janrichmond Posted October 8, 2017 Share Posted October 8, 2017 1 minute ago, RussTCB said: IMO, you shouldn't have to try to like it. There's no rule that says you have to like it because it says Guns N' Roses on the cover, ya know? I wanted to give it a fair chance because then i feel my opinion would be more valid. I could have said 'nah it's shit coz Slash ain't on it' 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MyPrettyTiedUpMichelle Posted October 8, 2017 Share Posted October 8, 2017 11 minutes ago, janrichmond said: I am trying to like it but it's so hard, I think it sounds too busy, like there's too much going on. I guess that's what others call over produced? I dunno I'm not well versed on that era and only listened to it when i joined the forum. I have also heard some of the demos and they are better. I feel Axl has to play some CD tracks to justify to himself (and the odd fan) that CD wasn't a failure. I'm trying hard to restrain myself from fully entering this discussion because I'm obsessed with CD and completely unobjective about it; I'm grateful to Axl for its existence. I think it showcases so much about his artistic abilities that he wouldn't have been allowed to develop with Slash and Duff at the time. But for what it's worth, yes it's busy, there's a lot going on; some of the layers are warranted, some aren't. Parts of it are over-produced, not all. Part of what he was trying to accomplish demands a busy, layered effect. Most of the time he got it right. It very much depends on what your ear likes the sound of and as @RussTCB said, there's no rule you have to like it. So if it's not working for you, give up on it. Life's too short! And no, it doesn't sound like GNR, although you can detect classic GNR in the basic song structures. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
T-Minus Posted October 8, 2017 Share Posted October 8, 2017 I'd like to believe that Axl listens to it now and realises just how cramped and over produced it is. The Blues was excellent in it's live state in the early 00's and This I Love is a borderline masterpiece musically IF it hadn't been layered 4000 times. Patti Hood's harp work is great and yet barely audible in the final track, along with many other elements. I don't actually hold out much hope that he learned his lesson though, and any future release would be just as layered and weighed down by it's over production and bloated layering. Such a shame Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
janrichmond Posted October 8, 2017 Share Posted October 8, 2017 @MyPrettyTiedUpMichelle I know i should give up trying and i will for now, i'll try again in a few months(years) I agree with @Tom-Ass that some songs had potential. There are snippets that i think 'oh that's cool' so maybe in a while i'll appreciate more of it 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
soon Posted October 8, 2017 Share Posted October 8, 2017 For me CD is no more over produced then UYI. And UYI's production threatened to ruin those albums imo, if the songs and performances (generally) weren't so strong. And some of the production approaches used on CD have become mainstay in music whereas the UYI production has been left in the dust bin of history. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
janrichmond Posted October 8, 2017 Share Posted October 8, 2017 1 minute ago, soon said: For me CD is no more over produced then UYI. And UYI's production threatened to ruin those albums imo, if the songs and performances (generally) weren't so strong. And some of the production approaches used on CD have become mainstay in music whereas the UYI production has been left in the dust bin of history. No. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tom-Ass Posted October 8, 2017 Share Posted October 8, 2017 (edited) 23 minutes ago, T-Minus said: The Blues was excellent in it's live state in the early 00's and This I Love is a borderline masterpiece musically IF it hadn't been layered 4000 times. I was on board early on... I used to enjoy listening to CD, The Blues and Madagascar from RIR when they first played those songs.. I though Rhiad was total garbage.. None of the studio versions of those songs were as good though and I didn't think there was one song on the rest of the album that came close to any of those.. I can say that I have recently started enjoying Sorry somewhat with this line up... Edited October 8, 2017 by Tom-Ass 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MyPrettyTiedUpMichelle Posted October 8, 2017 Share Posted October 8, 2017 8 minutes ago, Tom-Ass said: I was on board early on... I used to enjoy listening to CD, The Blues and Madagascar from RIR when they first played those songs.. I though Rhiad was total garbage.. None of the studio versions of those songs were as good though and I didn't think there was one song on the rest of the album that came close to any of those.. I can say that I have recently started enjoying Sorry somewhat with this line up... See, this is how biased I am: I can't for the life of me understand how everyone doesn't adore Riad. It's like when you find out there are people who have never eaten pizza or seen Star Wars and you're like...seriously? How? Why? Sorry is amazing...hope you end up loving it! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
T-Minus Posted October 8, 2017 Share Posted October 8, 2017 16 minutes ago, Tom-Ass said: I was on board early on... I used to enjoy listening to CD, The Blues and Madagascar from RIR when they first played those songs.. I though Rhiad was total garbage.. None of the studio versions of those songs were as good though and I didn't think there was one song on the rest of the album that came close to any of those.. I can say that I have recently started enjoying Sorry somewhat with this line up... I agree with all of this. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SoulMonster Posted October 8, 2017 Share Posted October 8, 2017 It was a long process, Axl has admitted as much, full of problems and struggles, and in the end he only managed to release one of the two records. It's like creating Venus de Milo and the arms break off immediately. How happy can you be with half a work? But looked at it separate from both the intention and the process then I suppose he is proud that he actually succeeded in getting it out and for most part happy with the music itself. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
janrichmond Posted October 8, 2017 Share Posted October 8, 2017 24 minutes ago, MyPrettyTiedUpMichelle said: See, this is how biased I am: I can't for the life of me understand how everyone doesn't adore Riad. It's like when you find out there are people who have never eaten pizza or seen Star Wars and you're like...seriously? How? Why? Sorry is amazing...hope you end up loving it! Riad is ok Never seen Star Wars Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dontdamnmeuyi2015 Posted October 8, 2017 Share Posted October 8, 2017 I don't think Axl regrets CD at all. He did tell Eddie Trunk he didn't understand why he had to release CD at a certain time. I think Axl would have taken more time if the record company would have given it to him, but it did take a long time to release. There are a lot of amazing songs on CD, it's just that Slash and Duff, and Izzy aren't on it, so many fans didn't really like it for that reason. I'm glad Slash and Duff learned the CD songs, they sound so amazing live. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Get In the Ring Motherfker Posted October 8, 2017 Share Posted October 8, 2017 Robin’s solo on TIL always gives me goosebumps Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
soon Posted October 8, 2017 Share Posted October 8, 2017 6 minutes ago, Get In the Ring Motherfker said: Robin’s solo on TIL always gives me goosebumps Me too! Slash's TIL solo gives me piss shivers as IMO he's turned the song into a washroom break song. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RussTCB Posted October 8, 2017 Share Posted October 8, 2017 1 hour ago, Tom-Ass said: I was on board early on... I used to enjoy listening to CD, The Blues and Madagascar from RIR when they first played those songs.. I though Rhiad was total garbage.. None of the studio versions of those songs were as good though and I didn't think there was one song on the rest of the album that came close to any of those.. I can say that I have recently started enjoying Sorry somewhat with this line up... I think I've mentioned this before, but I was the same. Very on board with the songs that I'd hear. Then we saw them in Detroit and they did Raid. As soon as it was over, I leaned over to my buddy and said "Swing and a miss Axl" lol 1 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ericy210 Posted October 10, 2017 Share Posted October 10, 2017 On 7/4/2017 at 7:21 PM, RONIN said: This is an inherent problem because a lot of times Artists have a way of diluting their art with more revisions. I don't know why this is but I think the album/film/painting, etc is a snapshot into their mind at that particular moment in time. You know you've waited too long when your feelings artistically begin to change and your head is somewhere else - which leads to the art "evolving" as your feelings continue to change. Eventually, the evolution is so great, the original piece has been given a total facelift and transformation that is neither here nor there. I've always felt like that's what happened with Chinese. Axl started the project feeling one way - and then revised it so much - that he felt alienated from the material since it had strayed so far from it's original conception. My conjecture obviously. I've rarely seen a revised director's cut of a film turning out better than the original cut. By that, I mean a director coming back to a film years later and reinterpreting their vision through a different cut of the film. The director of "Heat", Michael Mann, does this with his films, and his original cut is always superior to the revised version. Art is a snapshot in time imho. It evolves into a product the more you fuss over it and craft it beyond the incubation stage. There is a great fucking album buried in Chinese Democracy. Even without Duff, Slash and Izzy, that album could have been great with a little judicious overseeing of the extravagance. And yet...Guns N' Roses is all about extravagance and Chinese is authentically a result of that. It's a catch 22. He stayed true to himself and his process - his art suffered - but perhaps it turned out the only way it could have. I don't agree with it, but I can't fault Axl for it either. It is what it is. Right. Listen and read musician interviews. Often the masterpieces came in minutes. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tom2112 Posted October 10, 2017 Share Posted October 10, 2017 I think Axl loves the record, warts and all... but EVERY musician will look back on their last record and go "I would have done that differently" that's the nature of growing as a musician... and there's been over 10 years since recording wrapped on Chinese so I think it's a fair assumption that he might be thinking that way. Look at Metallica, When they released death Magnetic, they were over the fucking moon, "we want to play every song" "I can't pick a favourite", 8 years later, new album cycle and they've levelled a lot of (valid) criticism towards the record, and when the follow up to Hardwired comes out, they'll do it again. It's the way things work. It took very long to release it, some of it like Rhiad and Scraped are just straight up bad songs, Some are mediocre songs Catcher, Some are good I.R.S, Chinese and some hit that great mark, which for me includes Shacklers, Street of Dreams, If The world, This I Love. It's not a top to bottom belter, I don't think anyone here could make a convincing argument for that, BUT it's still one of my favourite albums, and there's songs on that record that get far more plays (by me) than older classic Guns songs... And that's not a slight on the older material, I love that too, It's the reason I started listening to GNR and continue listening to them. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
YourMother'sDruthers Posted October 10, 2017 Share Posted October 10, 2017 TWAT and Prostitute are among Axl's greatest songs, both lyrically and musically. CD absolutely did suffer from overproduction though, particularly with the guitar work... too many layers and overdubs. The endless noodling during the last verse on catcher in the rye almost ruined it (the demo was much better), and the loud, distorted rhythm guitars on TWAT drowned out alot of the beautiful orchestration. If this album had been released by 2001, before it got produced to death, and before any of the original Nu-Gnr members quit, it would've been a successful record, Slash or no. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gackt Posted October 10, 2017 Share Posted October 10, 2017 Riad's fun af on Rock Band at least Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
papashaun Posted October 11, 2017 Share Posted October 11, 2017 On 10/8/2017 at 12:13 PM, MyPrettyTiedUpMichelle said: That was a terrible video. Although not as nearly as bad as the video for Since I Don't Have You. Sorry, off topic. lol I'm pretty sure Axl still loves CD and so he should. It's a great album. All I can say is....AC/DC and Hall & Oates made the worst music videos of all time....collectively/per average. If Estranged was considered one of the worst videos....these below should have made the top of the list: Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gackt Posted October 11, 2017 Share Posted October 11, 2017 Worst music videos of all time, you say? 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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