Nice Boy

8 hours ago, BangoSkank said:

Agreed. It's OBVIOUSLY about a fictional character, based what he saw, experienced, and understood in rural America. I don't think Axl condones or even has those feelings. He's being truthful about what life is like for a lot people he saw growing up. 

sorry but I totally disagree. It’s obviously based on Axls experiences of the bus terminals in LA. He said so himself. And that doesn’t mean that he didn’t subsequently wise up and drop those prejudices gradually as he became accustomed to the city and grew up a bit.

8 hours ago, RussTCB said:

I'm a big fan of understanding context concerning art, so I would have no problem playing One In A Million for anyone. 

tbh I reckon anyone who isn’t already partial to GnR in some way would hear it and think wtf that is a messed up song (unless they held those views themselves.) They’re unlikely to think hey yeah it’s just the thoughts of a naive young midwestern kid etc. In other words it would take a lot of context and explanation for anyone unacquainted to be sympathetic and not write him / the band off as toxic..

On 3/4/2022 at 10:03 AM, SoulMonster said:

Axl used all kinds of excuses, not so sure he talked about writing it from the perspective of as character beyond himself. Duff used that excuse, tho.

Read this: (49) 09. AUGUST-DECEMBER 1988: LIES AND THE SPOTLIGHT (a-4-d.com)

 

yeah the 3rd person excuse doesn’t stand up imo. It’s blatantly based on Axls thoughts and experiences of arriving in LA. He should have been honest and said, “ that’s exactly how I felt as a green midwestern kid turning up in the metropolis. But now I’ve grown up a bit, accustomed to life here and don’t hold those immediate prejudices. I’m mates with ice cube blah blah”

As I recall, Izzy was totally against having a frontman singer figure in The Project/VR and wanted him or Duff to do vocals. Slash wanted to be another Aerosmith Rocks album band. Izzy was never going to be a long term partner in it realistically. Slash likes his Conspirators band because he’s the boss and creative director. That wouldn’t be the case in GnR writing , he’d be a partner so conceding to some of Axls wishes just as during the illusions writing. As he said it was a case of everyone saying they’d only do one person’s song if that person agreed to do theirs.

That's actually changed my view of Myles as a singer. His high forced wailing can be a bit much, but on this song his voice was way more controlled, good quality and easy on the ear 

Tough one because I suppose SCOM is the song I least need to hear again, but not because it's a bad song. Anything Goes has a shit chorus thst goes way too into generic glam / Motley territory but overall the instrumental track is amazing both melodies and rhythm changes so not a shit song overall. Crazy has similar problems but again the basic instrumental track is a decent thrasher.  Think About You is a bit soppy I guess. Michelle chorus is again into glam / Motley / hair territory but banging riffs and other sections.  I don't  know, it's hard to kick one tbh. 

On 1/6/2022 at 5:10 AM, 2020_Intensions said:

Didn't Axl say he doesn't like Anything Goes? Reason enough for it to have been permanently dropped from shows 

I suspect that's because its such an old, Hollywood Rose song, of a bygone era, a bit like Back Off Bitch. Also the chorus sucks, makes it sound like the kind of cheesy glam stuff they were trying to be different to. 

Defending factual errors (even if minor) by saying his books are "just literature" is meaningless and doesn't wash, for me.

The drums are really good on TSI, to be fair. For everything that's said about Sorum being a plodder with no swing etc, the booming tom sound on the intro to New Rose is really good

On 1/22/2022 at 1:54 AM, Gordon Comstock said:

The deep voice at the beginning of Paradise City 

If you listen to very early live versions, thats how he sings it at the beginning. And they don't do the jangly intro, it just starts with the drumming and power chords bit

Hadn't listened to this for a while so I gave it another go.. 

The first song is ok for a couple of verses, but quickly loses momentum

Next songs are lyrically average, basically variations on "I saw you walkin baby" and "now I'm a mayyyyn" choruses shouted repeatedly

Then there's one with a garbled rant through a megaphone or something, about communism and "the taxman comin" (millionaire rock stars moaning about the taxman, hmm)

Punk rock song is instrumentally ok but still a lost opportunity really, as is most of the album

Wish I could give a better review, as I really like Duff and his contributions to GnR are massive, his bass playing and writing actually underestimated imo. Even the bassline on SCOM, I mean everyone talks about the Slash riff but it's the bassline that actually drives that song and is hummed along to. 

I don't think you've done You're Crazy correctly

As far as I know the one still in the set is slow Crazy. So that should be listed on Lies with an X. 

fast Crazy, as on Appetite, should be given the date whenever that was last played. (Anyone know when?) 

Also of course there were the slow AND fast Crazies played in one medley in the 80s.

10 hours ago, t-p-d-a said:

Where is the problem? You can cut out the fails easily. He just started three times. Just cut the two tries out on the official material... and "Slash totally fucks up" i don't agree. That's not a total fuck up.

What degree of fuck up would you describe it as then, on a scale of 0 to Ashba Golden Gods? Lol 

I'm not Slash-bashing btw, he's my favourite top hatted guitarist of all time, but even he would admit making several false starts on the SCOM intro was an embarrassing fuck up - not that it even bothers me - it's just an exemplar of how raw/casual/drunk he was at that time, it's fine

There used to be a bootleg 7" going around in the 90s with a track on it called Guns n Rappers. I never heard it but guess it was a live recording of Tastes Good. 

Isn't Ritz 91 the one where Slash totally fucks up the intro to SCOM and has to restart it 3 times? 

There's no way they'd release that full show officially, if so.

Ffs. Naturally it's Vegas '92 not '89. They wouldn't be so kind as to give us new AFD era pro-shot footage. Plus I don't think any of them want to revisit their situation in 1989, only us crazy fans want to see that, lol

If only he had a cool, non corny, rock dude name like Dizzy, or Duff, or Buckethead

Seems a bit stupid the way they've used footage of Axl bringing the mic to his face and singing at the points where there's no singing at all on the track

Considering that Craig Duswalt managed to sync up Axl's teleprompter to the required song at a moment's notice in the 90s, you would have thought the visuals guy could sync up instantly in 2021 ?

Having just listened to the Adler band, I think that vocalist is probably the best of all the singers that have been hired by ex GnR members to cover GnR songs in their bands. Including the snakepit singers, Myles and Weiland. Though I suppose he's got age on his side. 

I'm into Hard Skool, after a few listens I had it going in my head so definitely catchy. The one thing I'd change is that sort of ascending bridge part near the end. 

Absurd is fine instrumentally but the vocals are sbsolute tripe, so I won't ever listen to it again voluntarily I guess.

I really don't understand why he didn't put Hard Skool on CD. I think it alone would have changed the perception of the album. The inclusion of a more classic style rock track would have assured sceptics that it had an aspect of GnR that people expected, and meant less of the "load of tortured ballads with a couple of weird industrial tracks" criticism. 

I called a UK radio station once years ago  and asked them to play it so I could hear what it was like

They didn't play it 

Probably because GnR were deeply unfashionable at the time, plus its not very good tbf

The only years he has really had an amazing voice are:

85-89, 92-93, 06,10, and AC/DC '16

I think the reason people think it sounds better at concerts than in videos is because when you're in front of the PA the overall barrage of sound doesn't highlight the voice weaknesses, plus the crowd is singing along so you don't hear it clearly. I noticed that when I went for a piss out of the main stadium bowl I could hear the mickeying clearly from that distance, noticeably worse..

Overall the main reasons it's not good anymore are: AC/DC effort took its toll; less motivation to go all out on GnR because it would hurt / totally break his voice; it's not as exciting singing the same old GnR stuff week in week out so tends to go through the motions. That said, I don't think he's deliberately slacking, it's just that he really can't sing it all at full throttle anymore without totally breaking his voice, so he trying to compromise. Plus people still buy tickets. Really though it's become indefensible to charge people for that. Imagine playing a newbie current video and saying yeah this is my favourite singer, he's awesome. They would bee like wtf.