Original 1992 Version of Ain't Life Grand, "Burnout"

[Homefuck]

22 hours ago, MaskingApathy said:

What song is that?

Also Always On The Run was another song that was scrapped for GnR because Steven couldn't play it.

IIRC slash wrote in his autobiography that he, himself, didn't show the riff to the band because he thought it was to funky for gnr? Maybe he had Steven in mind. Hard to bring a funky Groove and stay in the pocket if you're blitzed out of your mind on blow.

[SoulMonster]

47 minutes ago, Homefuck said:

IIRC slash wrote in his autobiography that he, himself, didn't show the riff to the band because he thought it was to funky for gnr? Maybe he had Steven in mind. Hard to bring a funky Groove and stay in the pocket if you're blitzed out of your mind on blow.

In another interview from 1995, Slash would say Guns hadn't been interested in the riff that ended up as Always on the Run it because it was "too funky", implying he had actually played the riff to them. So it wasn't Slash decided it was too funky for GN'R, it was the band. 

As a rule of thumb, if there is a discrepancy between Slash's book and things he said earlier in interviews, I trust the interviews

More here: (27) 12. JANUARY-JULY 1991: TOURING MAYHEM (a-4-d.com)

[Blackstar]

In 1992 Slash said this (about Always On The Run):

Slash: It was a riff that I wrote. Initially, I mean, I write everything for Guns, you know. And, sometimes, especially when Steve was in the band, some stuff was definitely too funky. And so we just didn’t use it. So now, having Guns play it, I was like, you guys don’t even realize how funny this is (laughs).

And Duff:

Duff: Slash was saying earlier how we didn’t like that song, because he wrote, you know, Always On The Run. [...] The lick, right? [...]  And then he did it with you [=Lenny Kravitz], and the thing is great, you know? So now it’s, “God, why didn’t we do that song?” (laughs)

https://www.a-4-d.com/t3540-1992-06-06-07-mtv-reports-and-interviews-from-paris-slash-duff-matt-gilby

In his book Slash wrote that he had come up with it but didn't think it fit with anything else he was writing at the time: 

As I was warming up in the lounge that day, I played a funky guitar riff that I’d come up with recently but hadn’t found a place for in any of the songs I was working on at the time with Guns. It was just another of my exercises at the time.

“Hey man, what is that?” Lenny asked

“I don’t know …Just something,” I said. “It’s too funky for Guns, but I like it. It’s cool.”

 

 

[SoulMonster]

The occasion where GN'R got to play Always On The Run was of course the June 6, 1992, show in Paris. More about that show here: JUNE 6, 1992: PLAYING PARIS WITH FRIENDS

[Homefuck]

5 hours ago, SoulMonster said:

In another interview from 1995, Slash would say Guns hadn't been interested in the riff that ended up as Always on the Run it because it was "too funky", implying he had actually played the riff to them. So it wasn't Slash decided it was too funky for GN'R, it was the band. 

As a rule of thumb, if there is a discrepancy between Slash's book and things he said earlier in interviews, I trust the interviews

More here: (27) 12. JANUARY-JULY 1991: TOURING MAYHEM (a-4-d.com)

Haha, thanks. That's a Good rule of thumb. He's really inconsistent in his assesments.

[MaskingApathy]

9 hours ago, Blackstar said:

In 1992 Slash said this (about Always On The Run):

Slash: It was a riff that I wrote. Initially, I mean, I write everything for Guns, you know. And, sometimes, especially when Steve was in the band, some stuff was definitely too funky. And so we just didn’t use it. So now, having Guns play it, I was like, you guys don’t even realize how funny this is (laughs).

And Duff:

Duff: Slash was saying earlier how we didn’t like that song, because he wrote, you know, Always On The Run. [...] The lick, right? [...]  And then he did it with you [=Lenny Kravitz], and the thing is great, you know? So now it’s, “God, why didn’t we do that song?” (laughs)

https://www.a-4-d.com/t3540-1992-06-06-07-mtv-reports-and-interviews-from-paris-slash-duff-matt-gilby

In his book Slash wrote that he had come up with it but didn't think it fit with anything else he was writing at the time: 

As I was warming up in the lounge that day, I played a funky guitar riff that I’d come up with recently but hadn’t found a place for in any of the songs I was working on at the time with Guns. It was just another of my exercises at the time.

“Hey man, what is that?” Lenny asked

“I don’t know …Just something,” I said. “It’s too funky for Guns, but I like it. It’s cool.”

 

 

So in that first quote he's kind of implying that Steven couldn't play it, but later on they played it live and Matt handled it just fine.

[SoulMonster]

36 minutes ago, MaskingApathy said:

So in that first quote he's kind of implying that Steven couldn't play it, but later on they played it live and Matt handled it just fine.

Yeah, that Steven was too limited as a drummer was one of the underlying reasons Slash gave for firing him. 

[MaskingApathy]

5 minutes ago, SoulMonster said:

Yeah, that Steven was too limited as a drummer was one of the underlying reasons Slash gave for firing him. 

I've said for years that as Slash and Duff were working on new songs for UYI they secretly realized that they needed a drummer who more technically advanced and could play at a higher level to make the new songs as good as possible, and so when the time came they used his drug problems as an excuse to replace him. Steven was great for AFD but when you listen to the Mates rehearsal tape and others with him playing Locomotive etc you can hear the difference between him and Matt. Matt brought a certain technicality and higher level of musicianship to those songs (some of which were more advanced than what was on AFD). Plus Matt could play the AFD stuff easily. 

[Sweersa]

23 minutes ago, MaskingApathy said:

I've said for years that as Slash and Duff were working on new songs for UYI they secretly realized that they needed a drummer who more technically advanced and could play at a higher level to make the new songs as good as possible, and so when the time came they used his drug problems as an excuse to replace him. Steven was great for AFD but when you listen to the Mates rehearsal tape and others with him playing Locomotive etc you can hear the difference between him and Matt. Matt brought a certain technicality and higher level of musicianship to those songs (some of which were more advanced than what was on AFD). Plus Matt could play the AFD stuff easily. 

Sort of unrelated, but from technical ability on the drums, are Josh and Brain the best GN'R had, then Matt, and finally Steve? Not sure where Frank fits in. My guess between Matt and Steve. 

[MaskingApathy]

31 minutes ago, Sweersa said:

Sort of unrelated, but from technical ability on the drums, are Josh and Brain the best GN'R had, then Matt, and finally Steve? Not sure where Frank fits in. My guess between Matt and Steve. 

Idk about Josh and Brain; Frank can definitely play, the problem is he tries to do too much of his own thing on the classic songs instead of just playing them how they're supposed to be done (like Fitzy does). Imo Matt is the best one they've ever had.

[Free Bird]

Matt is a killer on the drums. His work for GNR, VR and especially for Snakepit is amazing.

[MaskingApathy]

17 minutes ago, Free Bird said:

Matt is a killer on the drums. His work for GNR, VR and especially for Snakepit is amazing.

And Neurotic Outsiders too, great playing on that album.

[SoulMonster]

1 hour ago, MaskingApathy said:

I've said for years that as Slash and Duff were working on new songs for UYI they secretly realized that they needed a drummer who more technically advanced and could play at a higher level to make the new songs as good as possible, and so when the time came they used his drug problems as an excuse to replace him. Steven was great for AFD but when you listen to the Mates rehearsal tape and others with him playing Locomotive etc you can hear the difference between him and Matt. Matt brought a certain technicality and higher level of musicianship to those songs (some of which were more advanced than what was on AFD). Plus Matt could play the AFD stuff easily. 

The main reason given was that Steven's drug use made him incapable of performing in the studio. That's been a pretty consistent explanation given by many people involved. But of course, individual guys might have additional reasons to want to get rid of Steven. Slash seems to have been the one most frustrated with Steven's limitations as a drummer (probably because Slash brought in some riffs that required a different drum approach and got to see this with his own eyes when he and Steven worked together in the studio), while Axl might be the one who on a personal level had the most friction with Steven and could have wanted him gone (they had always butted heads, occasionally literally). In addition, judging from quotes from the period and reading between lines, it seems like most of them started to get a bit fed up with Steven's childlike persona. So when it comes down to is, they probably had different reasons for wanting to replace Steven, but I believe the main reason was -- as they have said -- that Steven got so fried from the drugs he was unable to perform, and that was a huge frustration to them when they finally got around to record UYIs.

More about the various reasons given here: APRIL/MAY 1990: STEVEN IS FIRED

[StrangerInThisTown]

14 hours ago, Blackstar said:

As I was warming up in the lounge that day, I played a funky guitar riff that I’d come up with recently but hadn’t found a place for in any of the songs I was working on at the time with Guns. It was just another of my exercises at the time.

I think he could have fit that into Bad Apples somewhere. But definitely not any other UYI song