106. Axl Is Tardy In Uniondale, NY

Where’s Hitler?
We were due on forty minutes ago.

Fucked if I know, bro.
What we gonna do?

Damn, I tired of this shit.
It’s every other night.

I know, I know.
It’s like we’re his hired hands.

Can you hear them out there?
Those kids paid good money.

We do what we always do.
Sit tight, do shots, give him ten minutes.

Damn, I tired of this shit.
It’s every other night.

I know, I know.
It fucking sucks.

We’re going to have to open
with a blues jam again.

I know, I know.
It fucking sucks.

I mean, imagine Zep opening
with ‘Bonzo's Montreux’?

Ah, fuck it. We’re here aren’t we?
And those fuckers are wasted.

True, true. We could fart on the mics
and they’d still give us gold discs.

Ha! Yeah. What are you going do.
Hey, let’s have some vodka.

Hell yes. Shoot, line them up.
It’s going to be a long night.

Los Angeles, California (warm up)
New York, New York (warm up)
East Troy, Wisconsin
Noblesville, Indiana
Grove City, Ohio

105. Slash Immortal

I don’t fear death.

Death is there to be ignored.
Death is there to be challenged, defeated.
Death is there to be beaten in an arm wrestle

a card game, Russian Roulette, a rusted needle,
whatever.

He’ll let you know when it’s your time sure enough.
In the meantime, why let it concern you?
No. I don’t let death bother me.

If anything I gently mock it.
I prod it and it feels pliable
I shake it between my teeth

I face it with bemusement
but I don’t fear it.

104. Johnny Thunders

They found his body
beneath the bed
bent double like a discarded
paper clip
in a New Orleans flop-house.

Tell the people:
the original NY Doll
the Heartbreaker
the gypsy king who was born too loose
is dead and gone.

Rigor mortis set in and
so did the conspiracy theories.
The roaches were out the wood-work
each with a different version of the same story.
But all I know is

when they carried
out his pale corpse
the body bag was
three feet in length;
and all his guitars were gone.

It’s true what he said:
‘You Can’t Put Your Arms Around A Memory’
but believe me, that night,
high or straight,
each of us tried.

103. Police Escort

It takes sixteen cops cars with sirens
blaring and blue lights spinning to
get us out through the crowds and back
to our hotel twenty miles away.

We all share a dark chuckle about this:
about how the cops are protecting us
from the people, rather than the other
way round. It makes for a nice change.

102. Guns N Roses Mark II: Matt Sorum Debuts In Rio

Unless you’ve been told at three minutes notice you got
to do a drum solo in front of 140,000 people with a
band who’ve never even rehearsed together, you don’t
know the meaning of the phrase ‘in at the deep end’.

101. Tour Prep (May 1991)

Slash calls me up
freaking out yelling
something about blood
something about goblins
incoherent, the ramblings
of a feral man who suddenly
finds he has no reason to
leave the house.

In the background I can
hear what sounds like
a girl laughing or maybe
she’s screaming
or maybe he’s just
playing a porno
on his new widescreen
home cinema.

It’s funny that Slash
has a home cinema
because he doesn’t
have a bed and he
doesn’t have a fridge,
just dozens of snakes.
He keeps his drinks and
frozen mice in an ice bucket.

But I’m done laughing
at Slash’s antics right now
so I dish it to him straight:
Dude, you have to clean up your act
the tour starts in three days
that’s just enough time to detox
the kids have paid good money -
yada yada, the usual spiel.

I really give it to him actually:
you wanna end up like Johnny,
washed-up and strung out to dry
at twenty-five? You wanna be like
Janis, Jimi and Jim man, another
H-wood r ‘n’ r victim, “Fuck yeah,”
he gurgles. “Totally!” then I hear
what sounds like breaking glass

I’m sitting there thinking maybe
an intervention is the only way,
how it won’t be the first time one of us
is dragged kicking and screaming to rehab
in readiness for a stint on the road
when I notice it’s all gone quiet.
I figure maybe Slash has fallen through
his coffee table or something.

I figure there’s no point trying to
talk someone down when they’re reaching
the zenith of a five-day weekend
so I call up management and tell them
that our guitarist needs patching up
and of course they say “which one?”
and I say “the one with the hat – the one
they’re calling the best of his generation”

and the girl who works over there,
the girl who answers the phones
she says to me – get this – she says
wait a second, who’s calling please?
and I say: It’s Axl, sweetie
and she’s like, Oh, OK…Axl who?
and I’m like, it’s Axl Foley from Beverley Hills Cop
who the fuck you think it is?

And while all this is going on
at home Slash is rolling around in shards of glass
laughing and gurgling and trying to get his
zippo to work so he can fire up another pipe
and though I’d dearly love to fire his ass
the fucker has a habit of bouncing back
from these drug jags and either way
another world tour starts in seventy-two hours.

100. Illusions: The Final Cut

Bad Apples
Bad Obsession
Back Off Bitch
Breakdown
Civil War
Coma
Dead Horse
Double Talkin’ Jive
Don’t Cry (Original)
Don’t Cry (Alt. Lyrics)
Don’t Damn Me
Dust N’ Bones
Estranged
14 Years
The Garden
Garden Of Eden
Get In The Ring
Knockin’ On Heaven’s Door
Live And Let Die
Locomotive
My World
November Rain
Pretty Tied Up
Perfect Crime
Right Next Door To Hell
Shotgun Blues
So Fine
Yesterdays
You Ain’t The First
You Could Be Mine

Now let’s go
tour this shit.

99. Axl Leaves A Series of Messages

Hey, it’s Axl.

Listen. I’ve
got the title.

Are you
ready? OK:

Use Your
Illusion.

Pretty cool
isn’t it?

That shit’s timeless,
right there.

And so long as
everyone from

David Geffen
to the band

to the fucking
lighting guy

does exactly
what I say

I think that this
is going to be

awesome.

98. Matt The Drummer Corners Axl Rose In The Studio Parking Lot

- Hey Axl.
- Hey bro. What can I do for you?
- Nothing. I just thought I’d say what’s up?
- Cool, brother. You want an autograph or something?
- Autograph?
- Sure. Should I make it out to you, uh…?
- Matt.
- Excuse me?
- I’m Matt.
- Sorry, bro. Hey, you look really familiar. Have we met before?
- Um, dude. I’m your drummer.
- Shoot! Sorry, man. I’m a little fried right now. It’s the album. Too long in the studio. I’m leaving right now, but you should swing by sometime.
- I did. But, you know, security wouldn’t let me in.
- Did you call ahead?
- No. Management said it would be fine.
- Always call ahead. It’s kind of a rule.
- Even for the band?
- Only for the band.
- OK. So, um, do you need me to come do my drum parts.
- Nah.
- No?
- Nah.
- How come?
- It’s in hand. Don’t you worry about it. You know, I don’t want to hex it or anything, but I really think this is a classic album we’ve made together. Good vibes. You know?
- Right. I mean, I’d love to hear it.
- Dude, you totally will. All being well, it’s being released next September.
- I don’t get to hear it beforehand?
- Better not.
- Why not?
- Dude, I can’t just go playing it to anyone. It might get bootlegged, then I’d have to take out a bunch of law-suits.
- But I am…you know, kind of in the band.
- So? I’m in the band too, but I don’t hassle you about your drumming.
- Sure, sure bro. But, I mean, you’ve not actually heard me drum yet.
- That’s cool.
- So you’ll let me hear it?
- Nah.
- OK. I mean, if you don’t mind me asking, when do we get to jam?
- I’ll let you know bro. Just sit tight and wait for the call.
- You told me that six months ago, guy.
- I did? Are you sure?
- Definitely.
- Are you working right now?
- Only for you.
- Cool, cool. Well, you know, maybe you might want to think about getting a little part-time work.
- Won’t that look a little funny though? I mean, I am in Guns N Roses: the worlds’ biggest rock band.
- And baddest. You forgot baddest.
- I mean, I’m in Guns N Roses: the world’s biggest and baddest rock band.
- You are? Oh, right, yeah – the drummer! Sorry. I keep forgetting. I’m a little fried right now. It’s the album. Too long in the studio. Um. So can you play drums?
- Sure. I’m the best in the business. I eat drums for breakfast.
- Great. Congratulations then dude, you’re in.
- In?
- The band. You’re in Guns N Roses, dude! Welcome to the brotherhood. How do you feel?
- Pretty good…I guess.
- Awesome.
- So when do we get to jam?
- Soon, dude. Soon. Any day. I’ve just got about ninety-odd songs to finish off first. Then we’ll do some shows. That cool?
- I...I guess.
- Awesome. Nice talking to you Mitch. See you around dude. Keep living the dream.

97. Love Thy Neighbour

“Rock star Axl Rose put on a personalised leather jacket
as he left jail for freedom in the early hour of today.

The lead singer of the rock band Guns N’ Roses allegedly
slammed a wine bottle into a woman neighbours’ head.

“I live next door to a psycho,” said Rose.

Rose and 37 year old Gabriella Kantor both live on the
twelfth floor of this condominium in West Hollywood.

Deputies say Rose confronted Cantor in a hallway, threw
her keys over his balcony and then hit her with the bottle.

Cantor called the sheriff’s department and paramedics
took her to the medical center. She was treated for bruises

and then released three hour later, coincidentally about
the same time Rose’s manager posted $5000 bond securing

his release from jail. Rose delights in maintaining a
‘bad boy’ image. Profanity is part of his act, and not

just on stage - he also cursed on a live national television
music awards programme. Axl Rose, chauffered away

is to appear in Beverley Hills municipal court, November 19.”


(Extracts from NBC News Report, October 31 1990)

96. Dizzy Speaks

Man, it sure would be
great to meet Axl.

95. Slash Works With Dylan

I grew up on Dylan
but, man, what a drag.

He was just this weird little
guy who looked like an
Eskimo, dressed in a wool
sweater, leather gloves and
a baseball cap even though
it was 90 out. He was also
really impolite and there’s
nothing I hate more than that.

After I’d recorded my solo
he took it off the record anyway
because apparently – I quote –
“it sounds too much like
Guns N Roses.” Yeah? And?
Nah, I didn’t dig Dylan at all.
But, you know, maybe he was
just having one of those days?

94. Back In The Studio

Late – about 8am.
Snakes in my arms.
Pins in my eyes.

Words on scraps of
paper scattered
at my bare feet.

Honey, hot water,
six sliced lemons
and a baby grand.

A pair of cans
around my neck
like a noose.

“Don’t worry,” says
a disembodied voice
from the control room:

“We’ll straighten
it all out
in the mix.”

93. Matt and Dizzy Learn The Way Of The Rose

I guess we’re making a quadruple album?
I mean, that’s what we read in Spin.

‘G n R Frontman Unveils Ambitious
Plans For Two Double Albums’

“I’ve got 652 songs demo’d, I just
need to teach the band them,”

is what it said, so I guess that’s what
we’re doing. Just waiting for the call.

It’s cool because I get to go cycling in the hills
a lot more and Dizzy has his water-colours.

But, you know, it would be kinda cool to,
like, you know, jam some tunes or something.

At the moment being in Guns just means
sitting around eating steak frites and watching TV.

Which is actually kind of like my life before I joined
the band, only the TV is bigger, and I have a boss now.

I guess we’ve just got to sit tight and be ready to
rock that shit, right Dizz? Dizz? He’s nodded off.

92. D-I-V-O-R-C-E

I was crazy about this girl;
for four years it was L-O-V-E, love.

I was a 24 year old hungry nothing
she a 19 year old model-slash-angel

two lost kids with
fuck-ups for parents.

She’s the chick I wrote
Sweet Child O’Mine for.

She’s the chick I quit drugs for
the chick I washed my clothes for.

One day I’m so overwhelmed, so consumed
by passion, I propose without thinking

I say to her, if you don’t marry me Erin
I’ll blow my brains out right now.

And she’s laughing and going, ‘Oh yeah? What with?
A hair-dryer?’; and though her sarcasm makes her cuter

and I’m laughing along too, deep down she knows I’m
packing, deep down she knows I’m serious about this

so a few days later we drive to the desert and have
ourselves a good old crummy Vegas shotgun wedding

in some tacky joint called the Cupid Wedding Chapel
somewhere just off The Strip at 4am.

We spend the wedding night shooting craps,
ordering beluga from room service and fucking noisily.

It was a time, man, but even then the arguments
were already commonplace; drunk, dumb shit

with lots of screaming and hurling of household
objects – just like all regular kids in love, you know?

But this girls, she’s a ball-breaker,
always all up in my shit so’s that sometimes

I can’t breath, can’t move, can’t think
and one day she’s cleaning my CDs

and I just snap: back off bitch – leave now
before I turn your ass out to the gang-bangers.

I mean, this chick made me feel like OJ
and all’s I knew was I didn’t want to see

myself on Fox News one day heading a
dumb-ass 20mph hour live TV car chase.

We reconciled, fought, reconciled again;
a spin-cycle of love and hate. I guess sometimes

my temper got the better of me.
When that red mist descended

like a curtain after an encore
I guess maybe I lashed out on occasion

but, you know, you got to understand
I was fronting the world’s biggest rock band.

I had big deals going down, people to keep in line,
songs to write, people to hire, people to hire.

When she miscarried I knew it was over.
The children in us were still best friends

but the adults had taken over, soured the mood,
spoiled the party. Everything was corrupt.

Everything was corrupt and everything was rotten;
everything had gotten crazy. We nearly killed those

crazy spirits that brought us together
but in the end it just couldn’t work.

Eight months later I had that shit annulled.
Filed for divorce and got myself a new girl.

91. Slash’s Morning After The Night Before

My whole body
is
just a big bruise.

90. Slash and Duff Get Very Drunk At The American Music Awards

So we’re slamming the
free drinks and we’re feeling
pretty damn good with
vodka, whisky and big gins
warming our bellies
All the greats are there:

Bobby Brown
Milli Vanilli
New Kids
Abdul
Hammer
Arsenio hosting

and suddenly they’re calling
out our names:
“…And the Favorite Heavy Metal/Hard Rock Artist
Awards goes to…Guns N Roses!”
and the sea of bodies parts and
and we’re walking on jelly legs

up to the stage
holding hands
high as kites
drunks as lords
chuckling like school kids
feeling like the dorks

that crashed the prom night
and suddenly everyone
is looking at us
and Slash, God bless him,
is rocking the mic, like
“God we didn’t even expect this

Hey, come down and
hang out at the show…
and shit!” and we’re
drinking champagne
and then we’re getting
called back up again

“…and the Favorite Heavy Metal/Hard Rock Albums
Awards goes to Guns N Roses
for Appetite For Destruction”
and now we’re feeling cocky
and full of love so we’re thanking
people from the heart and

when you speak from the heart
you don’t censor yourself
so we’re liberal with our curse words
but in a nice friendly warm way
and we’re wrestling over the mic
because we’re real

and it’s funny
and we’re high
and we’re G n R
and afterwards it’s some big deal
on the news and shit
and those fuckers

never broadcast live again.
It was as funny as shit
and obviously the record
keeps selling and selling
and selling
and selling.

89. Diz Meets Iz

“Hi Izzy
I’m Dizzy.”

“Um. Dude, sorry.
This isn’t going to

work. We sound
like a fucking

clown troupe
or something.”

88. Enter Matt And Dizzy

Hi, I’m Matt.
I’m the new drummer

the new tubthumper

and that there is Dizzy
he’s playing keys

the other new guy.

I’d love to chat
but we signed stuff

we’re sworn to secrecy, bro.

Anyway. We just
want to rock.

So let’s rock. Whoop!

87. Adler's Take

I get fired by
four drug addicts
for taking drugs
how whack is that?

86. Exit Adler

Axl fired his ass.
He and management gave
Him multiple warnings:

curb your addictions, they said
‘cos every time you show up high
we’re fining you two thousands bucks

but still he kept showing up high
so they called him in, got him to sign
something, then fired his ass.

Where were the rest of us?
I don’t know. Getting high
somewhere else probably.

That’s the thing, you see. Steven’s a
goofy guy, a puppy dog. I guess he just
couldn’t handle the concept of discretion.

85. Valley Girl

The valley girl is a
follower not a leader
the second tier
on the demographic chart;

the all-important floating voter, the
leg-warmer share holder
deely bopper-sporter
retainer-wearer
shitty hand-job giver
Corvette-driver
paternal manipulator
Pac-Man player
social-slummer
prick-teaser
pill-popper
peroxide-abuser
snatch-shaver
drugs-sharer
wine-barfer
cum-spitter
music-hater
jail-baiter
butt-fucker
heart-breaker

between us
we must have
had hundreds
of them

and sold
albums to
millions
more

they’re all in the suburbs now
a different demographic now
rich from their real estate husbands
bored from a lack of ambitions
never needing
always buying
the proverbial
pill popper
dildo-fucker
Botox-buyer
Compulsive-spender
pool-paddler
Lexus-driver
gossip-giver
cum-swallower
cookie-baker
sex-swinger
gin-drinker
canasta-player
therapy-dweller
divorce-seeker
alimony-chaser

you see porn sites
devoted to them -
things like Soccer Moms and
Moms I’d Like To Fuck

and driving round the Valley today
I wonder how many have
had a Guns dick inside
them at some point

and I wonder if any
of their blue-eyed
fucked-up kids
belong to me.

84. Slash Responds To The Critics

Life's a bitch.
Gimme a beer.

83. 'One In A Million'

“Immigrants and faggots, they make no sense to me,
They come to our country and think they'll do as they please,
Like start some mini Iran, or spread some fucking disease,
They talk so many goddamn ways, it's all greek to me.”

Jesus. You only have to ask Elton or Freddie,
God rest his soul. They’d tell it you straight
out (no pun intended). I like faggots….but I
couldn’t eat a whole one, ha, ha! But seriously,

I’ve had some bad experiences with homos
in the past, diddling with me when I was kid
and what-not. And all that N-word stuff, man,
to all the haters I say: lighten up. I was making

a serious point about racism and prejudice
and the way all y’all reacted just proved my
point: that the world is fucked up, but maybe,
just maybe, if we all open our hearts and our minds

one day all the fags and the blacks and the
other afflicted minorities will join together
with the real Americans to fight terror together
and party on down to the music of G n’ F’ n’ R

and then I’ll be able to sit back and survey the
black dudes fucking the white hos and the fags
blowing each other’s poles and I’ll smile and
I’ll be like, ‘I guess my work here is done’”.













(Lyrics from ‘One In A Million’ by Guns N Roses, picture by Sexton Ming)

82. Axl Calls Up The Guy From Kerrang! At Midnight And Rants About Something That No-One Cares About

“I can’t believe this shit I just read in Kerrang!...

“‘The interviewer asks Vince Neil about him throwing
a punch at Izzy backstage at the MTV awards last year,
and Vince replies ‘I just punched that dick and broke
his fucking nose! Anybody who beats up on a woman
deserves to get the shit kicked out of them.
Izzy hit my wife, a year before I hit him.’

Well, that’s just a crock of shit. Izzy never touched
that chick! If anybody tried to hit on anything, it was
her trying to hit on Izzy when Vince wasn’t around.
Only Izzy didn’t buy it. So that’s what that’s all about....

But this bit, man, where Vince says our manager, Alan Niven,
wasn’t around, and that afterwards he walked straight
past Izzy and me and we didn’t do a thing, that’s such
a lot of bullshit, I can’t believe that asshole said
those things in private, let alone to the fucking pres

The whole story is, Vince Neil took a pot-shot at Izzy
as he was walkin’ off stage at the MTV awards,
after jammin’ with Tom Petty, because Vince’s wife
has got a bug up her ass about Izzy. Izzy doesn’t
know what’s going on, Izzy doesn’t fuckin’ care.
But anyway, Izzy’s just walked off stage.
He’s momentarily blinded, as always happens
when you come off stage, by coming from the stark
stage-lights straight into total darkness side-stage.

Suddenly Vince pops up out of nowhere and
lays one on Izzy. Tom Petty’s security people
jump on him and ask Alan Niven, our manager,
who had his arm around Izzy’s shoulders when
Vince bopped him, asks if he wants to press charges.
He asks Izzy and Izzy says : ‘Naw, it was only
like bein’ hit by a girl!’ and they let him go.

Meantime, I don’t know nuthin’.
I’m walking way up ahead of everybody else,
and the next thing I know Vince Neil
comes flying past me like his ass is on fire or something.
All I saw was a blur of cheekbones!
I tell ya, man, it makes my blood boil when I read him
saying all that shit about how he kicked Izzy’s ass.
Turn the fuckin’ tape recorder on. I wanna set the record straight.

I mean, when Vince did that, we were advised
we could sue his ass off if we’d wanted to.
But we said no, fuck it, who needs the grief?
The guy’s a jerk. Fuck the courts, the guy needs a good ass-whippin’.

And now I read this - we get Kerrang! a little late here in LA -
and I tell ya, he’s gonna get a good ass-whippin’,
and I’m the boy to give it to him. It’s like, whenever you
wanna do it, man, let’s just do it. I wanna see that plastic
face of his cave in when I hit him.

There’s only one way out for that fucker now and that’s
if he apologises in public, to the press, to Kerrang!
and its readers, and admits he was lyin’ when he said
those things in that interview. Personally, I don’t think
he has the balls. But that’s the gauntlet, and I’m throwing
it down. Hey, Vince, whichever way you wanna go, man :
guns, knives, or fists, whatever you wanna do.
I don’t care. Turn on the machine...”

(With thanks to ‘Stick To Your Guns’ by Mick Wall Kerrang!, 21 and 28 April 1990)