Voodoochild

Nice reach from Todd at the end:

I agree. And I believe most of us here are not in her demographic reach. What it matters is if she's relevant for the youth, and I totally believe she is. That's how pop music always worked.

Great work, as always. Did you try to use some AI to transcribe those interviews? When I was a journalist, I sometimes used Google Pinpoint with my own interview recordings. It's not perfect, especially considering my field had a lot of technical terms (telecommunications) and most of those interviews were in Portuguese, but it helped. https://journaliststudio.google.com/pinpoint/about There's several other tools out there that may have better results, tho.

So this means that Axl and Caram were just following the latest trend? I presume Slash only recorded the solo, right? Thanks for the link. Is that an official instrumental piece or AI-manipulated? His solo kinda fades away in the ending.

The video is even better. I didn't know the song until my wife told me about it last year, before the movie came out. The problem is that my dentist was listening to this song when she was treating me with some torture instrument, and now I remember that every time I hear it.

2007 was already very late. They had an album before that, with good mixes and a somewhat cohesive soundscape. The late additions by Ron and Frank certainly changed this, but those were not the reason why it wasn't released earlier. IMO, Axl should've managed to release the album at least in 2006, without Ron and Frank. And then release the follow up with both in 2008. I know, it's just fan-fiction at this point. And we'll sure see a lot of more missed opportunities in the future. It's a shame, because this failed attempts (or lack of) is what causes frustration and even leaks.

I think the simplistic lyrics are more from the desire to have catchier songs. Perhaps, Hard Skool and Absurd also have simple lyrics and are pre-Bucket songs. If they were really intending for a 2011 album, I don't think they would introduce the first really unheard track of the batch with Tommy Stinson as lead singer. Maybe so, but maybe the tracks would sound more cohesive with that band and it would sound a bit better than what we have now as a package. I believe this tracklist would still need something like Better, meaning a great mid-tempo rock song with a more dynamic structure and some cool vintage Axl's vocals. This would elevate it as an album.

Is everybody trying to please me?

I know about this list. But I meant the style of writing. Like you said, a tad darker, but also simpler - considering only the tracks we know. There's a less emphasis in mid-tempo ballads, although we still have Atlas and Perhaps, and both are 1999-ish. Maybe Thyme and Nothing evolved into a ballad? Not a lot of fast tempo rockers either, much like CD1. OMG, Absurd/Silkworms and Going Down are a different thing to me. Those were all in the alt-setlist in 2011, which to me indicates that those could possibly be in a remix album/EP as bonus "new" songs.

Sorry, just realized you're from Canada. Yeah, I remember those DVDs. It had some problems, though. Can't remember exactly, but was one of them out of sync? And I believe you wanted to say Here Comes Your Man. One of the early 2000s band that I discovered back then was Placebo. Sure it had a single on a the Cruel Intentions movie, but besides that, it wasn't well known. Even Muse was not really mainstream rock here in the Plugin Baby era.

I honestly can't understand what was Axl's vision for CD2, style-wise. From the two unheard songs we got - The General and Monsters - I got the sense that it would have a more Bucket/Brain backbone, but it may have some older songs like Absurd, Hard Skool and Perhaps too, but this mix is frankly a lot like CD1 already. But we don't know if those 1999 instrumentals were all still on the table. Heck, we don't even know if they would still use Hard Skool and Perhaps if those were not leaked (I assume they would, but who knows). We're also in a parallel dimension.

Well, it depends. I really liked Meg Myers 2018 Take me To The Disco album, or HAIMs 2020 Women in Music Part. III. Full albums, with maybe a filler or two. Or Fiona Apple's Fetch the Bolt Cutters. Those are some from the top of my head and only from female singers/band. Sure, it's only my taste. About the gatekeepers: that was my main problem. You may feel different because I assume you're from US, but growing up in the 80s and 90s here in Brazil there would be your gatekeepers and then our gatekeepers filtering everything. Plus, we of course have our local music too, which is great and it's a lot more popular. There was simply not room enough for everything, so it was really hard to get exposed to great English-based content. I used to discover some stuff on MTV really late at night with shows that introduced me to stuff like Pixies, Live, Beck, Regina Spektor and even Fiona Apple. But yes, I agree that music is treated as a disposable product now. The Top 10 artists from streaming is not something to look for at all.

I agree with most of what you said. I would just add a thing to your rant: maybe that's true about rock music, but the alternative/indie scene is still pretty good IMO. I've been listening to a lot of new artists thanks to some great algorithms on Spotify, although I understand people's reservation with the platform. The problem is also on those platforms, as the back catalogue is too easy to access, and people often get fed by the most famous singles from those classic bands, which doesn't help at all. But people need to have a better understanding of that and actively search for new stuff, which isn't harder than back in the 90s. Also a problem is that there is too much stuff out there, it gets hard to get to know some new song and get used to it if it's not made to be catchy.

No, I had personal stuff going on so I couldn't attend. But I saw some videos on IG.

Don't think i saw that comparison, but I believe the CGI would at least fix my main issue with the whole thing, which is the constant moving parts and lack of focus. I'm being serious: the video should have a warning for photo-sensitive persons.

Don't Damn Me got played again yesterday here in São Paulo. Seems like it's been a staple at least for the LATAM leg.

So they were making it with Unreal Engine and scrapped it to use AI? It would be 10000x better.

Yes. Those are probably from 2005/06 batch of Andy Wallace mixes.

And here's yet another version, this time in Belo Horizonte, Brazil (starts at 14:00).

So it's confirmed that Axl is producing it. Expect a lot of clipping.

I mean, lists with Creed and so and so stuff hitting the #1 spot. I know people like to shit on CD, but the 2008 song is a generic power ballad. I'd take even Kings of Leon instead of this one (which I really like, but I don't consider it to really be a rock song).

Not sure if it was posted before, but in Colombia they played the song and Slash improvised the solo again. Safe to assume that it wasn't a mistake, he just wanted to play it different.

Where all those instrumental ideas went? Did Slash used anything from that batch after VR?

I get that and I agree, but it's just that we don't know for sure. And maybe the fact that both songs were not part of the Village batch means that it would still need some overdubs by 2020-ish. It's not safe to assume anything until we have access to some demo from pre-NITL era.

We don't know if Monsters and The General has any new Axl recording/overdub.