07/31/21 - Hershey, PA - Hersheypark Stadium

[Pedrolg]

9 minutes ago, Towelie said:

Lame analogy.

So Roger Federer is still world class, Axl isn't. If a random guy went into a karaoke bar sounding like Axl did the other night he would be booed and heckled off the mic. He doesn't just sound bad compared to his prime, he sounds bad full stop. No professional singer should let their standards slip to the level where they no longer sound like a professional singer anymore. He sounds dreadful 90% of the time. That's just a fact. If you played this show to anybody who wasn't invested in GNR, they would tell you the brutal truth, that this "singer" simply can't sing.

That. It is not that he sounds bad when compared to 2006 or 2010 or 2016, or that he sounds bad for Axl Rose. He just sounds bad, period, getting booed at  a karaoke bar bad.

He will improve a bit, for sure. The first few shows of a leg are always the worse with Axl. Still, it's the absolute worst starting point for a leg of his career. Up until 2018 we never had those cracks, failure to hit notes or even refraining from attempting to do so. They have been getting worse and more frequent each year. It really seems that he doesn't have much left.

[Popcorn crew]

I agree that Axls voice is at least mediocre karaoke level but I will be able to deal with it live cause crowd is actually singing along so his voice is not in focus.

But boring setlist with covers and overextended songs is lame. In 2 and half hours we have at least 1 hours of covers or song extentions. Boring as hell.  

[TheSlashrose]

Terrible show. The band is lost 

[WhazUp]

1 hour ago, kiwiguns said:

We on this forum are the minority and the majority are the causal fans, who aren't picking apart Axls vocals or the bands set list to cater towards those vocals. 

 

Yeah well people still buy tickets to see Bob Dylan and his vocals sound like he gargled razorblades for 30 years so should we say nothing because hey, the people who just want to get drunk and see a live show dig it?

Edited August 3, 2021 by WhazUp

[ohmygod]

I think we’re all being a bit too harsh… 

 

First show in over a year, no warm up shows… let’s wait this out a bit before we get the pitchforks out.

[Powderfinger]

3 minutes ago, ohmygod said:

I think we’re all being a bit too harsh… 

 

First show in over a year, no warm up shows… let’s wait this out a bit before we get the pitchforks out.

Just wait till the 70-80 year old rolling stones have the opening night on their tour. It’ll open your eyes....

[ohmygod]

2 minutes ago, WhazUp said:

To be fair, we have waited it out since 2017 and things are just getting worse lol

The last time GNR came out firing on all cylinders to open things up was the NYC shows in 2006. It’s par for the course for the first shows of a tour to be a little more reserved.

 

Remember how cynical everyone was around here after the first shows in 2009?! Then 2010 turned out to be one of the best yet.

[WhazUp]

1 minute ago, ohmygod said:

Remember how cynical everyone was around here after the first shows in 2009?! Then 2010 turned out to be one of the best yet.

I really hope to be wrong, but considering 2010 was 11 years ago and Axl has not shown anything 2016-esque since 2016 itself, it is hard to be optimistic on this one

[SoNobodyToldYaBaby]

1 hour ago, Padme said:

Nobody is asking Axl to go back to 1990. But he did a lot better back in 2016. That's the problem. He is not the Axl we got just a couple of years ago. Do you think that AC/DC would hire him now?

2016 is 5 years ago. Hes 59. The songs are hard to sing. I think he blew out the remainder of his voice doing Axl/Dc and this is pretty much as good as it can get for old Axl now.

[NicDwolfwood]

oh boy, video of this show are tough to watch. This may have trumped Bridgeschool, Rio '17 and Berlin '18. Axl's voice was  struggling to even hit screaming parts as early as ISE.  He's awfully close to Vince Neil levels of bad singing, like he has to skip lines now he can't keep up.. My god, NR I don't think he sang lines in the same pitch or tone twice. 

I guess if there is a semblance of optimism it's that he may improve a bit as he sings more shows......Or not and this is truly his voice on its last legs. 

Edited August 3, 2021 by NicDwolfwood

[stezmacc]

Just watched YCBM and Dead Horse videos from this gig and it was hard to watch. There was obviously sound issues as he is constantly talking in the in ear mic during guitar parts and pointing at something ? the monitors? but its sad to see him struggling on these songs. I don't understand why they don't just drop the faster songs from the set and add in slower songs where he doesn't have to scream along all the time. Bad Obsession, Pretty Tied up, Move To The City would be good replacements? even if they just rotated the songs every night would probably help. You can see he was doing his best to hit the notes but it was just not happening. Hopefully as the tour goes on things will improve. Im going to the London show next July so hope he does't burn himself out before then?

[DefinitelyInThisLifetime]

It’s not the worst show ever ever.

 

But it was close. Tried to listen to “highlights” and had to turn them off. My ears thanked me.

[El Guapo]

Unlistenable, all of it. He can't charge money for that, it's criminal. Dead Horse was the saddest thing I've seen/ heard in a long time. Just wow.

[Swedish]

What a train wreck of a show… I was up working all night so I had a stream going in the background. Like I wrote on here before the forum shut down, I think the first few songs sounded pretty good. It sounded like Axl sang with more power behind his clean voice, but all that ended about halfway through You’re Crazy. From Rocket Queen onwards it was a mess vocally, to the degree that YCBM and November Rain were unlistenable. I’m not saying that to be an asshole, I can not in any way, shape or form enjoy those songs sounding like that no matter how good the instrumentation behind the vocals are…

I have to say that I honestly feel bad for Axl, he has obviously put in work to loose some weight, he was pretty talkative in the early parts of the show, he was running around trying to get the crowd going and most importantly, he was visibly trying to reach for higher notes and to use his rasp but his voice failed him time and time again. 

Like others have mentioned before, there seems to have been some technical difficulties with the show so hopefully some of the negative aspects of this show will disappear as the tour moves on but I’m skeptical if they’ll even reach 2019-levels at this point…

Also: MASSIVE lol at the fact that Silkworms seem to be on the alts? I pray to whatever god is up there that it’s either a fake and/or another song that happens to be called Absurd. 

[Tom2112]

1 hour ago, ohmygod said:

I think we’re all being a bit too harsh… 

 

First show in over a year, no warm up shows… let’s wait this out a bit before we get the pitchforks out.

Nope. First show in over a year, and instead of preparing the lazy prick decided to do nothing and sound so horrible I needed to cleanse by listening to rio 2011. This was just bad from no matter what angle you decide to look at it from.

Maybe if you were utterly thrashed drunk this was a good show, but if you were honestly listening it couldn't be.

This idea that it's acceptable for Axl so come on stage and try and figure things out as he goes is unacceptable. Listen to dead horse, November rain he couldn't even sing the full lines. Completely underprepared.

[Dean]

With the forum being down, I was able to digest any disappointment at the band not unveiling new music to the crowd. There was apparent sound issues for the duration of the show, which ultimately caused them to wrap up earlier than what they would normally and, it made me reflect back to my own experience at a show that was plagued with issues that were similar - Berlin. Guns had put out a "brand new single" out that was doing well, so I was expecting them to play Shadow of Your Love, as that's what bands do when they release singles. Ultimately, the issues were severe enough that Axl's vocal delivery wasn't what it was the previous year and ultimately the show was cut short with no sign of Shadow of Your Love. People speculated that Axl was underprepared, but it really did seem as if there was sound issues, as mentioned a few times throughout the show.

I was up front, and could see Axl singing but with no sound coming out of the speakers, he made note that it was as if he was singing underwater etc, and I very much believe this is the case from their show at Hershey Stadium. The rehearsals, he seemed to be in similar form as to the last couple of years (he's shed some amount of timber from his last show - fair fucks to him) but obviously the show didn't replicate that. Shadow was eventually played live at the following show following Berlin, so there's every chance Hardschool (or Hard Skool (?!)) could make it's debut when these issues aren't widespread?

I mentioned elsewhere about a smaller set could eliminate a lot of complaints that are voiced within the community and wouldn't be as taxing on Axl vocally either if he were to play just over 2 hours each night instead of 3. It allows more of the songs to be rotated to eliminate the supposed stale set lists etc and they could maybe skim a few dollars off of the ticket prices too. Just my two cents.

TL;DR - new music being played live = soon…? That setlist with Absurd on it has to be BS.

[dgnr]

Hey! I'm kinda glad the forum was down, cause otherwise we would be seeing huge meltdowns in this thread. So let’s vent now, shall we?

What to say? Seriously. It was the worst performance by Axl since the Golden Gods back in 2014 or whatever.

He was constantly out of breath, struggling in every single song, he didn't sing half of YCBM, he fucked up the tempos, he skipped lyrics, Mickey showed up for all the songs, but not his regular Mickey, it was like Mickey with pneumonia. Even Slash was all over the place, noodling like crazy, sometimes even out of key.

It was pretty clear that the band was playing intros here and there to accommodate Axl, so he could take multiple breaks. The setlist was shortened because he simply couldn't sing more. Glad they started the Iggy cover when they did because if Axl sang  anything right after YCBM he would definitely faint on that stage.

It was sad, it was really, really sad. In the IG live one could hear people laughing during November Rain. We all know how this goes - he'll probably get better as the tour goes - but yesterday was rock bottom for him. I can't wrap my head around how can he be so unprepared after an almost 2 year break. What a disgrace 

Edited August 3, 2021 by dgnr

[Tom2112]

6 minutes ago, Dean said:

With the forum being down, I was able to digest any disappointment at the band not unveiling new music to the crowd. There was apparent sound issues for the duration of the show, which ultimately caused them to wrap up earlier than what they would normally and, it made me reflect back to my own experience at a show that was plagued with issues that were similar - Berlin. Guns had put out a "brand new single" out that was doing well, so I was expecting them to play Shadow of Your Love, as that's what bands do when they release singles. Ultimately, the issues were severe enough that Axl's vocal delivery wasn't what it was the previous year and ultimately the show was cut short with no sign of Shadow of Your Love. People speculated that Axl was underprepared, but it really did seem as if there was sound issues, as mentioned a few times throughout the show.

I was up front, and could see Axl singing but with no sound coming out of the speakers, he made note that it was as if he was singing underwater etc, and I very much believe this is the case from their show at Hershey Stadium. The rehearsals, he seemed to be in similar form as to the last couple of years (he's shed some amount of timber from his last show - fair fucks to him) but obviously the show didn't replicate that. Shadow was eventually played live at the following show following Berlin, so there's every chance Hardschool (or Hard Skool (?!)) could make it's debut when these issues aren't widespread?

I mentioned elsewhere about a smaller set could eliminate a lot of complaints that are voiced within the community and wouldn't be as taxing on Axl vocally either if he were to play just over 2 hours each night instead of 3. It allows more of the songs to be rotated to eliminate the supposed stale set lists etc and they could maybe skim a few dollars off of the ticket prices too. Just my two cents.

TL;DR - new music being played live = soon…? That setlist with Absurd on it has to be BS.

Maybe there were sound issues, but that still doesn't explain he sounded that bad. By far the worst NV I've heard. And I've heard some god awful versions. 

IF the sound was so poor then the pro thing to do was say "we need 10 minutes to sort out our monitors, I can't hear anything".

[slim26]

Not to be an asshole....   but I agree with all who suggest Axl's voice is truly shot and probably would benefit from some surgery.  However, as long as this band can continue raking in cash and getting people to cough up more cash to see them again, no way he's ever going to do that - he doesn't seem to care or grasp the fact that he just sounds awful.

I think if the cash started drying up, instead of improving the product they are selling,  they'll resort to guest appearances by Steven, Izzy, or even Teddy big-bag zig-zag, the Greek on the harmonica, before Axl would ever consider dramatically improving his vocals.

[Dean]

4 minutes ago, Tom2112 said:

Maybe there were sound issues, but that still doesn't explain he sounded that bad. By far the worst NV I've heard. And I've heard some god awful versions. 

IF the sound was so poor then the pro thing to do was say "we need 10 minutes to sort out our monitors, I can't hear anything".

Was the show overall as poor as Berlin? The issues seemed really similar and so did the vocal performance, which makes me lean toward Axl getting back on form soon enough, which was the case following Berlin. Is NV November Rain? I really don't think that's sounded good since 2002, at least vocally, but Rio 2011 wins the 'worst ever' for me. Shit show from start to finish. 

[jamillos]

They did seem to have a lot of technical issues… this band seems to be cursed with technical issues and sound problems. 
One would think that in all the years, a professional management would have sorted it out by now. 
Oh wait… 

[vloors]

10 minutes ago, Dean said:

Was the show overall as poor as Berlin? The issues seemed really similar and so did the vocal performance, which makes me lean toward Axl getting back on form soon enough, which was the case following Berlin. Is NV November Rain? I really don't think that's sounded good since 2002, at least vocally, but Rio 2011 wins the 'worst ever' for me. Shit show from start to finish. 

This was worse than Berlin. The cracks, random missing of lines, he struggled even singing Mickey.

[Swedish]

11 minutes ago, Dean said:

Was the show overall as poor as Berlin? The issues seemed really similar and so did the vocal performance, which makes me lean toward Axl getting back on form soon enough, which was the case following Berlin. Is NV November Rain? I really don't think that's sounded good since 2002, at least vocally, but Rio 2011 wins the 'worst ever' for me. Shit show from start to finish. 

I would say that the show was pretty on par with Berlin. Like you mentioned, I'm hoping a lot of the technical issues gets sorted out for the next show and that that will improve the show but I'm not sure about that.

[Stress Fracture]

The weird thing about Axl now missing out entire lines is that he still does unnecessary ad libs and more singing than he needs to in other places. Like he doesn’t need to sing badly over Slash at the start of Paradise City or do that higher repeat of Nightrain’s opening lines.

Not to mention he certainly didn’t need to struggle through the Dead Horse chorus in the middle of the solo. That wasn’t down to his voice or age, that was down to him treating this opening night as a rehearsal. Again.

[Dean]

3 minutes ago, youngswedishvinyl said:

I would say that the show was pretty on par with Berlin. Like you mentioned, I'm hoping a lot of the technical issues gets sorted out for the next show and that that will improve the show but I'm not sure about that.

The rehearsals, from the little we heard, he didn't sound any worse than what he did over the last three years, especially on Jungle, but come show day, it was a different story all together, sadly.