What's the Best G n' R Book You Have Read?

[Nosaj Thing]

Reckless Road
Duff
Slash

[ericy210]

The Bible. Axl is The Second Coming.

[BetterDay7]

Thanks everyone!

Really good to see that your thoughts mostly match mine.

I thought Duff's book was beautifully-written, bursting with pathos and humour, told from a self-deprecating viewpoint. I love his humour. Very deadpan. Duff comes over as an intelligent guy. I bought his book straight after reading 'Slash'.

I love the Slash autobiography too - it's a rollicking read and full of detail (some say too much) but Duff takes time to talk about how things made him FEEL, such as the deaths of two fans at Donington. With Duff you feel like he does genuinely care about people. Slash talks constantly about 'some guy', 'some chick', 'some gig', which can sound a bit throwaway... but I know his book came out of a series of very long interviews Bozza (who should have edited his work WAY more than he did). Duff is more specific about names and events and is more effusive in his gratitude towards those who helped them.

However, I thought Duff maybe did hold back a bit in other ways, maybe.

Duff aimed to write something that has more literary merit than your average rock autobiography, I feel. It pitches itself differently. I also think it's been well edited.

Ah, Duff...

Would love to read a book by Izzy. With him being more detached I think he would lend a great eye to what happened.

I quite liked Steven's book actually cos his bonkers personality bounces off the page. But the constancy of the crack pipe does get pretty depressing!

The Bible. Axl is The Second Coming.

That made me laugh.

[31illusions]

Duff's book is an easy read, Stevens was just ok. Slash's was the best. It was insightful, detailed and was the most professionally written one.

Reckless Road is a given as the most accurate and has the best photos.

[classicrawker]

Reckless Road and Slash are the 2 best IMHO and I have read just about every book on GnR.

Personally I enjoyed Slash's more than Duff's. I thought Duff's was a little dry.

Edited January 21, 2015 by classicrawker

[Damn_Smooth]

Basically it is now the, excepted position that, somehow Duff''s is better than Slash's. Nobody has actually challenged this conception.

What the fuck? You William Shatner now?

[Brunzopolis]

I've read Duff's, Steven's, and Slash's. I honestly liked them all. I remember, at the time, wishing Steven hadn't gone into such detail, near the end of his book, on his various relapses. But it's his book, and his life, and it's an autobiography, so you can't fault him for his thoroughness. I just wasn't super interested in all of it. I'm sure a major Steven fan would be though.

I'm fascinated by the stories surrounding the creation of songs - when and where riffs were come up with, etc. etc. Slash had a lot of stuff on the whole songwriting thing, so I dug his book the most.

[Free Bird]

Reckless Road is like a documentary of the early days. It's very detailed with a lot of background informations.

Duff's book is very personal. It's well written an it captured the feelings of Duff very well.

Slash's book is very informative regarding the origins of the songs. It's riddled with some funny storys here and a sad storys there. All in all I laughed the most by reading his book.

Everybody should have read all three books. They are all good and it depends on what you are looking for to know which one you like the most.

[gunsfanoldie]

Slash's book, for the most part, is laughably bad. And I love Slash, but the book is literally, at least for a large portion of it, "I woke up, I did smack, I saw things or stumbled around places, then I slept with one of my many ex-girlfriends." Maybe others find that interesting, but it was totally annoying when I read it to just keep hearing page after page about his drugged out, rather uneventful life. Obviously thats mixed in with the great GNR stories and insights into either songs or the people in his life, but far too much of that book was almost daily journal entries that I don't think are interesting to anyone but that person. Blame it on Slash, blame it on Bozza, but it was bad for a book. Or at least could have been cut back when the gist became clear.

Haven't read any other GNR books but would like to. Slash's just kind of soured my taste and for a while there wasn't any other alternative. I remember always seeing this book "GNR: The Band That Time Forgot" in my local bookstore, but it just looked like a cheap money grab.

[SoulMonster]

Reckless Road is by far the best GN'R book in my opinion. It provides vital detail and information on a formative period in the band. Second comes Duff's book that was for the most part a good read although a bit boring here and there. I mean, it's the memoirs of a somewhat famous bass player from a 1980s band - how exciting can it be? But as a story of maturing and surviving addictions it was nice, and he opened up somewhat and I felt I could trust what he wrote. Slash's not so much. It was thoroughly uninteresting. It almost felt like a very watered-down The Dirt. I never felt he opened up and really revealed anything of himself. It felt calculated and uninspired. In addition, obvious errors made it difficult to look at it as a credible source of info. Waste of time, really. Steven's was actually entertaining because he is and was such a fuck up. As a source to understanding GN'R it wasn't worth much, but as a story of fucking up, it was gloriously brilliant.

I have read 2-3 others but none one them have made much of a positive impression on me.

[ludurigan]

Mark Putterford OVER THE TOP was written in 1993 I guess and it is a terrific read.

There is a very rare photo book by photographer George Chin (you can find it on eBay) that has awesome photos from the band (I guess 1987-1991)

pretty much every book is worth reading, except THE BAND THAT TIME FORGOT which is absolutely awful

[BetterDay7]

Mark Putterford OVER THE TOP was written in 1993 I guess and it is a terrific read.

There is a very rare photo book by photographer George Chin (you can find it on eBay) that has awesome photos from the band (I guess 1987-1991)

pretty much every book is worth reading, except THE BAND THAT TIME FORGOT which is absolutely awful

Ah, I have not heard of this Over the Top. I will check it out. Thanks.

[DangerousCurves]

One of my favorite parts of Duff's book was the beginning when he was talking about his daughter's birthday party. Here he is, a badass in his own right, his wife is a supermodel and their daughter banishes them from her party because they are dorks. That made me laugh. A lot.

[ThomasZZ]

Reckless Road/Duff's Book

The book of Slash could be better but launch was before a certain time

[supercool]

reckless road is a beautiful work, truly amazing, every gnr fan should own a copy of it.

i enjoyed slash's book, it was entertaining.

there's also an interesting chapter about gnr in nick kent's book the dark stuff.

[LyndaRose]

Robert John's book....

I am still reading Reckless Road, I think I need new glasses, the text through the pics, I find it very hard to read, I think it is my age....

[Liquor & Whores]

reckless & duff

[DieselDaisy]

The unofficial biographies are garbage, absolute junk. Full of errors.

[username]

I've only read Slash's and Duff's. They're very different, but I loved both of them. Only other one I'd consider is Reckless Road.

[BetterDay7]

One of my favorite parts of Duff's book was the beginning when he was talking about his daughter's birthday party. Here he is, a badass in his own right, his wife is a supermodel and their daughter banishes them from her party because they are dorks. That made me laugh. A lot.

I love his humour. I also like it when his daughter wants to take lipgloss on a hike 'cos she might meet a boy en route.

The unofficial biographies are garbage, absolute junk. Full of errors.

The Mick Wall book is dire. He says Slash grew up in Hampstead and gets other stuff about him wrong and he syas Axl crowned Izzy King of Beers! Yeah, that's why the beer in The Simpsons is called Duff Beer... Drr!

Robert John's book....

I am still reading Reckless Road, I think I need new glasses, the text through the pics, I find it very hard to read, I think it is my age....

It's not you! A review on Amazon says the text is hard to read. I have just ordered this book. Can't wait!

[stella]

One of my favorite parts of Duff's book was the beginning when he was talking about his daughter's birthday party. Here he is, a badass in his own right, his wife is a supermodel and their daughter banishes them from her party because they are dorks. That made me laugh. A lot.

I had to laugh at that too. I loved that he opened with that, too - it really set the down-to-earth, accessible tone that the rest of the book had. Duff's family stories were some of the best parts of the book. I also loved the anecdote about trying to call his business professor outside a sold-out concert...and the guy had no idea who he was. And the one about saying goodbye to Chloe the dog, although that was incredibly sad. None of that has anything to do with Guns N' Roses but it all really helps show who he is as a person.

[Strange Broue]

Slash's book was an okay read, a little clichéd but it does give you a vibe of that whole time period. Duff's is better written and a bit more personal, you're left with the impression he has really learned from life's journey. Reckless Road is an excellent record of the band's rise.

I haven't read any others. Still holding out for Axl's story. *takes a deep breath*

Pretty much this

Steven's book is fake as fuck plus he did not even pay the writer

[HubbaBubba]

Slash's book is the definitive 'guitarist's side if the story' and is a very engaging read.

People here are painfully patronising about Duff's personal efforts as a writer (probably because they considered him a drunk retard before they read his book), but his book is much simpler and parochial than Slash's, and nowhere near as good a read.

Stevie's book is (presumably deliberately) written like he talks, ie like an 80s valleyboy, and so is both irritating and a bit dull.

And to an extent they all make the same mistake as many other rock autobios (most notably Kiedis'), that's to say they think the reader will be fascinated to read pages and pages of rhetoric about their recovery from their addictions, when in fact this gets very tedious. The only one who seems to have any appreciation of this is Slash, who after talking a lot about heroin makes very little of the various subsequent occasions he got hooked again and then kicked again, unless there's a real story attached to it (as with Todd Crew).

Reckless road is cool and well worth owning, but it's primarily a picture book right?

[stella]

I don't think anyone is being patronizing at all to Duff. He's never come across as being stupid. Even in the old days when he was three sheets to the wind, he usually came across as being intelligent and articulate in interviews. I remember reading one at the height of Appetite's success where he was talking about all the books he read. He tells a good story, IMHO. Sometimes it's not about how simple or complex the writing is; it's about how well the writer can engage, entertain and communicate, and Duff does that very well, I think. What people consider a good read is very subjective. There are millions of people out there who would say that Twilight and Fifty Shades of Grey are good reads and I'd think the opposite, for instance.

[BetterDay7]

I don't think anyone is being patronizing at all to Duff. He's never come across as being stupid. Even in the old days when he was three sheets to the wind, he usually came across as being intelligent and articulate in interviews. I remember reading one at the height of Appetite's success where he was talking about all the books he read. He tells a good story, IMHO. Sometimes it's not about how simple or complex the writing is; it's about how well the writer can engage, entertain and communicate, and Duff does that very well, I think. What people consider a good read is very subjective. There are millions of people out there who would say that Twilight and Fifty Shades of Grey are good reads and I'd think the opposite, for instance.

Totally agree, Stella. It's insulting to people's intelligence (here) to say that we are patronising about Duff's capabilities. I work as an editor and I truly believe that Duff's book is something of real merit. Even if I wasn't a music fan I'd still think it was a great read. It's got great 'shape' - peaks and troughs. And what a life he's led .

I gather Duff was described as a bright kid at school. It seems like other members of his family a bright too.