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Axl & DJ Ashba


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20 hours ago, HollyWoodRose84 said:

TIL would have been an entirely different and in my opinion much better song if recorded with an older lineup. It is one of the more cringeworthy songs for me in the Guns catalog, especially the guitar work. 

Well, we've all seen what Slash did with This I Love in the last 4,5 years... It's higly doubtful your statement... 

Slash with few and far between exceptions did a lame ass job in CD songs... And that includes first and foremost his input on This I Love

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I think Axl was really intent on selling the Ashba thing, because he is well aware how significant the "lead" guitar spot is in GnR. Some sunk cost fallacy stuff, in there. It really is just the fact of the matter that even if he might be a successful songwriter, his chops as a guitarist aren't there and his image was wal-mart emo bret michaels. It just wasn't a fit.

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On 2/2/2021 at 12:05 PM, HollyWoodRose84 said:

Imagine if Slash was the original player on CD and then Ashba was hired to replace him and played the tunes the way he did. Would you still call it butchering?  I think we just have our ears trained to the way a song “should sound” because it was recorded that way on the album. Slash returning showed that the last 7 guitarists (minus Fortus) Axl recorded with and toured with all lacked one thing. 
 

Soul. 

I 100% disagree. I don't think Ashba butchered Finck's parts ... I thought he did a great job ... And soul? Are you serious? Slash has not sounded soulful at all this tour and it's pretty in your face obvious .. It's been discussed here at length .. 

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1 hour ago, Beto 22 said:

Well, we've all seen what Slash did with This I Love in the last 4,5 years... It's higly doubtful your statement... 

Slash with few and far between exceptions did a lame ass job in CD songs... And that includes first and foremost his input on This I Love

To be fair, TIL is cringeworthy to me personally but it’s just my opinion. 

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2 hours ago, 2020_Intensions said:

I 100% disagree. I don't think Ashba butchered Finck's parts ... I thought he did a great job ... And soul? Are you serious? Slash has not sounded soulful at all this tour and it's pretty in your face obvious .. It's been discussed here at length .. 

Sad but true

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On 2/2/2021 at 9:17 PM, JimiRose said:

What is odd is Axl really liked DJ, that was obvious, that metal show, stage connection, Axl even went with Ashba to watch the rolling stones live. Everyone says Axl is incredibly loyal, yet ashba says they no longer talk? Ashba may have officially left, but in reality he was pushed out. When slash was coming back there was no room for Dj no matter what contract axl may or may not have sent. DJ knew that. So maybe Axl isn't this great loyal guy he used to be, or he simply doesn;t consider anyone in the band a real friend, and once they're out the band, they're our of his life.

As for comparisons with Slash, I don't think DJ ever tried to be like Slash. Yes he wore a top hat, but lots of people do. It was nothing like slash's. He didn't play the slash solos as well as slash does live, but his versions of Sorry, This I Love and on Better are waaaay better than the junk paced noodling slash is offering. GnR 2010 Live were much better than the reunion line up. Just tnew(ish) album promotion, Axl still caring and being able to actually sing. Way more energy too. 2016 was ok. 2006 was great. The only thing that can save the current band is a new album. 

I think it's pretty much the norm that once a member leaves a band that they fall out of communication. 

If DJ text Axl I'm sure he'd get a friendly response. I don't think there's much to read into it. However, there is the possibility that Axl realised that DJ was basically using gnr as building block for his own brand and soured on him (he had called out members for doingb the same before). From the outside it seemed obvious what Dj was doing, but it's also possible Axl didn't give shot about any of that.

Like you said, there was no room for a player like DJ in the band with Slash. There was more hope of Bumblefoot as he at least brought a whole other style and level of technique... and there was no hope for him being in the line up (nor did he want the job, and he wasn't offered it).

Edited by Tom2112
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I never really liked DJ Ashba. Something about him just screamed clown. I didn't like Bumblefoot either, but at least he could shred. Ashba was the Wish dot com version of Slash. People wanna say the NITL gang are in it for the "loot," but if anyone was in GNR for the money, it was Ashba, who name-dropped GNR or Axl all the time to push his personal ventures. The guy used GNR every chance he got, right till the end with that BS letter explaining why he left.

I've been to a bunch of live shows, and I don't really see this supposed lack of chemistry between Axl and Slash. 

Edited by GnR Chris
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1 hour ago, Tom2112 said:

Like you said, there was no room for a player like DJ in the band with Slash. There was more hope of Bumblefoot as he at least brought a whole other style and level of technique... and there was no hope for him being in the line up (nor did he want the job, and he wasn't offered it).

Nope. There was no hope for him either. As if Slash would play with someone in his band, who potentially could upstage him (technically). And nothing that Bumblefoot brought is needed in GNR either.

Edited by PatrickS77
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3 hours ago, GnR Chris said:

I never really liked DJ Ashba. Something about him just screamed clown. I didn't like Bumblefoot either, but at least he could shred. Ashba was the Wish dot com version of Slash. People wanna say the NITL gang are in it for the "loot," but if anyone was in GNR for the money, it was Ashba, who name-dropped GNR or Axl all the time to push his personal ventures. The guy used GNR every chance he got, right till the end with that BS letter explaining why he left.

I've been to a bunch of live shows, and I don't really see this supposed lack of chemistry between Axl and Slash. 

He still name drops GnR to promote his stuff. He was, and still is, a clown.

2 hours ago, PatrickS77 said:

Nope. There was no hope for him either. As if Slash would play with someone in his band, who potentially could upstage him (technically). And nothing that Bumblefoot brought is needed in GNR either.

100% that last sentence

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10 hours ago, PatrickS77 said:

Nope. There was no hope for him either. As if Slash would play with someone in his band, who potentially could upstage him (technically). And nothing that Bumblefoot brought is needed in GNR either.

Fortus is better than Slash, technically. Slash said it himself in an interview.

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17 hours ago, PatrickS77 said:

Nope. There was no hope for him either. As if Slash would play with someone in his band, who potentially could upstage him (technically). And nothing that Bumblefoot brought is needed in GNR either.

There's an entire gnr album that needs the stuff a guitar player like Bumblefoot brings. It's not as if those songs aren't played live. I also much preferred gnr as a 3 gtr sound. 

Also Richard is technically superior, so there's that.

Anyway... I did say he wasn't asked and Bumble has stated several times that he wouldn't have wanted the gig, so not sure why you're disagreeing with what I said.

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45 minutes ago, PatrickS77 said:

BS. There is nothing that Fortus would upstage him with.

You can like Slash and still admit that the guy on the other side of the stage is a great player. 

Slash has way more natural charisma, and I obviously prefer his style but sometimes Richard plays nicer solos and upstages Slash! Doesn't mean one is better than the other, it just means that you can't be 'on' every night and that sometimes even a legend can play a stinker of a solo.

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To be fair to Richard, he came to the band at the time when the majority (?) of the CD era songs had already been written. The fact they didn't release a sequel (where his contribution might have been larger) is another thing. Like with all those purported songs that DJ "presented" to Axl, but they never came to fruition. These guys (also BBF) didn't have a big chance of self-fulfillment at that time, did they. 

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On 2/3/2021 at 10:10 AM, Beto 22 said:

Well, we've all seen what Slash did with This I Love in the last 4,5 years... It's higly doubtful your statement... 

Slash with few and far between exceptions did a lame ass job in CD songs... And that includes first and foremost his input on This I Love

The two shows I saw I thought Slash did a great job with TIL, maybe I caught him on two good nights in terms of improv

Honestly I think Slash did a decent job with the CD songs more than he didn't - not that I like all he did with them but I was a fan of his takes on the guitar material on Sorry and CD as well.  Better, I liked the melodies he went for during what used to be Robin's solo, not as much during the Bucket one

TWAT was more mixed, I really liked his more verbatim take at the San Diego show I saw as opposed to other versions I heard

Edited by WhazUp
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Nice to see some appreciation for Dj. Had Dj come along 15-20 years earlier- IMHO he’s the kind of guy that would have gotten attached to one of the big bands in the LA scene [MC/Poison/Guns (instead of Gilby?), etc.], and become a household name- at least for a period of time. He has the looks, just enough chops, and something to offer songwriting-wise. I think Axl recognized that, and sort of enjoyed providing Dj a platform to at least get a little taste of what it would have been like for him had he been on the scene mid/late 80s. Then, as mentioned, there was that brotherhood/kinship Axl seems to develop w/fellow midwestern rockers...

FWIW 2009-2014 Guns was my favorite “non-Slash”-era. Pressure was seemingly off (i.e. more of a “Spend the Evening With Rock Legend Axl Rose”-vibe than trying to continue on as Guns). Joyful- as opposed to mournful (Bucket/Robin-era). It also just happened to be enough past the 80s/early 90s scene that people were ready to look back in a fun/nostalgic way. Casuals I took to those shows had a ball- and loved Dj (still ask about him).

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