Chinese @ 15. Your memories/thoughts - Then and now. Anything Goes.

[colonizedmind]

Happy 15th Birthday Chinese Democracy...

(And 30 years since the last Slash/Duff etc LP)

So, I had thought of doing this thread last week, if no-one else did...but then had second thoughts in light of recent reports, news and threads.  On reflection, I thought, this is exactly the reason to do it....since Oct 26th, it's been quite the steady flow of fairly negative (mostly just) comments and opinions, reacting to unfortunate news such as the last minute nonsensical delay, to Fernando and Axl getting sued and so on. So let's change the narrative, even if just for today! 

A lot of people were on the forum (as posters or lurkers) before and in the lead up to 23/11/08 (or 11/23 if you prefer) so have experienced the mayhem pre, during and now 15 years to the day on....

What did Chinese mean to you, at the time, as it finally released and that period in general? The myth, the legend, the frustration...

What does Chinese mean to you now, 15 years on? Is it like The Beatles White Album, as Bumble would often refer to it being known as a lost masterpiece in the future...

Does the record hold up? Or would you have preferred the '99 version, 2000 intensions or whatever else...

What have you thought of the tracks we've since had officially and unofficially from CD2/3 ....would you have swapped any on CD1? (Taking into account that the demos would be fully realised and mixed like the original LP)

Are you gonna celebrate the milestone today? How?  I'm gonna put the record on front to back and engage with anyone that does that in here too. Listen to Tokyo '09 which basically had the full album live... Plus watch some cherry picked clips from the proshots in 2011/12, topped off with a viewing of Appetite for Democracy 3D.

Was Axl rail-roaded by sussy managers, was he the problem, was it the movement in the industry at the time away from big budget music making money, or was it a combo? 

Anything goes...anything you want to mention about thoughts on that era and what it ended up being. We talk about those times a lot, as we've not had much progress since but I thought why not again, especially on this day...

Right, I'm off to stick CD of CD on...

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chinese_Democracy

Edited November 23, 2023 by colonizedmind

[Stay.Of.Execution]

I remember buying it the day before the official release and being so afraid to put the CD in because the anticipation and the wait for a decade had been so intense, so actually putting the CD into the player and pushing the play button was filled with lots of nervousness. So i couldn't believe i am about to actually listen to this fucker.

It's still a good record, but i rarely listen to it. Some tunes seem kinda dated and it doesnt really have timeless tunes like the records before that. But the whole CD era had been pretty fun and frustrating at the same time.

[Cosmo]

I remember buying it before even being a proper GnR fan, just because I saw it in the store and knew it was "the legendary album that never comes out, and has been in production for more than a decade". I put it in my car and got blown away. Especially when If The World and TWAT played. Became a fan that very day. I still love that album. Don't listen to it that much anymore, or to any GnR album for that matter, but I still consider it one of my favourite albums of all time.

[axl666]

Like the album, though has a lot of songs I don't listen to anymore like irs, scraped or riad. The interesting thing for me was that whole period rather than the album. People had a sense that axl was trying to create something genuinely innovative by bringing in underground guitarists. He was visiting China for inspiration. He was working at all kinds of crazy hours etc. And then the price of the recording session. Also the fact that he became a recluse at the height of his fame.

 

[colonizedmind]

36 minutes ago, Cosmo said:

I remember buying it before even being a proper GnR fan, just because I saw it in the store and knew it was "the legendary album that never comes out, and has been in production for more than a decade". I put it in my car and got blown away. Especially when If The World and TWAT played. Became a fan that very day. I still love that album. Don't listen to it that much anymore, or to any GnR album for that matter, but I still consider it one of my favourite albums of all time.

That's cool....that Chinese made you a Guns fan...you don't hear that entry so often! 👍

[guitarpatch]

Hit Best Buy in LA at opening. This store was one of the flagship music stores that also sold instruments and they’d usually get a lot of promo items/signed items etc.. 

Went in and they had red hand covers in the display. Didn’t grab one. Grabbed the normal cover and vinyl. Thought about it all day and went back after work. They were all pulled 

Edited November 23, 2023 by guitarpatch

[colonizedmind]

26 minutes ago, axl666 said:

Like the album, though has a lot of songs I don't listen to anymore like irs, scraped or riad. The interesting thing for me was that whole period rather than the album. People had a sense that axl was trying to create something genuinely innovative by bringing in underground guitarists. He was visiting China for inspiration. He was working at all kinds of crazy hours etc. And then the price of the recording session. Also the fact that he became a recluse at the height of his fame.

 

We sometimes forgot it was known as the most expensive UNRELEASED album! In terms of released, it's like a 1/3 of what MJ spent on Invincible! 😝 Still, a ton of $$$

2 minutes ago, guitarpatch said:

Hit Best Buy in LA at opening. This store was one of the flagship music stores that also sold instruments and they’d usually get a lot of promo items/signed items etc.. 

Went in and they had red hand covers in the display. Didn’t grab one. Grabbed the normal cover and vinyl. Thought about it all day and went back after work. They were all pulled 

Ahhh gutted. That would fetch a nice sum on the eBay's once upon a time! 

[Cosmo]

2 minutes ago, colonizedmind said:

That's cool....that Chinese made you a Guns fan...you don't hear that entry so often! 👍

Yeah, cause at the time I only knew the most famous songs... like WTTJ, SCOM, PC, KOHD, Patience... I think I didn't even know Nightrain, probably. This album clicked right away and so I started listening to old GnR because of it.

[adamsapple]

The shows I went to mean a lot more to me than the actual album. Met the band, made friends, lived my life. Mostly good memories, some not so good ones too. Anyway, in hindsight none of it really matters. But it seemed to at the time and I guess that's ok.

[pbj_jam]

The only album since that I anticipated and waited for, and it would take literal years until it clicked for me. Helped seeing them in 10'. At this point it has its place among other gnr, I prefer the album over demos, Axl's fingerprint until it was taken away. Overall really solid album, that judging by now, seems almost too plain and safe imo. However for the longest time its a great record over a period of 10years listening to nothing but CD when it came to guns music, its here to stay.

 

What hinders it becoming a white type album is exactly it being dated at release and dumbed down, again imo.

Closing, some of my fav cuts are on that monstrosity.

[Homefuck]

I tried to get into when it came out. It's an ok album. Some really good parts, like the verses in "catcher in the rye", but there's not a song on it that I think holds up from start to finish.

(Ok, maybe TWAT)

[Gimmick]

6 hours ago, colonizedmind said:

We sometimes forgot it was known as the most expensive UNRELEASED album! In terms of released, it's like a 1/3 of what MJ spent on Invincible! 😝 Still, a ton of $$$

Ahhh gutted. That would fetch a nice sum on the eBay's once upon a time! 

Crazy that Invincible and CD were recorded at the same time. There was just a five year period where two albums were eating up at least $40 million 

[colonizedmind]

1 hour ago, Homefuck said:

I tried to get into when it came out. It's an ok album. Some really good parts, like the verses in "catcher in the rye", but there's not a song on it that I think holds up from start to finish.

(Ok, maybe TWAT)

Hmmm....so you feel it's kinda unfinished....like there was something great there but, dare I say it, he needed to work harder on it and write some more melodies and hooks?

[CernakA]

My most favouritealbum from this band, I am fan since UYI.

[megaguns1982]

I liked it back then but now I listen and think it’s a garbled overproduced embarrassing mess.

It simply isn’t a good album.

[Gimmick]

I wish they had of said fuck if and released a double album. I wonder what the story is with the final delay from when the mix was done in early 2007 until final release a year and a half later. Tommy has said that the label “ripped away” the album from Axl “right as he was almost done” without really giving more details.

[lame ass security]

I remember my gf at the time sending me a copy, that's about it.

[there is no dana only zool]

20 minutes ago, Gimmick said:

Tommy has said that the label “ripped away” the album from Axl “right as he was almost done” without really giving more details.

I always thought that quote had to do with the artwork inside.  I mean, Axl himself stated here on MyGNR that it was a work-only draft at the time. 

[BucketEgg]

as someone newer to Guns N Roses, I listened to the entirety of Chinese Democracy before I heard the entirety of AfD, because of the trivia of how long it came to come out.

it was alright.

 

[colonizedmind]

1 hour ago, Gimmick said:

I wish they had of said fuck if and released a double album. I wonder what the story is with the final delay from when the mix was done in early 2007 until final release a year and a half later. Tommy has said that the label “ripped away” the album from Axl “right as he was almost done” without really giving more details.

Well.the back end of Catcher is soo muddy, it was so close to being a modern Axl masterpiece that song....so there's one example. Clearly the songs we know they had and have had since, personally I would of placed some of them on CD...but that's with the benefit of hindsight that CD2 and 3 didn't come (yet! 😉) And that the original plan wasn't necessarily to put all the best/favourite material out first....I love a good alternate timeline....and we are getting closer to being able to fill in the gaps and create our own CD2, probably a couple of years from now, if no official new album, we will be able to create a half decent one with the singles and odds and ends, chuck in an instrumental or two for LL

[colonizedmind]

As I allude to in my OP, it is by chance, also Spaghetti's 30th anniversary today too...no acknowledgement of either by Guns camp...but hey, bigger fish to fry (for them)

[Old_school_gnr_fan]

It's an Axl Rose solo record.

Robert Plant didn't release solo records and call it Led Zeppelin, Don Henley didn't release solo records and call it The Eagles, Mick Jagger didn't release solo records and call it The Rolling Stones.

Gotta have more than one original member on an album, otherwise it's a solo record.

For what it's worth, Chinese Democracy has a few bright spots like There Was A Time and Catcher In The Rye, but otherwise it's generally a letdown. I haven't listed to the full album in about ten years.

[bmus1]

I started really getting into GNR from Hard Skool/Absurd (we do exist!) so this thread has been super cool to read.

I remember when CD came out the title track played a lot on my local classic rock station, and even stayed in the rotation for at least a year. I loved it so much, so I listened to the rest of the album and hated the rest of the songs besides Better. But I was also in middle school. I've come to really love this album 15 years later, but it did take understanding of Axl as a person and musician to fully be taken by it. I kind of think NuGNR is a little too niche of music to be fully appreciated by the general public, but it is done very well for those of us who love it.

[rocknroll41]

I remember buying it the day it came out and showing it to my family. They were all pretty impressed by it. Good times!

I guess that means that today is also the 30th anniversary of TSI, and the 24th anniversary of Live Era. Pretty crazy that it’s already been another 15 year since the last GnR album. I guess this time we at least got the reunion, the AFD and UYI boxes, and an EP’s worth of leftovers.

Edited November 24, 2023 by rocknroll41

[Lies They Tell]

What did Chinese mean to you, at the time, as it finally released and that period in general? The myth, the legend, the frustration...

CD always felt like a very personal record to me, since back in the day I didn't know anyone else who was looking forward to it. Axl's GNR was considered a joke everywhere and it was clear that many people would hate the record no matter what. So I couldn't really share my excitement with anyone. (Except with people online of course.)

What does Chinese mean to you now, 15 years on?

It's still one of my favorite albums.

Does the record hold up? Or would you have preferred the '99 version, 2000 intensions or whatever else...

I mostly prefer the finished songs over the demos. There's maybe a couple of songs that worked slightly better in their earlier forms. Riad for example. That being said I never really listen to the demo versions these days. The finished versions are great.

What have you thought of the tracks we've since had officially and unofficially from CD2/3 

I love all of the songs that they've released. Hard Skool being my favorite, then Absurd and then Perhaps. Not sure how I would rank The General and Monsters. I still prefer those songs as one. CD would definitely be a better record if "If The World" was replaced with Hard Skool. I'd probably trade some other songs too. I actually haven't listened to all of the Village leaks. It was kinda sad that I had already heard most of Chinese Democracy when the record was finally released. So that's why I didn't want to listen to all of the Village leaks. But I listened to some of them. Especially Oklahoma was awesome!

Are you gonna celebrate the milestone today? How?  

Lol, no! I'm not that hardcore of a fan.

Was Axl rail-roaded by sussy managers, was he the problem, was it the movement in the industry at the time away from big budget music making money, or was it a combo? 

Probably a combo. But I don't really care to speculate too much. I'm just happy that we're getting new music slowly but surely.