Watch You Bleed

[Demon Wolf]

Not sure where to put this, feel free to move it to where it should be. Anyway I recall there were some talk about this book back when it came out some year ago, and an excerpt was posted here. I got it for Christmas and just finished reading it.

If you haven't read it yet, stay away!

Alot of facts are completely wrong (he claims Seb Bach filled in on Paradise City and Nightrain at Wembley in 2002, that GNR toured in 2005, etc etc) and it annoys me to no end how he mixes "facts" with his personal opinions about songs and albums and events, and then there are assumptions and lines like "some say", "most people think", "the hardcore GNR fans agree", "according to rumors" all over the place.

It is just a fucking awful book, the writing is horrible and on the whole it offers NO new insight whatsoever. Get Slash's book if you want something better. How is Reckless Road, for those who've read it?

[oneAXLinamillion]

I've read it..it was a present

and I think that I really wasted my time..

I agree with your analysis

[F*ck Fear]

Yea, I read it and probably will never read it again. I'd rather read Slash's autobiography, or W.A.R by Mick Wall.

[carsonskitz]

ive got it but never read it, ive read the band that time forgot...once youve read one you have read them all. Reckless road, slash and the W.A.R. book are good though

[MJG]

ive got it but never read it, ive read the band that time forgot...once youve read one you have read them all. Reckless road, slash and the W.A.R. book are good though

I've never heard of that one. When did it come out?

I've never read Reckless Road. I've got it and looked through it. It's not so much a book as a photo album filled with quotes and facts!

[LaBellaVita]

Reckless road is good, it's crazy to have a face be put on all the other characters & see their stories in Reckless Road. Marc really did an amazing job. The website's bonuses are great as well.

Watch You Bleed wasn't too bad, imo. it was good to see all the stories I've heard kind of tie in with one another. While validity is important, considering the state of mind these people in, i don't think we'll ever get the 100% truth.

Edited January 5, 2010 by LaBellaVita

[Conor]

I read The Band That Time Forgot, it was the first time I'd heard about Chinese Democracy. As far as I knew, Axl had played a few shows with some new guys, that was my extent of the knowledge. I thought it was quite a good read, and one of the better ones out there. It's quite Axl biased in terms of content, but with Slash's autobiography now out that's not so much of a problem. It might not be 100% accurate or anything, but neither was Slash's book, and I enjoyed that thoroughly as well. Reckless Road is quality as well, especially of your interested in that era of the band. If they came out with something like that for the Use Your Illusion era, I'd jizz.

As for Watch You Bleed, I heard about it here and flicked through it in HMV one day. I found a few mistakes just by flicking through, pretty important ones. After that, and hearing poor things on here, it was one I felt I'd leave out.

As someone said, once you've read one of them, you've read them all. If you've already got a great interest in the band, chances are there's nothing in the biographies that you don't already know.

[Nika Rose]

I have Reckless road and its amazing.

its like a scrap book of photos and set lists of the very beginning.

and its written very well

you really get the seance of how the band came together and you know its reliable because its written by a good friend of slash that been there and took a lot of those pictures himself.

and he doesn't take sides or even gets into Axl vs. the world crap like other books and people.

[HubbaBubba]

IMO, The Band That Time Forgot was the worst of all. It read like a mediocre school project, and those totally irrelevant lyrics peppered through the text became fucking irritating as hell. Initially I was looking for some deeper reason to relate them to what had just been said in the main text, but nope, it was just a retarded attempt at filler.

Watch Your Bleed did indeed have more than its fair share of inaccuracies. And he had his own annoying habit with the lyrics - how the hell do you quote from songs that come supplied complete with liner notes, and still get the wording wrong? Answer: have no real interest in GnR and their music.

There was also a major change in vibe as the story went on - by the end Davis could barely contain his contempt for Axl and his behaviour. There was some sort of odd, pseudo-righteous anger simmering just below the surface for the latter chunk of the book. That was weird to read...it was almost as if he'd worked himself up into an ever more belligerent mood as his research went on. Heaven knows, maybe he convinced himself he was actually a fan of the band!

[Orsys]

Read them all. BTTF. Read Reckless Road and Watch You Bleed in the bookstore and glad I didn't pay for the last two. RR was pretty interesting from someone who was there for it all. WAR and Slash's autobio together seem to give you everything. Slash's book is noticably missing a lot about Axl, as if he was afraid to write about him.

Looking forward to Duff's book. Will probably read Steven's in the bookstore.

[Powerage5]

I've only read Band That Time Forgot and W.A.R., didn't care for either.

I wouldn't really include Reckless Road in this debate, it's not a book to read really.

[slush72]

How cool would a real GN'R biography book be? Like No One Hear gets Out Alive or Hammer of the Gods...

[DirtyZ7]

I thought Baz did have to fill in for Axl at Wembley. I saw the vidz, he did do it. Baz said he was glad there was a teleprompter cause its a hard song. Not sure if it was '02 though.

[James Bond]

I thought Baz did have to fill in for Axl at Wembley. I saw the vidz, he did do it. Baz said he was glad there was a teleprompter cause its a hard song. Not sure if it was '02 though.

He did. The part that's inaccurate is that the book claims it was in 2002. It was in the summer of 2006. Likewise, the book says that Guns N' Roses toured in 2005 when they didn't.

On the topic of Bach filling in for Axl, I've always enjoyed that performance. He did the job he had to do and didn't do too bad with it. Plus the common bootleg video of it has a nice view from the crowd on the floor and you can see everybody jumping and going crazy all around. Kind of a cool atmosphere, and nice to know they did what they could to finish the show!

[Christabel]

Band that Time Forgot is absolute bullshit. Ineptly cobbled together, factually innacurate bullshit. The 'best' GNR related book not written by Slash (and by 'best', I mean funniest) is Danny Sugarman's seminal opus Appetite for Destruction: The Days of Guns N' Roses.

[Use Your Delusion 1]

I found the W.A.R book good up to a point, that point being around the years 1993/1994 where he started to attack Axl at every chance. When he talks about Nu GNR its clear he still holds a grudge over his name being included in 'Get in The Ring' and he attacks them at every chance, plus there are slight mistakes which punctuate the book. However I found the start, Axl's early years pre GNR very intresting.

[Drifter]

Not sure where to put this, feel free to move it to where it should be. Anyway I recall there were some talk about this book back when it came out some year ago, and an excerpt was posted here. I got it for Christmas and just finished reading it.

If you haven't read it yet, stay away!

Alot of facts are completely wrong (he claims Seb Bach filled in on Paradise City and Nightrain at Wembley in 2002, that GNR toured in 2005, etc etc) and it annoys me to no end how he mixes "facts" with his personal opinions about songs and albums and events, and then there are assumptions and lines like "some say", "most people think", "the hardcore GNR fans agree", "according to rumors" all over the place.

It is just a fucking awful book, the writing is horrible and on the whole it offers NO new insight whatsoever. Get Slash's book if you want something better. How is Reckless Road, for those who've read it?

Yeah i read this book to. I noticed that in the part wear they told you where Axl was born and his date of birth, they said he was born on the 12th Feb 1962, then half way through the book they said he was born on 6th Feb 1962. I found it quite mixed up and scattered, i didn't really find it insightful, it kinda seemed like a flung together book, with no though put in it. It didn't really have have hard facts either, it was more poeples thoughts and opinions.

I've also read Slash's book, i thought it was great and VERY insightful, it actually made you feel like you were there and part of it all. I really enjoyed Slash's book personally.

I always think books like these should be written by the person that was part of it and lived it, than some journalist who just pieces shit together and actually has no idea what they are talking about.

You have to have been part of it all and lived it all I think, and thats how i think Slash's book was really good because it came from someone who done that and knew what they were talking about.

But i've never read reckless life, would like to though.