Slash interview (Total Guitar)

[Blackstar]

Another new Slash interview in the current (March 2022) TG issue (not officially available online yet, but can be read here).

Not much about new GnR music (basically the same he has said in other interviews) - some interesting stuff about his playing with GnR Vs. SMKC:

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With so much riding on a new Guns N’ Roses album, this is one subject on which Slash remains tight-lipped, stating simply and diplomatically: “We put two songs out already and there’s more stuff coming.”

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How is it different playing your old songs with Guns N’ Roses again versus playing the same songs with Conspirators?

There’s a certain chemistry that Duff, Axl and I have that goes back to the very beginning. That’s the magic ingredient that nobody could necessarily put a finger on what it is. That happens instantly when I’m working with Guns. I have great chemistry with the Conspirators but when we do a Guns N’ Roses song it doesn’t have that particular spark to it. I realised that as soon as we started rehearsing. There really is a magic that happens with that combination of people that is different than doing the same material with Myles, Todd and Brent [Fitz, drums], even though those guys do play the sh*t out of the Guns N’ Roses stuff. As soon as I rejoined Guns I didn’t have that need to play Guns stuff in the Conspirators. We only play one Guns song in the set now. I don’t know what song we’re gonna play this time around. The Conspirators holds up on its own, which is great.

Have you put your own stamp on the Chinese Democracy parts?

Yeah, if there’s a signature part like the hook or something, I want to be recognisable, but the way I go about playing it is probably entirely different from how the original guys played. It’s definitely my own interpretation.

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On Appetite For Destruction was it planned that you an Izzy played variations on the same riffs?

No, it never was. I think playing with Izzy is what started the trend to have one guy playing his main part and the other one playing something off of that. That loose thing was just the way that I play with other guitar players. The other guy does his thing and I do my thing and hopefully the twain meet on the same ground somehow. Izzy was such a unique guitar player unto himself. Everything he did was so simplified that if he had a riff I would take it into another place. My approach to it, inspired by whatever he was doing, would make it a bit more complex or more driving. If I had a riff he would just find an off-the-cuff way of playing it without having to play all the notes. It just worked. There was never much discussion or sitting around working stuff out, and I just never have done since then.

Do you play differently with The Conspirators’ Frank Sidoris compared with current GN’R guitarist Richard Fortus?

I mean, I play the way I play with Richard as well. He just does his thing, so it’s the same dynamic. Some things are a little bit different when it comes to Chinese Democracy stuff. I learned parts from listening to whoever was playing, Bumblefoot or Buckethead. If there’s a particular part, I want to play it to sound like that. Richard would come up and go, ‘Actually, this is how he did it.’ Other than that I mean we just do our thing.