Nu GnR: Doomed to fail

[soon]

17 minutes ago, Mendez said:

Yeah i went last night. It was a great show. Loud but still crowd (which is good for some people, i personally prefer rowdy crowds with pits). Brain was awesome, wish he was still with GNR instead of Frank. Hes got a groove, but he also just bashes right into the drums. Buckethead was awesome as always. He played some more calmer/emotional songs than he usually did last tour which was definitely a treat. It didnt feel like a Buckethead, Brain definetely quite a bit of spotlight moments during the songs, as did Dan Monti to a lesser extent

Sweet!  Id take Brain back in GNR over Frank any day too. Brain is a great mix of technique and feel.  After hearing that BH conversation with the life coach, somehow it makes sense to me that they did more of those types of tunes. Sounds like an awesome show, thanks for the review

[themadcaplaughs]

There seemed to be an idea before that Buckethead and Robin met and played together on that Ghosts of Mars soundtrack. The two of them worked on that completely separately. From what I've been told, Buckethead and Robin never formally met or started playing together until the band started rehearsals for the Las Vegas and rock in Rio shows. 

[RONIN]

7 hours ago, themadcaplaughs said:

There seemed to be an idea before that Buckethead and Robin met and played together on that Ghosts of Mars soundtrack. The two of them worked on that completely separately. From what I've been told, Buckethead and Robin never formally met or started playing together until the band started rehearsals for the Las Vegas and rock in Rio shows. 

There's an article I just read recently from the archives on Soul Monster's site that alleged that Bucket and Robin couldn't stand each other. I'll try to find it and transcribe for this thread.

It's not that hard to believe though. Imagine the balls you need to have to put probably one of the top 3 guitar players in the world as second fiddle to Robin Finck. In some of those Rio 2001 songs like Patience and SCOM, Bucket is literally standing around while Finck butchers the solos. To make matters worse, Finck quit the band. Bucket was supposed to be the only lead guitarist for GnR before Finck was brought back in and given his old spot. That's like asking your ex to live in the same house with you again and spending more time with her than your current gf.

Edited November 3, 2017 by RONIN

[soon]

^^^^ to this, I think it was Philly but theres a story (maybe the one in that article) that Bucket and Finck were bickering backstage as they waited for Axl.  I love, love, love the image of goth Finck in heels arguing with a hand puppet named Herbie, who is speaking on behalf of Buckethead, lol!

[Fashionista]

I don't think NuGNR was doomed to fail. I think Bob Ezrin did more damage than anyone else. We would've probably had an album in 2001 or 2002 at the latest if not for that guy.

[southsiderwp]

Enlighten us as to who and what Bob Ezrin allegedly did

[DieselDaisy]

The reason Chinese Democracy was delayed, which is also the reason there is no impending album now, is clear viz: W. Axl Rose. There seems little point in blaming highly prolific and successful music producers such as Bob Ezrin - or for that matter Sean Beavan and Roy Thomas Baker. 

[RONIN]

1 hour ago, southsiderwp said:

Enlighten us as to who and what Bob Ezrin allegedly did

He said there were only a few good songs on the album and that everything else needed to be worked on more. To paraphrase, Bob mentioned how he thought the songs sounded like they had been painted over too many times.

I don't think it was an entirely off the mark appraisal. Imho there isn't a 5 star song on Chinese aside from possibly Prostitute and the Catcher demo w/Brian May.

[DieselDaisy]

The album was already gridlocked before Ezrin arrived - in fact he arrived precisely to alter that fact. 

[Fashionista]

According to Ezrin, Axl was ready to go into the mixing stage and Ezrin basically told Axl it wasn't good enough to do that. Which had to be a blow to Axl's confidence. That, combined with Roy Thomas Baker having them re-record the entire album I'm sure didn't help.

[Blackstar]

I’ve read that at some point during the Guns N’ Roses lengthy “Chinese Democracy” recordings, Axl Rose called you to evaluate what he had already done. What really happened?

EZRIN: Hm.. Well.. (ed:pause) I’m not sure!! (laughs)

I’ve read that you told him he had about 2 ½ songs or 3 ½ songs. Something like that.

EZRIN: Yeah, I probably did. It started off when Jimmy Iovine (ed: producer, chairman of Interscope/ Geffen) asked me for a big favour. They were stuck, they were stuck in a studio in North Hollywood for years with Roy Thomas Baker (ed: Queen’s producer), and nothing was happening. They were paying enormous rental bills and they were paying people to sit around the studio waiting for Axl to show up and it was just a disaster.

I agreed to go there immediately and listen to a bunch of stuff. What I heard was – I don’t know how to say this without be insulting, I don’t want to be insulting because he worked very hard on it – but what I heard was something that he had painted over too many times. So, by the time I heard it, the original content was lost and it was just a highly produced piece of something…

Anyway, I agreed to help out if Axl would agree to work with me, which he did. He had the idea that the only person who could finish the album with him was me, based on what I don’t know. I came, I listened, I said to him I will listen and will give you notes we will see together. I spent a lot of time listening.

I went to see Jimmy Iovine and I gave him my perception of the situation, including the fact that they had to get out of Rumbo Studios immediately – not because Rumbo is a bad studio, it’s a wonderful studio –  but because they needed to be closer to the scrutiny of the record company and Jimmy’s team, so there could be at least some measure of control. And I recommended we move them to the Village Recorder in West Hollywood. So, they did that, and moved everybody there.  

I had to wait to talk to Axl because he avoided me. He was nervous about hearing what I had to say. We finally met, on a night when my wife – who was then my girlfriend – came down from Toronto to visit me and we were having a dinner with friends at my house. She was cooking when I got a phone call from Jimmy Iovine saying that I needed to come meet Axl and I said “I can’t tonight. I’m booked”. And Jimmy replied saying “ok” (laughs). No he didn’t. When he wants something, he really knows how to get it. Anyway, he basically guilt-tripped me and I told him “Ok, I will be there at 8pm and I will leave there at 8.30, whether Axl shows up or not”, because that was Axl. Because last time we had an appointment at 10pm and Axl showed up at 2 in the morning. “So tell Axl that’s it”. 

I went to the restaurant at 8 and a team of Axl supporters and hangers-on showed up and joined me at the table – and no Axl. Axl finally came about 8:25 (laughs). Anyway, I told him basically what you’ve heard. I didn’t tell him “you have 2 ½ songs” and when he sat down, he started saying me that he has finished the record. And I said “Axl, we are not ready to mix this record. This record isn’t ready to be mixed”. I said “there are two great songs on it and I know that you’re capable of more, that’s the reason why I’m here.  You’re such a great talent and I would do you a disservice if I didn’t tell you the truth, which is that most of the songs aren’t great.  But I‘m very happy to help you get there and I believe that it’s possible, if you would like to continue to work on the record, to make it better”.   He said “I don’t agree with that. We are ready to mix”. And I told him “you have my number, if you change your mind let me know, but I have a dinner party at home now and I had to go”.  I left and I haven’t heard from him since. It was years later when it came out.

https://www.hit-channel.com/bob-ezrin-pink-floydalice-cooperkisspeter-gabriel-producer/2508

Edited November 27, 2017 by Blackstar

[DieselDaisy]

Yip, and there is your reason,

Quote

They were stuck, they were stuck in a studio in North Hollywood for years with Roy Thomas Baker (ed: Queen’s producer), and nothing was happening. They were paying enormous rental bills and they were paying people to sit around the studio waiting for Axl to show up and it was just a disaster.

It is really that simple. You are merely deflecting the blame away from the one common denominator here (W. Axl Rose) by blaming these world famous and highly prolific producers of rock who worked with everybody from Floyd, Alice Cooper, Kiss (Ezrin), Queen, The Cars (Baker) and NIN, Manson (Beavan). They all arrived, they all similarly departed.

It is funny that they all, despite a plethora of major albums under their belt (The Wall, School's Out, Destroyer), began messing up for the first time in their career while working with Rose?

No, the only person to blame is Axl. He is also the reason there is about as much chance of an album now as there is of Lord Lucan being caught in flagrante with a yeti. Basically the same problem still exists except these days Rose isn't even bothering to add those bleeps of his onto things at four in the morning, and now and is just ignoring the issue through endless nostalgia touring.

[RONIN]

^^^ Agreed, and just to add to that - I've always suspected that Axl spent so much time developing his music that halfway through, he lost the original inspiration for these songs. I wouldn't be surprised if he had mentally moved on from all these Chinese songs years ago. It would explain why getting him into the studio post-2000 was nearly impossible. No creative juice left.

His most productive years for Chinese were '98-2001 - the bulk of vocals for the album were recorded by then iirc. After that initial burst of activity, it has been mostly a dormant period with a smattering of studio work - mostly just tinkering on endless layers. Oh and lots of touring to fund adding more bleeps to the songs.

There is a soulless quality to Chinese  (and even most of Illusions) which reflects this. The gestation time for these albums was way too long. They lost whatever spark they may have once had.

Edited November 27, 2017 by RONIN

[Sydney Fan]

My thoughts are either axl coukdnt find any inspiration or he doesnt know how to translate musical thoughts/ideas onto tape easily and we just have a mishmash of beeps and sounds. The producers he worked must have felt they were trying to pull teeth to help translate ideas to sounds. Maybe he thought " shit ive disbanded a group and i dont know what musical journey i want to go on". Wasnt industrial music all over by 2001?.

[gabfm]

12 minutes ago, Sydney Fan said:

 Wasnt industrial music all over by 2001?.

Yes, I think so. He was trying to follow the trend. Took too long and it was gone before he could release the album.
C.D. might have worked if released in year '99-00

[Tom2112]

6 hours ago, DieselDaisy said:

Yip, and there is your reason,

It is really that simple. You are merely deflecting the blame away from the one common denominator here (W. Axl Rose) by blaming these world famous and highly prolific producers of rock who worked with everybody from Floyd, Alice Cooper, Kiss (Ezrin), Queen, The Cars (Baker) and NIN, Manson (Beavan). They all arrived, they all similarly departed.

It is funny that they all, despite a plethora of major albums under their belt (The Wall, School's Out, Destroyer), began messing up for the first time in their career while working with Rose?

No, the only person to blame is Axl. He is also the reason there is about as much chance of an album now as there is of Lord Lucan being caught in flagrante with a yeti. Basically the same problem still exists except these days Rose isn't even bothering to add those bleeps of his onto things at four in the morning, and now and is just ignoring the issue through endless nostalgia touring.

Look you definitely have a point and I agree. End of the day the buck stops at Axl. But he is not the only one that deserves blame. Also, while all those producers are world class and have helmed the releases of classic records without delaying them etc. that does not mean their work style meshes with Axls style (I know there's an easy joke about Axls work style ), with Caram came on board he obviously knew how to get Axl to work... the other guys either got some work out of him and then ground to a halt, or never even got into the studio with him in the first place. 

I'm not an Axl apologist though, as I said he was definitely the main reason for the delay... even if the label or whoever rejected the record in 2001 or not. 

[Hollywood Gunner]

any band that replaces slash with a dude wearing a kfc bucket on his head is doomed. no matter how how many skills said dude with bucket may have

[RONIN]

Would Chinese Democracy have even been released if a Best Buy or Walmart/Target exclusive was not closed by Azoff? There was no way Interscope was going to recoup their investment otherwise.

So much time had gone by - that album was DOA by 2008. 2006 was really the last window of opportunity to make a commercial impact. There's plenty of unreleased albums and movies out there where the studio/record label didn't even feel like the original investment was worth releasing into the marketplace let alone spending more money on a marketing launch. Didn't Interscope just dump a chinese turd on Best Buy's lap without much of a marketing push? I remember some talk about Axl being pissed that the label wasn't willing to do a major marketing blitz for CD.  

Edited November 28, 2017 by RONIN

[DieselDaisy]

19 minutes ago, Tom2112 said:

Look you definitely have a point and I agree. End of the day the buck stops at Axl. But he is not the only one that deserves blame. Also, while all those producers are world class and have helmed the releases of classic records without delaying them etc. that does not mean their work style meshes with Axls style (I know there's an easy joke about Axls work style ), with Caram came on board he obviously knew how to get Axl to work... the other guys either got some work out of him and then ground to a halt, or never even got into the studio with him in the first place. 

I'm not an Axl apologist though, as I said he was definitely the main reason for the delay... even if the label or whoever rejected the record in 2001 or not. 

Wasn't Caram on-board early in an engineer guise. Survival of the fittest then.

[Tom2112]

15 minutes ago, DieselDaisy said:

Wasn't Caram on-board early in an engineer guise. Survival of the fittest then.

Ha! anyone who lasted that long has some constitution for pain  Thought he joined sometime around 2006. but I really don't know to be fair.

[Tom2112]

23 minutes ago, RONIN said:

Would Chinese Democracy have even been released if a Best Buy or Walmart/Target exclusive was not closed by Azoff? There was no way Interscope was going to recoup their investment otherwise.

So much time had gone by - that album was DOA by 2008. 2006 was really the last window of opportunity to make a commercial impact. There's plenty of unreleased albums and movies out there where the studio/record label didn't even feel like the original investment was worth releasing into the marketplace let alone spending more money on a marketing launch. Didn't Interscope just dump a chinese turd on Best Buy's lap without much of a marketing push? I remember some talk about Axl being pissed that the label wasn't willing to do a major marketing blitz for CD.  

Remember CD came out and there was no major promotion for it. Axl pretty much disappeared for the next year and was apparently non responsive to label requests that he does some interviews. I don't know how true that is though.

Think there was definitely some shenanigans, I mean the whole having a video made for better and not releasing it? that perplexes me.

[DieselDaisy]

13 minutes ago, Tom2112 said:

Ha! anyone who lasted that long has some constitution for pain  Thought he joined sometime around 2006. but I really don't know to be fair.

2000 according to chinese whispers,

Quote

 

The band moved to Village Recording Studios in Western LA. The studio team would also be revamped with Pro Tools engineer Eric Caudieux (and, presumably, new main engineer Caram Costanzo).

"Eric Caudieux, our rhythm guitarist/keyboardist, had an offer to produce Guns'n'Roses, and we wouldn't let him turn it down!" (Joe Satriani, 08/11/00)

 

 

[Tom2112]

24 minutes ago, DieselDaisy said:

2000 according to chinese whispers,

 

Interesting! that might explain the Joe satriani connection that led to Bumblefoot getting recommended.

[BangoSkank]

I don't have too much meaningful info. to add, only that this is one of my favorite subjects, I could talk/read about it for hours. It really is one of the great lost opportunities in music - what could have been. 

Although the talent would have likely been fed up with Axl's bizarre work habits at some point, I can never ignore the fact that it probably was the name and the lack of release. I actually do see (and even support) Axl's view to just carry the name forward as guys came and went, but still proved to be too huge of a burden in the eyes of the general public (not to mention a lot of hardcore fans too).

Under another name he could have looked as weird as he wanted, had his band be as freaky as possible, and played old and new songs with ease.

It honestly could have have been a Post-Sabbath Ozzy & Randy Rhodes scenario, but with NIN influences. It would probably still exist in some capacity too and he could even interchange between his solo work and the new GNR reunion. 

[RONIN]

3 hours ago, Tom2112 said:

Remember CD came out and there was no major promotion for it. Axl pretty much disappeared for the next year and was apparently non responsive to label requests that he does some interviews. I don't know how true that is though.

Think there was definitely some shenanigans, I mean the whole having a video made for better and not releasing it? that perplexes me.

Right - it seems almost like Interscope/Azoff and Axl were playing chicken with each other. Axl probably expected a UYI style grand launch and the label just wanted to do the bare minimum without having to throw even more cash into the CD money pit for promotion. It's like they screwed each other but Best Buy got the worst of it. The label probably didn't make much if any profit with CD (they may still be in the red with CD) and Axl shot himself in the foot by refusing to promote his magnum opus thereby guaranteeing that it would underperform. As a consequence, this probably helped seal the fate of Chinese Democracy 2. 

I guess Azoff saw the writing on the wall given that he was pushing hard for a reunion. From what I understand, Azoff had to move mountains to get Chinese Democracy released and work out a deal that Interscope and Axl would both sign off on. The relationship between Interscope and Axl was probably at a complete standstill after they cut him off the tab in 2004. The Merck fiasco in 2006  no doubt made things even more acrimonious. 

Consider the irony of the whole situation. You're talking about one of the biggest bands of all time (rock royalty) - led by one of the greatest singer/frontmen of all time - with a near perfect multi-platinum track record and a global fanbase thirsty for new music. How bad does the situation have to be that the label needs motivation to even release an album that they supported with the biggest recording budget..ever? How bad does the situation have to be that they kill the followup album even after Chinese went multi-platinum? Working with Axl must have been an unbearable situation where the ROI didn't seem worth the headache.

It will be interesting to see if Interscope gets involved with a new GnR album - after the NITL tour becomes the #2 biggest tour of all time by the end of 2018. IIRC, Axl still owes them another album. Maybe they'll do a greatest hits package and wash their hands of the relationship - or maybe they already released Axl from whatever contract they had him under? It's been nearly a decade since Chinese and they haven't bothered to release anything with or without Axl's approval.  It could be that perhaps the stipulation for supporting another release would only be if Slash was back in the fold - seems plausible enough. Maybe that's part of the reason the reunion started to shape up - there was no way Axl could release an album otherwise. 

Edited November 28, 2017 by RONIN