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The Axl Rose doesn't like Michael Jackson story


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Is there any truth to it? I always read that Axl didn't like MJ over the acusations Michael suffered in the 90s and that he got really pissed at Slash because he went to play on Dangerous... But it doesn't make any sense, Dangerous was released in 1991, two years before any acusations. The UYI ended in mid july of 93, the acusations on Michael got public on late august, so GNR wasn't even on the road and I bet Axl and Slash were very far from each other at that point... So, anyone knows if there is any truth to this or the "feud" didn't even existed?

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4 minutes ago, cqleonardo said:

Is there any truth to it? I always read that Axl didn't like MJ over the acusations Michael suffered in the 90s and that he got really pissed at Slash because he went to play on Dangerous... But it doesn't make any sense, Dangerous was released in 1991, two years before any acusations. The UYI ended in mid july of 93, the acusations on Michael got public on late august, so GNR wasn't even on the road and I bet Axl and Slash were very far from each other at that point... So, anyone knows if there is any truth to this or the "feud" didn't even existed?

There might be a little truth. I believe Axl said something at the VMAs somewhat disavowing MJs name on an award the band recieved. There would be absolutely no reason to make a comment like that unless there was a solid reason. 

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Doug Goldstein has told this story. I think there might be some truth to it, but not that it was such big a deal as Doug has made it out to be (he basically said that it broke the band).

The timeline indeed doesn't make sense, but Goldstein isn't generally good with dates (for example, one time he said that Moby was involved in 1994). Slash also played in the HIStory sessions, which was after the scandal broke out. I don't know if this has anything to do with Axl or Goldstein's claims, but Slash did say then that people tried to talk him out of it:

Q: I heard you're going to work with Michael Jackson again, on his next record.
 
Slash: Yes, he asked me to. It was just when the controversy about Michael and those kids had broken out. I know Michael, and I know he's different, but he isn’t capable of doing that kind of thing. So he asked me to do it, and when I told people that I was going to record with Michael, they looked at me in shock and were like, ‘But have you heard about the children? Are you gonna put yourself in the middle of this?’ I told them that I’d heard the stories, but Michael was my friend and I wanted to play with him. So I did three songs for him, but I don’t know which ones will end up on his album, because he does things differently than I do.

https://www.a-4-d.com/t4647-1995-02-dd-popular-1-spain-interview-with-slash

Edited by Blackstar
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Tom Zutaut has also alluded to it:

Zutaut: If Axl would take his greatest press visibility of his career and he would use that to try and save one child's life from sexual abuse, how do you think he would feel about his guitar player playing with a guy who admitted in court documents that he drove to some ten-year-old boy's house and slept with him in the ten-year-old's bed in the room next door to the mom for 168 days in a row? [BBC, "The most dangerous band in the world", 2016]

Edited by Blackstar
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4 hours ago, loke212 said:

Calling Slash "negatively seductive," Rose recalled feeling hurt in his fallout with the guitarist, who left the band in 1996. "I mean, with Slash, I remember crying about all kinds of things in my life, but I had never felt ... hot, burning tears of anger. Basically, to me, it was because I am watching this guy and I don't understand it. Playing with everyone from Space Ghost to Michael Jackson. I don't get it. I wanted the world to love and respect him. I just watched him throw it away."

Yes, I think Axl at one point had a big issue with Slash playing with other people so often in general, especially big names. It's interesting that Matt mentioned it in his book (and he mentioned MJ specifically) as the main reason he thinks Axl wanted to take control of the band. Maybe Axl felt insecure or that there was a plan behind Slash doing that, like that he was trying to establish a career for himself outside GnR (so he wasn't concerned whether GnR would remain successful as much as Axl was) - and with MJ there was the additional issue of the accusations, and the fact that Slash continued playing with him although he knew that Axl was very sensitive about child abuse.

Quote

So Axl definitely did seem to feel very negatively about Michael Jackson (or at least didn't seem to have much respect for him) for quite some time. But more recently, he listed him as one of his favorite singers, so maybe his opinion has changed.

Maybe his opinion changed after MJ was acquitted in court. But, iirc, he mentioned him as one of the singers he thought should be above him in the greatest singers' list, not necessarily as one of his favourites. In any case, I think Axl could always be objective as far as acknowledging someone's talent even if he had personal problems with them (for example, he once said that although he had problems with Johnny Thunders, it didn't have anything to do with his music which he loved), although I guess he wouldn't want to work with them let alone be friends with them.

4 hours ago, loke212 said:

As for Slash, he may have defended MJ a quite a bit in the past, but he didn't actually trust him to get too close to his own son either:

Would you let Michael Jackson meet your children?
Cait, Streatham
I already did! Michael met my eldest, London, when London was one or two years old, at the home of [film producer] Robert Evans, of all places. And no, I didn’t let Michael hold him. No offence to Michael but, at the time, with all that unnerving shit going down, I held on to him tight. You know, I give the benefit of the doubt to Michael on everything – innocent until proven guilty and whatnot – but I was thinking, okay Michael, you figure out your shit and I’ll hold on to my son! But I like Michael a lot, and I enjoyed recording those two albums with him. He’s different.

This is interesting. I hadn't read this Slash interview before.

https://www.uncut.co.uk/features/slash-i-felt-very-proud-that-i-was-part-of-this-grand-lineage-of-english-piss-heads-72283/2/

Edited by Blackstar
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Yikes, that's a weird mindset for Slash to have - to be giving the benefit of the doubt to MJ due to being friends with him, but keeping his son away from him just in case. I get that's it's hard to digest terrible accusations against someone you know, though. 

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13 minutes ago, Nice Boy said:

Yikes, that's a weird mindset for Slash to have - to be giving the benefit of the doubt to MJ due to being friends with him, but keeping his son away from him just in case. I get that's it's hard to digest terrible accusations against someone you know, though. 


With London it would have been in the early 2000’s when that second wave of accusations came... Michael dancing on cars at the courthouse and all that jazz....

Chris Rock : We love Michael so much, we let the first kid slide. I'm fuckin done! What the fuck? Another kid? Another... That's like another dead white woman showing up at O.J.'s house, and O.J. going "I know what you're thinking..." Michael Jackson going to jail. Oh, it's going to be a sad sight when Michael Jackson's going to jail. Oh, we going to shed a tear when Michael Jackson going to jail. We're not going to be sad the day he goes in. We're gonna be sad a month later. When that perm grows out... shits all nappy and gray. His face is all fucked up because it dont got the Crayola people to fix his face nowhere. That's a fuckin sad ass sight.

Edited by Ant
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Call me crazy but I believe around the time of the 2000s allegations I remember reading a quote from slash along the lines of “I love Michael, but until he sorts this out he’s not allowed around my kids” does anybody remember that besides me? So it’s possible his stance on him hardened throughout the years.

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2 minutes ago, The Matinator said:

Call me crazy but I believe around the time of the 2000s allegations I remember reading a quote from slash along the lines of “I love Michael, but until he sorts this out he’s not allowed around my kids” does anybody remember that besides me? So it’s possible his stance on him hardened throughout the years.

 

It's quoted above

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5 hours ago, Blackstar said:

Yes, I think Axl at one point had a big issue with Slash playing with other people so often in general, especially big names. It's interesting that Matt mentioned it in his book (and he mentioned MJ specifically) as the main reason he thinks Axl wanted to take control of the band. Maybe Axl felt insecure or that there was a plan behind Slash doing that, like that he was trying to establish a career for himself outside GnR (so he wasn't concerned whether GnR would remain successful as much as Axl was) - and with MJ there was the additional issue of the accusations, and the fact that Slash continued playing with him although he knew that Axl was very sensitive about child abuse.

Maybe his opinion changed after MJ was acquitted in court. But, iirc, he mentioned him as one of the singers he thought should be above him in the greatest singers' list, not necessarily as one of his favourites. In any case, I think Axl could always be objective as far as acknowledging someone's talent even if he had personal problems with them (for example, he once said that although he had problems with Johnny Thunders, it didn't have anything to do with his music which he loved), although I guess he wouldn't want to work with them let alone be friends with them.

This is interesting. I hadn't read this Slash interview before.

https://www.uncut.co.uk/features/slash-i-felt-very-proud-that-i-was-part-of-this-grand-lineage-of-english-piss-heads-72283/2/

His exact quote: 

"That said, I enjoy Freddie Mercury, Elvis Presley, Paul McCartney, Dan McCafferty, Janice Joplin, Michael Jackson, Elton John, Roger Daltrey, Don Henley, Jeff Lynne, Johnny Cash, Frank Sinatra, Jimmy Scott, Etta James, Fiona Apple, Chrissie Hynde, Stevie Wonder, James Brown and a ton of others (predominantly '70s rock singers) and would rather hear ANY of them anytime rather than me!"

I think him saying "I enjoy" and "would rather hear" implies he does like MJ as a singer and doesn't just think of him as being superior.

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The "this has nothing to do with Michael Jackson" thing is regarding the name of the award, which was renamed the "Michael Jackson Video Vanguard Award" like the year before. 

I don't think it's personal about MJ, I just think it was what he represented as an artist, as he said in the 2000 RS article when talking about Slash. 

PS - Space Ghost (and MJ) are awesome so I have no idea what Axl was talking about

Edit: here's a little clip of MJ mentioning GnR winning the award the year prior: 

 

Edited by Crazyman
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11 minutes ago, Free Bird said:

Don't forget sell-out-Slash did this all for big screen televisions :awesomeface:

Apparently he didn't do it for the TV's, but MJ gave him two of them anyway :lol:

Slash: But there’s another song, called Give In To Me where it’s all my guitar; all my leads and everything. And I’m doing a video with him when I get back from England. But that’s how we met, and now we talk on the phone all the time. He sent me a couple of TV sets. He’s a funny guy, you know, very distant, but very personable. Sometimes I don’t know exactly what his motives are, but when I talk to him he always seems really sincere and I take him at face value. 

https://www.a-4-d.com/t4357-1992-07-dd-guitarist-magazine-gun-law-slash

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Taking into account the quote from Tom Zutaut that I've posted above, I assume that, even if it doesn't consist proof of molestation in itself, hearing that someone was sleeping in the same bed with children could be enough to creep many people out, more so someone like Axl who was sensitive about child abuse.

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Axl's position on Slash working with MJ back then could have had to do with Axl trying to protect the GNR name at a time when it was still kind of uncertain if Michael Jackson was guilty or not as during the first accusations Jackson tried to solve the issue and protect his brand without the legal system that left somewhat of a bitter taste.

Next time Jackson was accused he went all the way through the legal system. I remember the news reporting about it on a daily basis just waiting to slaughter him alive - but eventually he walked out a free man, declared innocent on all charges. Maybe that's when Axl might have somewhat changed his opinion, if it ever even was about Michael Jackson and not about Slash devalutating the exclusivity of the GNR brand by playing with everyone and his dog, even though Jackson was the biggest star on the planet back then and certainly one of the greatest musicians ever. I wonder Axl ever met him in person? Sure would have made for one hell of a vocal duet.

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17 hours ago, cqleonardo said:

Is there any truth to it? I always read that Axl didn't like MJ over the acusations Michael suffered in the 90s and that he got really pissed at Slash because he went to play on Dangerous... But it doesn't make any sense, Dangerous was released in 1991, two years before any acusations. The UYI ended in mid july of 93, the acusations on Michael got public on late august, so GNR wasn't even on the road and I bet Axl and Slash were very far from each other at that point... So, anyone knows if there is any truth to this or the "feud" didn't even existed?

Yes. So let it rest. Some years ago Axl mentioned Michael as one of the singers he enjoyed.

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35 minutes ago, adamsapple said:

Axl's position on Slash working with MJ back then could have had to do with Axl trying to protect the GNR name at a time when it was still kind of uncertain if Michael Jackson was guilty or not as during the first accusations Jackson tried to solve the issue and protect his brand without the legal system that left somewhat of a bitter taste.

Next time Jackson was accused he went all the way through the legal system. I remember the news reporting about it on a daily basis just waiting to slaughter him alive - but eventually he walked out a free man, declared innocent on all charges. Maybe that's when Axl might have somewhat changed his opinion, if it ever even was about Michael Jackson and not about Slash devalutating the exclusivity of the GNR brand by playing with everyone and his dog, even though Jackson was the biggest star on the planet back then and certainly one of the greatest musicians ever. I wonder Axl ever met him in person? Sure would have made for one hell of a vocal duet.

Michael Jackson molested multiple children. We don’t need the court cases to turn out any way to know that.

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