said:

Axl Rose is a brand unto itself. So yeah, Axl chose the path of most resistance in foregoing a "solo" project and continuing with "Guns N' Roses" as a band. But that was his right. And I'm sure it was more financially beneficial to leverage that name.

Rock was still mainstream in the early 2000s, but with a bunch of awful bands like Korn and Limp Bizkit. There was definitely an appetite for Axl to re-emerge. with or without GNR. In fact, I think people would have been far more receptive if Axl started a new group like Slash and Duff did with Velvet Revolver. You would have far less people shitting on it saying, "It isn't Guns N' Roses without Slash" or "Who the hell is this guy with a KFC Bucket on his head?"

Just talking about Axl and GNR in the Chinese era totally bums me out to see how seemingly driven he was to create a new version of a classic act, yet now it's the same old endless touring.

I so agree with this.

And obviously using GNR gave him access to more money, but could it really have been that much more? I get that they were a music juggernaut, but Axl Rose solo would still have been a brand name, there was huge amount of interest in him, and I have to think the record company would have put out a pretty amount of money for him. 

Hot take: the 2002 tour would have had a better chance of finishing if he was solo.

1 hour ago, sofine11 said:

Literally anything. He's Axl Rose. Whatever he offered up in the way of promotion would have had eyeballs on it and would have only helped.  He chose not to lift a finger. The closest thing to promotion he did were those forum chats nearly a month later. Most artists do that just for fun, as in converse with fans.  Then radio silence for another couple months until that laughable Del James interview where Axl was clearly unhappy with the state of...well...everything.  It was so bad haha

Did he explain in the chats why he went radio silent? I'm trying to read them in the archive, but can't open most of them for some reason.

1 hour ago, sofine11 said:

Spot on. And if that's how Axl wanted it, as in he just couldn't be moved to promote the album in any way, that's fine....and could almost be seen as kind of rock n' roll of him.  But the way he threw blame at the label, Azoff, Slash, Jimmy Iovine in the handful of interviews he did, and MONTHS later, it makes him seem utterly un-self-aware.  It's like...Dude...you were completely MIA...was Azoff going to go on SNL and play Better & Chinese Democracy?  Nah dude, that's on you to get that shit going.  He couldn't be bothered, but still wants to blame others when it quickly tapered off. 13 years later and I'm still wondering exactly what he was thinking. 

All of this is 100% true. I always thought the label kind of forced him to release it and he just didn't stand behind it and that was why he never showed for anything. But I mean, he could have STILL made an appearance somewhere, gave an interview, whatever. 

1 hour ago, CAFC Nick said:

Well what we can say for certain is that Axl would be worse-off financially.

He mentioned on the chats back in '08 that keeping the name was as much as commercial decision as it was an artistic one. Pretty certain to say that Axl Rose solo band wouldn't have been headlining European festivals back in the Nu-GNR era.

Eh, I don't see why he couldn't have headlined. If he played his cards right he could have eventually pulled an Ozzy and made a name for himself as a totally separate act from GNR.

I originally posted this in The Jungle and it got some interesting replies so I thought reposting it here might garner some more discussion. There's also so little happening until 7/31 so I figured I might as well post it. Mods feel free to delete or move or whatever. 

Anyway, I know it's been talked about ad nauseum whether or not GNR '98-'14 is really GNR and I'm not trying to have that discussion now. 

But as I listen to the CD leaks, watch Axl now, see how semi-broken he probably is from the whole CD experience, I can't help but wonder if anything would be different if everything post-Slash was just labeled Axl solo. Would we have more music released? Would we have had CD sooner? Would he have had an overall easier time? Would people have been more receptive to the music? He wouldn't have felt the enormous weight of the GNR name and he probably would have felt more free to do whatever he wanted. 

I know there are no real answers, but I'm curious if anyone thinks things would be different and, if so, how?

So real talk, MetLife is at about 50% capacity. What will realistically be happening with it? I can't see them playing to a half empty stadium. Will it be moved to a different arena? Tickets prices cut?