The only people who seem to have consistently adored Guns N Roses Chinese Democracy is Todd Leibowitz and I.
That being the case, only Todd and I are jumping up and down over GNR guitarist DJ Ashba's announcement that Axl has tons of new material just waiting for the studio: "Axl has a lot of great songs up his sleeve. He probably has three albums worth of stuff recorded.The stuff I've heard. I've been up in his hotel room many nights and he just sits down at the piano and plays. I'm like 'this is amazing, people have to hear this song' and he's like "ah, this is something I'm tinkering on."'
Of course, when it comes on the deeply eccentric party animal known as Axl Rose this means something between nothing and less than nothing.GNR were the greatest heavy metal band of the 1980's and maybe of all times.
A quick grade? It should be easy enough:
Appetite For Destruction: A+
GNR Lies: A-
Use Your Illusion Parts I and II: B+
The Spaghetti Incident?: B+
Chinese Democracy: A
I don't care what anybody says and I don't care what it means: Chinese Democracy sounds incredible, never before has a sound this thick, this layered and layered sounded so fast on its feet.It almost literally levitates and swirls on beds of sound, of guitars. And the songs are excellent -everyone is a perfect hard rock construction.
The world got it wrong. They thought because it took Axl nearly a decade and a half to record it was a MAJOR STATEMENT. But since when has Axl been in on the statement gig? The music is the mother fucking message, and always has been. Now, I thought it might suck because of the godawful song on the "Godzilla" soundtrack, but that song wasn't even a dry run; it was an idea but it would take stuff like "I.R.S." to make sense of it.
Incidentally, the band was hard as nails at the Hammersmith Ballroom in 2006(ish). I never saw em when Slash and Duff were in the band but if they were half this good… In 14 years I will be 68 years old… he better not keep me waiting that long….