WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:02.180 Welcome back to the Deep Dive. I want you to 00:00:02.180 --> 00:00:03.839 take a second and just look at the calendar. 00:00:04.879 --> 00:00:09.300 Today is February 6, 2026. Right. Now, if you 00:00:09.300 --> 00:00:11.839 open up your news feed or check the concert listings 00:00:11.839 --> 00:00:14.060 for the biggest stadiums in the world, you're 00:00:14.060 --> 00:00:17.239 going to see a name that, by all rights, shouldn't 00:00:17.239 --> 00:00:19.940 still be there. It honestly defies the laws of 00:00:19.940 --> 00:00:23.370 physics, medicine, and... Probably gravity. We 00:00:23.370 --> 00:00:25.989 were talking about Guns N' Roses. And the reason 00:00:25.989 --> 00:00:27.929 we're doing this today is that they aren't just 00:00:27.929 --> 00:00:30.410 a nostalgia act playing casinos. No, not at all. 00:00:30.469 --> 00:00:33.630 They're active. They have a massive 2026 world 00:00:33.630 --> 00:00:35.869 tour booked. They have two new songs, Nothing 00:00:35.869 --> 00:00:38.810 and Atlas, which are slated to drop. in just 00:00:38.810 --> 00:00:41.229 a couple of months and that context is so important 00:00:41.229 --> 00:00:44.789 because if you were a betting person in say 1987 00:00:44.789 --> 00:00:48.530 or 1994 or even 2002 forget about it and you 00:00:48.530 --> 00:00:50.570 put money on guns and roses being a functioning 00:00:50.570 --> 00:00:54.189 corporate touring entity in the year 2026 you 00:00:54.189 --> 00:00:55.710 would have been laughed out of the room you would 00:00:55.710 --> 00:00:57.630 have been institutionalized exactly i mean this 00:00:57.630 --> 00:00:59.750 is a band that was branded the most dangerous 00:00:59.750 --> 00:01:01.869 band in the world and usually when you hear that 00:01:01.869 --> 00:01:05.010 marketing tag it's hype it's just pr it's a pr 00:01:05.010 --> 00:01:08.140 team trying to make a boy band look edgy With 00:01:08.140 --> 00:01:11.239 Guns N' Roses, the danger was a liability. It 00:01:11.239 --> 00:01:14.040 was the defining feature of their entire existence. 00:01:14.599 --> 00:01:17.480 So that is our mission for this deep dive. We 00:01:17.480 --> 00:01:19.040 aren't just going to recite a biography. We're 00:01:19.040 --> 00:01:21.799 going to try and unpack the chemistry of this 00:01:21.799 --> 00:01:25.560 specific group of people. How did a band formed 00:01:25.560 --> 00:01:29.519 from the absolute grit and, frankly, the squalor 00:01:29.519 --> 00:01:31.879 of the L .A. club scene become a global phenomena, 00:01:32.219 --> 00:01:34.579 then completely implode under the weight of its 00:01:34.579 --> 00:01:38.420 own excess, and then somehow? find a way to glue 00:01:38.420 --> 00:01:40.719 the pieces back together. It's a story of survival, 00:01:40.840 --> 00:01:43.040 really. We've come through the biographies, the 00:01:43.040 --> 00:01:45.219 tour writers, which are legendary in themselves. 00:01:45.659 --> 00:01:47.939 Oh, I bet. The court documents, the studio logs. 00:01:48.180 --> 00:01:50.219 And what you find is that this isn't just a story 00:01:50.219 --> 00:01:52.180 about sex, drugs, and rock and roll, though there's 00:01:52.180 --> 00:01:54.260 plenty of that. A lot of that. It's a story about 00:01:54.260 --> 00:01:57.319 volatility. Cure, uncut volatility. We have so 00:01:57.319 --> 00:01:58.840 much to get through. We're going to talk about 00:01:58.840 --> 00:02:01.379 the Hell Tour, where they essentially became 00:02:01.379 --> 00:02:04.290 hobo musicians. The truly defining moment. We're 00:02:04.290 --> 00:02:06.310 going to talk about an album that cost $14 million 00:02:06.310 --> 00:02:09.110 to produce. And, of course, we have to talk about 00:02:09.110 --> 00:02:12.229 the riots. You cannot tell the story of Guns 00:02:12.229 --> 00:02:15.289 N' Roses without the riots. The two are, I mean, 00:02:15.330 --> 00:02:18.349 they're inextricably linked. So let's not get 00:02:18.349 --> 00:02:20.009 ahead of ourselves. Let's go back to the dirt. 00:02:20.150 --> 00:02:24.180 Let's go back to 1985, Los Angeles. The Sunset 00:02:24.180 --> 00:02:26.360 Strip. Paint the picture for us. What does it 00:02:26.360 --> 00:02:27.840 look like? What does it smell like? It smells 00:02:27.840 --> 00:02:30.259 like hairspray and cheap whiskey. You have to 00:02:30.259 --> 00:02:33.639 understand the moment. 1985 is this transition 00:02:33.639 --> 00:02:36.919 period. The glam metal scene, the mutley crews, 00:02:37.180 --> 00:02:40.020 the poisons. It's exploding. Right. The Sunset 00:02:40.020 --> 00:02:41.900 Strip is the center of the universe for that 00:02:41.900 --> 00:02:44.280 sound. It is. And it's very polished, very colorful. 00:02:45.219 --> 00:02:48.819 Spandex, makeup, big hair. But underneath all 00:02:48.819 --> 00:02:51.580 that, there's this desire for something grittier. 00:02:52.330 --> 00:02:54.889 Something more real. And floating in this ecosystem, 00:02:55.069 --> 00:02:57.349 you have these two struggling bands, Hollywood 00:02:57.349 --> 00:02:59.789 Rose and L .A. Guns. Right. And the names are 00:02:59.789 --> 00:03:01.689 obviously the key here. In Hollywood Rose, you 00:03:01.689 --> 00:03:04.310 had a singer named Axl Rose and a guitarist named 00:03:04.310 --> 00:03:06.870 Izzy Stradlin. The core songwriting duo, really. 00:03:07.349 --> 00:03:10.710 Absolutely. And in L .A. Guns, you had a guitarist 00:03:10.710 --> 00:03:14.219 named Tracy Guns. And the scene was incredibly 00:03:14.219 --> 00:03:17.180 incestuous. I mean, musicians were swapping bands, 00:03:17.500 --> 00:03:19.979 sleeping on each other's floors, stealing each 00:03:19.979 --> 00:03:22.759 other's gear. It was a community born out of 00:03:22.759 --> 00:03:26.039 pure desperation. So in March 1985, they decide 00:03:26.039 --> 00:03:29.639 to merge these two entities. And the naming process 00:03:29.639 --> 00:03:32.419 wasn't exactly a high -level corporate branding 00:03:32.419 --> 00:03:35.250 strategy session. Not at all. They literally 00:03:35.250 --> 00:03:37.810 just mash the names together. L .A. Guns plus 00:03:37.810 --> 00:03:40.530 Hollywood Rose equals Guns N' Roses. It's functional. 00:03:40.590 --> 00:03:42.490 It works. I was looking through the notes and 00:03:42.490 --> 00:03:44.189 they didn't land on that immediately. There were 00:03:44.189 --> 00:03:47.759 some rejected names that are. Frankly, hilarious. 00:03:48.159 --> 00:03:50.500 Oh, they are terrible. Just awful. They considered 00:03:50.500 --> 00:03:53.139 heads of Amazon. Which sounds like a bad prog 00:03:53.139 --> 00:03:55.259 rock band from the 70s. Or an online retailer 00:03:55.259 --> 00:03:57.520 from the future. But the other one, and I still 00:03:57.520 --> 00:03:59.039 can't believe they seriously considered this, 00:03:59.099 --> 00:04:02.099 was AIDS. AIDS. Yes. Can you imagine the announcer? 00:04:02.419 --> 00:04:04.659 Ladies and gentlemen, please welcome to the stage, 00:04:04.960 --> 00:04:06.979 AIDS. It just shows you the headspace they were 00:04:06.979 --> 00:04:08.819 in. They wanted to shock people from day one. 00:04:09.129 --> 00:04:11.129 They wanted to be provocative. They wanted to 00:04:11.129 --> 00:04:13.990 be shocking from the jump. But thankfully, sanity 00:04:13.990 --> 00:04:16.550 prevailed and they went with guns and roses. 00:04:16.790 --> 00:04:19.689 OK, so the lineup at this exact moment, March 00:04:19.689 --> 00:04:22.750 1985. It isn't the classic five yet, is it? No. 00:04:22.870 --> 00:04:25.290 And this is crucial. The chemistry wasn't instant. 00:04:25.920 --> 00:04:28.139 Tracy Guns, the guy who gave the band half its 00:04:28.139 --> 00:04:30.699 name, actually leaves pretty quickly. He gets 00:04:30.699 --> 00:04:34.259 into an argument with Axl. Which, spoiler alert, 00:04:34.360 --> 00:04:36.540 is going to be a recurring theme in this story. 00:04:36.759 --> 00:04:39.139 Yeah. Arguments with Axl. A very common theme, 00:04:39.220 --> 00:04:42.399 yes. So Tracy leaves, and that opens the door 00:04:42.399 --> 00:04:44.779 for a guy named Saul Hudson, better known to 00:04:44.779 --> 00:04:47.740 the world as Slash. The man in the top hat. Exactly. 00:04:48.279 --> 00:04:50.639 Now, Slash had been in a band called Road Crew 00:04:50.639 --> 00:04:52.720 with two other guys who would eventually join 00:04:52.720 --> 00:04:55.699 the circus. Duff McKagan and Steven Adler. So 00:04:55.699 --> 00:04:57.639 it's like a puzzle snapping together piece by 00:04:57.639 --> 00:05:00.199 piece. It really is. Duff comes in and replaces 00:05:00.199 --> 00:05:02.959 Ole Beach on bass. Steven Adler eventually replaces 00:05:02.959 --> 00:05:06.180 Rob Gardner on drums. And suddenly, on June 4th, 00:05:06.180 --> 00:05:10.120 1985, you have the lineup. Axl, Slash, Izzy, 00:05:10.240 --> 00:05:12.459 Duff, and Steven. And that's the magic combination. 00:05:12.860 --> 00:05:15.360 And I want to pause here because we really need 00:05:15.360 --> 00:05:19.379 to explain why this worked. On paper, these five 00:05:19.379 --> 00:05:21.709 guys shouldn't make sense together at all. Right, 00:05:21.790 --> 00:05:23.430 because they aren't all just straight -up metal 00:05:23.430 --> 00:05:26.649 guys. Far from it. This is where the magic happens. 00:05:27.050 --> 00:05:30.370 Let's look at Slash. He isn't a shredder in the 00:05:30.370 --> 00:05:33.850 style of, say, Eddie Van Halen. He's a blues 00:05:33.850 --> 00:05:36.509 player at his core. He grew up on Aerosmith, 00:05:36.649 --> 00:05:40.269 The Stones. Exactly. Old blues records. He plays 00:05:40.269 --> 00:05:42.209 with a lot of emotion, and he tends to play a 00:05:42.209 --> 00:05:44.730 little behind the beat. It's lazy, you know, 00:05:44.730 --> 00:05:46.629 in a good way. It's got swagger. And then you 00:05:46.629 --> 00:05:49.110 have Duff McKagan on bass. Duff is a punk rocker. 00:05:49.659 --> 00:05:52.939 100%. He's from Seattle. He idolized The Clash, 00:05:52.980 --> 00:05:55.660 The Sex Pistols, Johnny Thunders. So he plays 00:05:55.660 --> 00:05:57.800 with the pick, he plays hard, and he tends to 00:05:57.800 --> 00:05:59.600 push the beat. He's driving the car forward. 00:05:59.819 --> 00:06:01.759 So you have the guitar pulling back and the bass 00:06:01.759 --> 00:06:04.639 pushing forward. That creates an inherent tension. 00:06:04.920 --> 00:06:07.220 That's the word. It creates this push -pull dynamic 00:06:07.220 --> 00:06:09.740 that makes the music feel unstable and incredibly 00:06:09.740 --> 00:06:12.319 exciting. And then you have the secret weapon, 00:06:12.620 --> 00:06:15.980 Steven Adler on drums. I feel like Adler gets 00:06:15.980 --> 00:06:18.220 overlooked a lot because he wasn't some technical 00:06:18.220 --> 00:06:21.470 wizard. He wasn't Neil Peart. He wasn't doing 00:06:21.470 --> 00:06:24.569 complex math on the drum kit. But my God, he 00:06:24.569 --> 00:06:27.110 had swing. Okay, let's unpack that term, swing. 00:06:28.730 --> 00:06:30.610 For the listener who just taps their foot, what 00:06:30.610 --> 00:06:33.029 does that actually mean in a hard rock context? 00:06:33.610 --> 00:06:36.269 So most rock drummers in the 80s were trying 00:06:36.269 --> 00:06:38.810 to be machines. They wanted to hit the grid perfectly, 00:06:39.009 --> 00:06:41.850 very straight, very rigid, like a drum machine. 00:06:42.350 --> 00:06:44.649 Adler played with a jazz sensibility. He would 00:06:44.649 --> 00:06:47.449 hit the snare drum just a millisecond late. It 00:06:47.449 --> 00:06:50.290 gave the beat this rolling, swaggering feel. 00:06:50.470 --> 00:06:52.910 It made the music danceable. It's the reason 00:06:52.910 --> 00:06:55.009 a song like Mr. Brownstone has that groove. That 00:06:55.009 --> 00:06:57.709 groove is all Adler. It's loose. It breathes. 00:06:57.709 --> 00:07:00.170 It feels alive. So you have this voluble musical 00:07:00.170 --> 00:07:02.189 mixture, this perfect storm of personalities 00:07:02.189 --> 00:07:04.980 and influence. Yeah. And what is the first thing 00:07:04.980 --> 00:07:07.079 they decide to do? They decide to go on tour. 00:07:07.879 --> 00:07:10.720 The legendary Hell Tour. This is the origin story. 00:07:10.959 --> 00:07:13.180 This is the crucible. They decide to book a West 00:07:13.180 --> 00:07:16.139 Coast run going from Sacramento up to Duff's 00:07:16.139 --> 00:07:18.500 hometown of Seattle. They call it a tour, but 00:07:18.500 --> 00:07:20.339 that's a very generous term. And transportation 00:07:20.339 --> 00:07:23.009 was also a generous term for what they had. They 00:07:23.009 --> 00:07:26.850 had two beat up vans and in true rock and roll 00:07:26.850 --> 00:07:29.569 fashion, they get on the road and almost immediately 00:07:29.569 --> 00:07:32.290 the flunked van breaks down. So they all pile 00:07:32.290 --> 00:07:34.610 into the second van. And then maybe 100 miles 00:07:34.610 --> 00:07:36.610 later, the second van breaks down. So now you 00:07:36.610 --> 00:07:39.209 have five guys, hair teased up, wearing leather 00:07:39.209 --> 00:07:43.009 tattoos, looking like absolute freaks to the 00:07:43.009 --> 00:07:45.709 average person in 1985, stranded on the side 00:07:45.709 --> 00:07:47.990 of the highway. What do they do? They leave the 00:07:47.990 --> 00:07:50.910 gear. They grab their guitars, just the essentials, 00:07:51.050 --> 00:07:53.490 what they can carry. And they stick their thumbs 00:07:53.490 --> 00:07:55.750 out. They hitchhike. They hitchhiked all the 00:07:55.750 --> 00:07:57.709 way to Seattle. They hitchhiked for hundreds 00:07:57.709 --> 00:07:59.589 and hundreds of miles. And we aren't talking 00:07:59.589 --> 00:08:01.490 about a fun road trip. This was brutal. They 00:08:01.490 --> 00:08:03.370 were starving. There are stories of them finding 00:08:03.370 --> 00:08:05.250 an onion field, stealing onions, and trying to 00:08:05.250 --> 00:08:07.529 roast them over a fire just to have something, 00:08:07.689 --> 00:08:10.230 anything to eat. That is insane. It sounds like 00:08:10.230 --> 00:08:12.430 something out of a Steinbeck novel. It is. But 00:08:12.430 --> 00:08:14.850 Duff McKagan later said this is the most defining 00:08:14.850 --> 00:08:17.430 moment of their lives. He said that when you 00:08:17.430 --> 00:08:20.230 are stripping down to nothing, starving on the 00:08:20.230 --> 00:08:22.439 side of the road with four other guys, You either 00:08:22.439 --> 00:08:25.699 kill each other or you become brothers. And they 00:08:25.699 --> 00:08:27.519 became brothers. They missed most of the gigs. 00:08:27.620 --> 00:08:29.759 They barely played any music on that tour, but 00:08:29.759 --> 00:08:32.860 they learned how to survive as a unit. That trip 00:08:32.860 --> 00:08:35.519 forged them. So they limp back to Los Angeles. 00:08:35.679 --> 00:08:38.879 They are broke, but they are bonded. And they 00:08:38.879 --> 00:08:40.860 move into a place that becomes known as the Hell 00:08:40.860 --> 00:08:43.440 House. Which was, again, a very generous term 00:08:43.440 --> 00:08:46.279 for what it was. It was a tiny one -room apartment 00:08:46.279 --> 00:08:49.529 that was also their rehearsal space. No furniture, 00:08:49.710 --> 00:08:52.230 just mattresses on the floor, empty bottles of 00:08:52.230 --> 00:08:55.129 night train wine, pizza boxes, and five guys 00:08:55.129 --> 00:08:57.649 living on top of each other. And amidst this 00:08:57.649 --> 00:09:00.289 squalor... They are writing the songs that are 00:09:00.289 --> 00:09:02.090 going to change the world. They're playing the 00:09:02.090 --> 00:09:05.429 Troubadour, the Roxy, and the buzz is starting 00:09:05.429 --> 00:09:07.889 to build. The industry is noticing. The labels 00:09:07.889 --> 00:09:09.570 start sniffing around, and this is where we see 00:09:09.570 --> 00:09:12.190 the band's integrity early on. They had a huge 00:09:12.190 --> 00:09:14.289 offer from Chrysalis Records. It was the best 00:09:14.289 --> 00:09:16.490 financial offer on the table by far. But they 00:09:16.490 --> 00:09:18.769 turned it down. Why? Chrysalis wanted to change 00:09:18.769 --> 00:09:21.690 them. They looked at Guns N' Roses and saw a 00:09:21.690 --> 00:09:23.990 rough diamond that needed polishing. They wanted 00:09:23.990 --> 00:09:26.529 to change the image, maybe tweak the sound to 00:09:26.529 --> 00:09:28.929 be more radio -friendly. To make them more like 00:09:28.929 --> 00:09:32.029 Bon Jovi or Poison. Exactly. And even though 00:09:32.029 --> 00:09:34.730 they were literally starving, the band said no. 00:09:34.870 --> 00:09:37.149 That takes a staggering amount of confidence. 00:09:37.870 --> 00:09:41.230 Or delusion. A bit of both, probably. They eventually 00:09:41.230 --> 00:09:44.769 signed with Geffen Records in March 1986. The 00:09:44.769 --> 00:09:48.370 advance was smaller, only $75 ,000, which split 00:09:48.370 --> 00:09:50.629 five ways and after paying debts isn't a fortune. 00:09:50.909 --> 00:09:53.809 It's nothing. But Geffen offered them the one 00:09:53.809 --> 00:09:56.570 thing they wanted more than money. Absolutely. 00:09:56.750 --> 00:09:59.049 100 % creative control. They bet on themselves. 00:09:59.350 --> 00:10:01.649 They knew that their danger, that grit we talked 00:10:01.649 --> 00:10:04.309 about, was the product. If you polished it, you 00:10:04.309 --> 00:10:07.070 ruined it. So they signed the deal. They need 00:10:07.070 --> 00:10:08.769 to get some product out to keep the momentum 00:10:08.769 --> 00:10:11.149 going while they record the debut album. So they 00:10:11.149 --> 00:10:15.350 release an EP called Live. Like a suicide. A 00:10:15.350 --> 00:10:17.470 brilliant bit of marketing, really. It sounds 00:10:17.470 --> 00:10:19.509 incredibly raw. You hear the crowd screaming. 00:10:19.590 --> 00:10:21.509 You hear the banter between songs. It established 00:10:21.509 --> 00:10:25.529 them as this ferocious, must -see live act. But 00:10:25.529 --> 00:10:27.870 there is a catch. A big catch. The catch is that 00:10:27.870 --> 00:10:30.049 it wasn't live. Not even a little bit. It was 00:10:30.049 --> 00:10:31.690 studio demos they had already recorded. They 00:10:31.690 --> 00:10:33.350 just took those tapes and dubbed crowd noise 00:10:33.350 --> 00:10:35.929 over the top. That is hilarious. It's literal. 00:10:36.519 --> 00:10:39.139 Fake it till you make it. It was strategic. They 00:10:39.139 --> 00:10:41.039 needed the world to think they were conquering 00:10:41.039 --> 00:10:43.120 the club, so they just manufactured the sound 00:10:43.120 --> 00:10:45.340 of a conquered club, and it worked. It bought 00:10:45.340 --> 00:10:46.960 them the time they needed to enter the studio 00:10:46.960 --> 00:10:49.519 for the main event. Appetite for Destruction. 00:10:49.700 --> 00:10:54.279 July 1987, the album drops. And today, we look 00:10:54.279 --> 00:10:58.500 at Appetite as this monolithic juggernaut. 30 00:10:58.500 --> 00:11:00.820 million copies sold. The best -selling debut 00:11:00.820 --> 00:11:03.120 album of all time. But when it first came out, 00:11:03.200 --> 00:11:06.210 nothing. Crickets. I mean, dead in the water. 00:11:06.330 --> 00:11:08.570 It debuted at number 182 on the Billboard 200. 00:11:08.789 --> 00:11:11.269 It was a total flop. What was the problem? Was 00:11:11.269 --> 00:11:13.809 the music just too aggressive for the time? The 00:11:13.809 --> 00:11:15.529 music was aggressive, but the biggest hurdle 00:11:15.529 --> 00:11:17.600 was the cover art. We have to talk about the 00:11:17.600 --> 00:11:19.500 original cover. It was a painting by Robert Williams. 00:11:19.620 --> 00:11:21.279 It wasn't the cross with the skulls that we all 00:11:21.279 --> 00:11:23.620 know from the T -shirts. No. The original painting 00:11:23.620 --> 00:11:26.740 depicted a robotic rapist who had just assaulted 00:11:26.740 --> 00:11:29.100 a woman, and he was about to be attacked by this 00:11:29.100 --> 00:11:33.399 metallic, vengeful monster. It was incredibly 00:11:33.399 --> 00:11:35.720 graphic, disturbing, and deeply controversial. 00:11:35.820 --> 00:11:39.669 And retailers just said, no way. Walmart, Kmart, 00:11:39.830 --> 00:11:42.129 all the big record store chains, they refused 00:11:42.129 --> 00:11:44.950 to stock it. So the band had to compromise. They 00:11:44.950 --> 00:11:47.649 moved the controversial art to the inside sleeve 00:11:47.649 --> 00:11:53.090 and put the now famous tattoo design, the Celtic 00:11:53.090 --> 00:11:55.950 cross, with the five skulls on the cover. But 00:11:55.950 --> 00:11:58.909 even with the new, less offensive cover, radio 00:11:58.909 --> 00:12:02.320 wasn't touching it. MTV wasn't touching it. They 00:12:02.320 --> 00:12:04.320 were just viewed as too dirty, too dangerous. 00:12:04.460 --> 00:12:06.799 They were completely stuck. So the story goes 00:12:06.799 --> 00:12:08.940 that David Geffen, the head of the label, decided 00:12:08.940 --> 00:12:11.559 to call in a personal favor. He called the head 00:12:11.559 --> 00:12:14.100 of programming at MTV and begged him. He said, 00:12:14.100 --> 00:12:16.039 just play the video for Welcome to the Jungle 00:12:16.039 --> 00:12:19.019 one time, just once, as a personal favor to me. 00:12:19.179 --> 00:12:21.700 And MTV agreed. Reluctantly, they agreed to play 00:12:21.700 --> 00:12:24.370 it one time at 4 a .m. on a Sunday morning. The 00:12:24.370 --> 00:12:26.330 graveyard slot. The slot where music videos go 00:12:26.330 --> 00:12:28.169 to die. Exactly. They thought nobody would see 00:12:28.169 --> 00:12:30.289 it. But here's the thing about the Guns N' Roses 00:12:30.289 --> 00:12:33.009 demographic. The misfits, the rockers, the night 00:12:33.009 --> 00:12:35.990 owls, the bad kids, they were awake at 4 a .m. 00:12:35.990 --> 00:12:38.710 on a Sunday. And what happened? The switchboards 00:12:38.710 --> 00:12:41.529 at MTV lit up like a Christmas tree. Kids were 00:12:41.529 --> 00:12:43.789 calling in, just flooding the line, saying, What 00:12:43.789 --> 00:12:46.049 was that? Who was that guy with the teased hair 00:12:46.049 --> 00:12:48.450 screaming at the bus? Play it again. It was a 00:12:48.450 --> 00:12:51.360 grassroots explosion fueled by insomnia. Within 00:12:51.360 --> 00:12:53.600 days, it became the most requested video on the 00:12:53.600 --> 00:12:56.100 entire channel. That's an incredible story. And 00:12:56.100 --> 00:12:58.740 that song, Welcome to the Jungle, it captures 00:12:58.740 --> 00:13:01.639 such a specific anxiety. It does. And the lyrics 00:13:01.639 --> 00:13:04.940 are basically a documentary. Axl wrote them after 00:13:04.940 --> 00:13:08.019 a specific encounter he had when he first visited 00:13:08.019 --> 00:13:10.440 New York City. This is a true story. According 00:13:10.440 --> 00:13:13.600 to Axl, yes. He was hitchhiking, got dropped 00:13:13.600 --> 00:13:16.220 off in Queens or the Bronx, and a homeless man 00:13:16.220 --> 00:13:18.019 came up to him and yelled at him. He shouted, 00:13:18.139 --> 00:13:19.840 you know where you are. You're in the jungle, 00:13:19.919 --> 00:13:22.519 baby. You're going to die. He literally quoted 00:13:22.519 --> 00:13:25.519 the man in the song. Verbatim. He took that pure 00:13:25.519 --> 00:13:28.639 terror of the big city, the predator versus prey 00:13:28.639 --> 00:13:31.279 dynamic, and he bottled it. He turned it into 00:13:31.279 --> 00:13:34.639 an anthem. Then, on the complete opposite end 00:13:34.639 --> 00:13:37.399 of the spectrum, you have Sweet Child of Mine. 00:13:37.659 --> 00:13:40.059 This is their biggest hit, their only number 00:13:40.059 --> 00:13:43.820 one single in the U .S., and yet Slash hated 00:13:43.820 --> 00:13:46.620 it. He despised it. He thought it was a joke. 00:13:46.639 --> 00:13:48.759 He was sitting in a rehearsal, just goofing around, 00:13:49.039 --> 00:13:52.159 trying to play this ridiculous circus melody 00:13:52.159 --> 00:13:55.600 to annoy Steven Adler. He was making a face, 00:13:55.779 --> 00:13:58.360 playing this high -pitched winding riff. And 00:13:58.360 --> 00:14:00.659 Axl was in the other room. Axl heard it through 00:14:00.659 --> 00:14:02.539 the wall and came running in. He said, hold on, 00:14:02.600 --> 00:14:04.679 what is that? That's amazing. And Slash was like, 00:14:04.759 --> 00:14:07.580 no, it's stupid. I'm just messing around. But 00:14:07.580 --> 00:14:10.379 Axl insisted they keep playing it. And the lyrics 00:14:10.379 --> 00:14:13.139 were very personal for Axl. Yeah, it was a poem 00:14:13.139 --> 00:14:14.820 he had written for his girlfriend at the time, 00:14:14.879 --> 00:14:17.879 Erin Everly. It was vulnerable. It was sincere. 00:14:18.080 --> 00:14:20.779 And that clashed completely with Slash's tough 00:14:20.779 --> 00:14:23.980 guy, blues rock image. In fact, Slash actually 00:14:23.980 --> 00:14:26.320 tried to sabotage the song during the recording. 00:14:26.440 --> 00:14:28.419 How'd he do that? You know that guitar solo in 00:14:28.419 --> 00:14:30.440 the middle, the really dramatic soaring one? 00:14:30.899 --> 00:14:33.200 Slash recorded that in one take because he just 00:14:33.200 --> 00:14:35.220 wanted to get it over with and leave the studio. 00:14:35.460 --> 00:14:37.799 He thought, I'll just shred over this stupid 00:14:37.799 --> 00:14:40.679 ballad and ruin it. Instead, he accidentally 00:14:40.679 --> 00:14:43.240 laid down one of the most iconic guitar solos 00:14:43.240 --> 00:14:45.580 in rock history. It's just so ironic that the 00:14:45.580 --> 00:14:47.399 song he hated the most is the one that probably 00:14:47.399 --> 00:14:49.559 bought him his house. It's always the way, isn't 00:14:49.559 --> 00:14:52.639 it? The pop hit pays the bills. So Appetite eventually 00:14:52.639 --> 00:14:55.059 goes supernova. They are the biggest band on 00:14:55.059 --> 00:14:58.659 the planet. But as their fame grows, the controversy 00:14:58.659 --> 00:15:01.990 starts to mutate. It stops being fun danger and 00:15:01.990 --> 00:15:04.250 starts becoming ugly danger. And that brings 00:15:04.250 --> 00:15:07.970 us to 1988. They released the EP GNR Lies, and 00:15:07.970 --> 00:15:09.649 we have to stop and talk about the song One in 00:15:09.649 --> 00:15:12.029 a Million. This is the elephant in the room. 00:15:12.210 --> 00:15:14.370 For listeners who don't know, this is an acoustic 00:15:14.370 --> 00:15:18.210 track where Axl uses racial slurs, homophobic 00:15:18.210 --> 00:15:21.230 slurs, and anti -immigrant rhetoric. It is shocking 00:15:21.230 --> 00:15:23.669 to listen to, even now, especially now. It was 00:15:23.669 --> 00:15:26.490 shocking then, too. It caused an absolute firestorm. 00:15:26.629 --> 00:15:28.750 Why did he write it? What was the defense? What 00:15:28.750 --> 00:15:31.559 was he thinking? Axel's defense at the time was 00:15:31.559 --> 00:15:34.360 that he was writing from a persona. He claimed 00:15:34.360 --> 00:15:36.580 he wasn't expressing his own views, but rather 00:15:36.580 --> 00:15:39.639 the viewpoint of a naive, angry white kid from 00:15:39.639 --> 00:15:42.960 Indiana who gets off a bus in downtown LA and 00:15:42.960 --> 00:15:45.299 feels threatened by the diversity and the chaos 00:15:45.299 --> 00:15:47.779 around him. So he was trying to channel a character, 00:15:47.879 --> 00:15:50.000 sort of like an Archie Bunker. That was the claim. 00:15:50.379 --> 00:15:52.779 He called it immersive journalism or satire. 00:15:52.799 --> 00:15:54.639 He said, I'm not saying I hate these people. 00:15:54.720 --> 00:15:57.080 I'm saying this character is ignorant and afraid. 00:15:57.700 --> 00:15:59.860 But the problem, obviously, is that the song 00:15:59.860 --> 00:16:02.139 doesn't really frame it as satire. It just sounds 00:16:02.139 --> 00:16:05.620 like pure venom. And the rest of the band, Slash 00:16:05.620 --> 00:16:08.700 is half black. His mother was a famous African 00:16:08.700 --> 00:16:10.639 -American costume designer. That must have been 00:16:10.639 --> 00:16:12.700 an incredibly difficult position for him to be 00:16:12.700 --> 00:16:15.419 in. it was awful for him slash has spoken about 00:16:15.419 --> 00:16:17.620 this in interviews he was visibly uncomfortable 00:16:17.620 --> 00:16:20.039 he fought against the song being on the record 00:16:20.039 --> 00:16:23.460 he told axel this is a bad idea this is hurtful 00:16:24.379 --> 00:16:27.200 But by this point in 1988, the power dynamic 00:16:27.200 --> 00:16:29.879 in the band had shifted. It was becoming Axl's 00:16:29.879 --> 00:16:32.460 band. It was becoming Axl's dictatorship. If 00:16:32.460 --> 00:16:34.720 Axl wanted it on the record, it went on the record. 00:16:34.899 --> 00:16:36.919 End of discussion. And the consequences were 00:16:36.919 --> 00:16:39.320 real, weren't they? Oh, absolutely. They were 00:16:39.320 --> 00:16:42.240 kicked off the bill for an ACT -UP benefit concert, 00:16:42.500 --> 00:16:45.379 which was a major AIDS charity. Later, at the 00:16:45.379 --> 00:16:47.759 Freddie Mercury tribute concert, Freddie was 00:16:47.759 --> 00:16:50.559 obviously a gay icon. There were protests outside. 00:16:51.320 --> 00:16:54.360 Activists wanted GNR removed from the show. It 00:16:54.360 --> 00:16:56.519 created this duality where millions of people 00:16:56.519 --> 00:16:59.059 loved the music, but the cultural baggage was 00:16:59.059 --> 00:17:01.399 becoming incredibly heavy. And that heaviness 00:17:01.399 --> 00:17:04.059 starts to crack the foundation. We move into 00:17:04.059 --> 00:17:08.259 the Use Your Illusion era. 1990, the first domino 00:17:08.259 --> 00:17:10.819 falls. Steven Adler. This is the beginning of 00:17:10.819 --> 00:17:13.319 the end for that classic sound. Steven was struggling 00:17:13.319 --> 00:17:15.640 heavily with heroin addiction. The band was in 00:17:15.640 --> 00:17:17.839 the studio trying to record the song Civil War, 00:17:17.980 --> 00:17:19.759 which is a fantastic track. But the sessions 00:17:19.759 --> 00:17:22.119 were a complete disaster. They were a nightmare. 00:17:22.259 --> 00:17:24.680 They did nearly 30 takes of the song. Steven 00:17:24.680 --> 00:17:26.960 was so out of it, nodding off, losing focus, 00:17:27.039 --> 00:17:28.599 that he just couldn't keep time. He couldn't 00:17:28.599 --> 00:17:30.619 find that pocket, that swing we talked about. 00:17:30.799 --> 00:17:33.240 So they fired him. But the way they did it was 00:17:33.240 --> 00:17:37.769 legally very strange. It was desperate. Before 00:17:37.769 --> 00:17:39.970 they fired him, they actually made him sign a 00:17:39.970 --> 00:17:42.710 contract. The contract stated that he was still 00:17:42.710 --> 00:17:45.490 in the band, but he would be fined $2 ,000 every 00:17:45.490 --> 00:17:47.809 single time he used heroin. They were trying 00:17:47.809 --> 00:17:50.549 to find him into sobriety. It was a clumsy, misguided 00:17:50.549 --> 00:17:53.150 attempt to help him, I think. But obviously, 00:17:53.309 --> 00:17:54.990 addiction doesn't work like that. He couldn't 00:17:54.990 --> 00:17:57.710 stop. So he was fired, and he immediately sued 00:17:57.710 --> 00:18:01.359 them. And in comes Matt Sorum from the cult and 00:18:01.359 --> 00:18:03.799 Dizzy Reed on keyboards. And this is where the 00:18:03.799 --> 00:18:05.740 music fundamentally changes. We talked about 00:18:05.740 --> 00:18:08.640 Adler's swing earlier, that loose, jazzy, behind 00:18:08.640 --> 00:18:11.180 -the -beat feel. Matt Sorum was a completely 00:18:11.180 --> 00:18:13.740 different drummer. He was a machine. A powerhouse. 00:18:13.859 --> 00:18:16.279 A powerhouse. Very precise, very heavy, very 00:18:16.279 --> 00:18:18.880 on the grid. He played like a metronome. So the 00:18:18.880 --> 00:18:21.079 band got tighter, but they lost the groove. That's 00:18:21.079 --> 00:18:23.440 exactly it. Izzy Stradlin said that when Adler 00:18:23.440 --> 00:18:26.279 left, the swing left the band. They transformed 00:18:26.279 --> 00:18:29.029 from a gritty street... rock band into a heavy, 00:18:29.089 --> 00:18:31.650 epic stadium rock band. Which fit the ambition 00:18:31.650 --> 00:18:34.670 for Use Your Illusion. I mean, releasing two 00:18:34.670 --> 00:18:37.349 double albums on the same day, September 1991. 00:18:37.910 --> 00:18:40.890 Use Your Illusion, I and 2. That is pure hubris. 00:18:41.109 --> 00:18:43.450 It's never been done before or since on that 00:18:43.450 --> 00:18:46.430 scale. It was Axl attempting to be Elton John, 00:18:46.670 --> 00:18:49.869 Queen, and the Rolling Stones all at once. And 00:18:49.869 --> 00:18:52.799 commercially, it worked. They debuted at number 00:18:52.799 --> 00:18:55.359 one and number two on the Billboard charts. They 00:18:55.359 --> 00:18:57.539 were literally competing with themselves for 00:18:57.539 --> 00:19:00.400 the top spot. And the videos became these massive 00:19:00.400 --> 00:19:04.359 cinematic events. November Rain. The epic. It 00:19:04.359 --> 00:19:06.480 was nearly nine minutes long. At the time, it 00:19:06.480 --> 00:19:08.700 was the longest song to ever reach the top ten, 00:19:08.819 --> 00:19:11.980 and the video cost a fortune. They built a chapel 00:19:11.980 --> 00:19:14.099 in the middle of the desert specifically so they 00:19:14.099 --> 00:19:16.119 could burn it down for a scene. You're kidding. 00:19:16.319 --> 00:19:18.579 No. They had helicopter shots, a full orchestra, 00:19:18.819 --> 00:19:21.319 a wedding, a funeral. Axl wanted to show the 00:19:21.319 --> 00:19:23.200 world that they were high art now. But while 00:19:23.200 --> 00:19:26.019 the videos were polished and cinematic, the tour... 00:19:26.200 --> 00:19:28.839 The Use Your Illusion Tour is legendary for being 00:19:28.839 --> 00:19:31.119 a traveling disaster zone. It was the tour of 00:19:31.119 --> 00:19:34.680 chaos. It lasted 28 months. They played 192 dates, 00:19:34.799 --> 00:19:37.180 and it was defined by two things, lateness and 00:19:37.180 --> 00:19:40.019 riots. We have to zoom in on St. Louis, July 00:19:40.019 --> 00:19:42.920 1991, the Riverport Riot. Walk us through this 00:19:42.920 --> 00:19:44.619 night, because it plays out like a movie scene. 00:19:44.940 --> 00:19:46.940 Okay, so the atmosphere is already tense. It's 00:19:46.940 --> 00:19:49.940 hot. The band takes the stage late, as usual. 00:19:50.160 --> 00:19:52.400 They're in the middle of playing Rocket Queen, 00:19:52.599 --> 00:19:56.019 a fan favorite. Now, Axl has a strict policy. 00:19:57.009 --> 00:19:58.890 No unauthorized filming. And you have to remember, 00:19:59.029 --> 00:20:03.670 in 1991, this means huge, bulky camcorders, not 00:20:03.670 --> 00:20:06.089 stealthy iPhones. So it's hard to miss someone 00:20:06.089 --> 00:20:08.569 filming. Right. Axel spots a guy in the front 00:20:08.569 --> 00:20:11.369 row, a biker type, holding a camera. Axel stops 00:20:11.369 --> 00:20:13.950 singing mid -lyric. He points. He yells at security, 00:20:14.170 --> 00:20:16.509 take that, get that guy, take that. And security 00:20:16.509 --> 00:20:18.910 doesn't move. They hesitate. Maybe they didn't 00:20:18.910 --> 00:20:21.170 see who he was pointing at. Maybe they were intimidated 00:20:21.170 --> 00:20:23.890 by the biker. But that split -second hesitation 00:20:23.890 --> 00:20:26.829 was all it took. Axel snaps. He yells into the 00:20:26.829 --> 00:20:29.589 mic, I'll take it, goddammit. And he dives. He 00:20:29.589 --> 00:20:32.269 executes a perfect swan dive off the stage, right 00:20:32.269 --> 00:20:34.789 into the crowd. This isn't a friendly stage dive 00:20:34.789 --> 00:20:37.049 to be caught by fans. This is an attack. It's 00:20:37.049 --> 00:20:38.849 an assault. He lands on the guy, punches are 00:20:38.849 --> 00:20:41.750 thrown. Axl grabs the camera. His security team 00:20:41.750 --> 00:20:44.309 has to literally grab him by his legs and drag 00:20:44.309 --> 00:20:46.190 him back onto the stage like a sack of potatoes. 00:20:46.430 --> 00:20:48.950 He gets back up. He's breathless. His hair is 00:20:48.950 --> 00:20:51.450 a mess. He grabs the mic. And he delivers the 00:20:51.450 --> 00:20:53.369 line that ends the night. Well, thanks to the 00:20:53.369 --> 00:20:57.000 lame -ass security, I'm going home. He slams 00:20:57.000 --> 00:21:00.160 the microphone onto the stage. A huge boom echoes 00:21:00.160 --> 00:21:03.420 through the arena and he storms off. And the 00:21:03.420 --> 00:21:05.750 crowd. What do they do? The crowd is confused 00:21:05.750 --> 00:21:08.730 at first. Slash plays a weird questioning chord 00:21:08.730 --> 00:21:10.970 on his guitar like, oh, what just happened? But 00:21:10.970 --> 00:21:13.809 then the house lights come on and 20 ,000 people 00:21:13.809 --> 00:21:16.630 realize they have just been ripped off. And that 00:21:16.630 --> 00:21:19.029 is a dangerous realization for a crowd to have. 00:21:19.289 --> 00:21:21.710 It turned into a war zone. They tore the seats 00:21:21.710 --> 00:21:23.710 out of the concrete floor. They smashed the PA 00:21:23.710 --> 00:21:26.390 system. They stole the band's gear. It caused 00:21:26.390 --> 00:21:29.390 millions of dollars in damage. Axl actually had 00:21:29.390 --> 00:21:31.730 a warrant out for his arrest for inciting a riot. 00:21:31.869 --> 00:21:33.640 He couldn't enter the state of Missouri. for 00:21:33.640 --> 00:21:35.720 a year, they had to hide him in the tour bus 00:21:35.720 --> 00:21:38.079 while they crossed state lines. And as if that 00:21:38.079 --> 00:21:41.420 wasn't enough, you have Montreal in 1992. This 00:21:41.420 --> 00:21:43.920 is the co -headlining tour with Metallica, the 00:21:43.920 --> 00:21:46.000 biggest ticket of the decade. This should have 00:21:46.000 --> 00:21:48.259 been the greatest night in rock history, but 00:21:48.259 --> 00:21:50.619 it was cursed from the start. Metallica plays 00:21:50.619 --> 00:21:53.799 first. Their frontman, James Hetfield, accidentally 00:21:53.799 --> 00:21:57.339 walks into a pyrotechnics blast. He suffers second 00:21:57.339 --> 00:22:00.099 and third degree burns all over his body. His 00:22:00.099 --> 00:22:03.039 skin is literally melting. Metallica has to stop 00:22:03.039 --> 00:22:05.099 the show immediately so he can be rushed to the 00:22:05.099 --> 00:22:07.400 hospital. So the crowd is already traumatized 00:22:07.400 --> 00:22:10.039 and restless. But they're thinking, at least 00:22:10.039 --> 00:22:12.200 we still have guns and roses. And they wait. 00:22:12.559 --> 00:22:14.900 And they wait and they wait. It takes hours for 00:22:14.900 --> 00:22:17.420 GNR to set up their stage. When they finally 00:22:17.420 --> 00:22:20.339 come out, Axl is clearly in a mood. He complains 00:22:20.339 --> 00:22:22.440 about the sound monitors. He says his throat 00:22:22.440 --> 00:22:24.839 hurts. And after a very short set, he just says 00:22:24.839 --> 00:22:27.920 goodnight and walks off. Two headliners. Basically 00:22:27.920 --> 00:22:30.710 no show. The city of Montreal erupted. We are 00:22:30.710 --> 00:22:33.609 talking about overturned police cars, fires in 00:22:33.609 --> 00:22:36.029 the streets, looting stores. It was absolute 00:22:36.029 --> 00:22:39.589 anarchy. And amidst all of this madness, the 00:22:39.589 --> 00:22:42.430 riots, the late start times, the drugs, you have 00:22:42.430 --> 00:22:45.930 Izzy Stradlin. The quiet one, the rhythm guitarist, 00:22:45.950 --> 00:22:48.769 the soul of the band in many ways. He was crucial 00:22:48.769 --> 00:22:51.829 to the songwriting, right? He and Axl. He was 00:22:51.829 --> 00:22:54.630 the glue. Axl was the voice, Slash was the soul, 00:22:54.849 --> 00:22:57.869 but Izzy was the architect of the songs. And 00:22:57.869 --> 00:23:00.670 Izzy had recently gotten sober. He was traveling 00:23:00.670 --> 00:23:02.470 in a separate van because he just couldn't be 00:23:02.470 --> 00:23:04.410 around the heroin and the alcohol on the main 00:23:04.410 --> 00:23:06.769 tour bus anymore. And looking at St. Louis, looking 00:23:06.769 --> 00:23:10.049 at the chaos in Europe, he just decided he was 00:23:10.049 --> 00:23:12.089 done. He looked at the circus and said, I'm not 00:23:12.089 --> 00:23:15.269 going to die for this. He quit in November 1991. 00:23:16.240 --> 00:23:18.559 And that was the moment the band truly broke, 00:23:18.680 --> 00:23:20.640 even if they kept touring for another two years. 00:23:20.980 --> 00:23:23.740 Without Izzy, the balance of power shifted 100 00:23:23.740 --> 00:23:27.240 % to Axl. And that shift leads us into the slow, 00:23:27.299 --> 00:23:30.339 painful disintegration of the mid -90s. The tour 00:23:30.339 --> 00:23:33.660 finally ends in 1993. They're exhausted. They 00:23:33.660 --> 00:23:35.700 release the spaghetti incident. which is a covers 00:23:35.700 --> 00:23:37.619 album. It was supposed to be a fun, back -to 00:23:37.619 --> 00:23:39.859 -roots punk covers album, something to clear 00:23:39.859 --> 00:23:42.200 their heads. The title itself came from a drug 00:23:42.200 --> 00:23:44.700 lawsuit involving Steven Adler. He used to refer 00:23:44.700 --> 00:23:46.680 to his stash as spaghetti when he kept it in 00:23:46.680 --> 00:23:49.099 the fridge. Even this fun covers album managed 00:23:49.099 --> 00:23:51.779 to have a major scandal. The hidden track, Look 00:23:51.779 --> 00:23:53.880 at Your Game Girl. A song written by Charles 00:23:53.880 --> 00:23:57.710 Manson. The cult leader. The murderer. Axl included 00:23:57.710 --> 00:24:00.369 a cover of a Charles Manson song as an unlisted 00:24:00.369 --> 00:24:02.910 hidden track. He thought it was dark, ironic 00:24:02.910 --> 00:24:05.509 humor. He thought it was edgy. The public did 00:24:05.509 --> 00:24:08.130 not think it was funny. No, not at all. Victim 00:24:08.130 --> 00:24:10.410 rights groups were outraged. It was a PR nightmare. 00:24:10.650 --> 00:24:13.369 The label had to agree to donate all the royalties 00:24:13.369 --> 00:24:16.109 from that specific song to the son of one of 00:24:16.109 --> 00:24:18.730 Manson's victims. It was just another example 00:24:18.730 --> 00:24:21.170 of Axl's judgment drifting further and further 00:24:21.170 --> 00:24:23.349 away from reality. And the internal fracture 00:24:23.349 --> 00:24:26.269 finally snaps during the recording of Sympathy 00:24:26.269 --> 00:24:29.910 for the Devil. This is 1994. A Rolling Stones 00:24:29.910 --> 00:24:32.150 cover for the Interview with the Vampire soundtrack. 00:24:32.509 --> 00:24:34.789 This is the breaking point for Slash. He goes 00:24:34.789 --> 00:24:37.009 into the studio, records his guitar parts, lays 00:24:37.009 --> 00:24:39.210 down his solo, he thinks they're done. Then, 00:24:39.289 --> 00:24:41.670 without telling Slash, Axl brings in his childhood 00:24:41.670 --> 00:24:44.609 friend, a guitarist named Paul Tobias, sometimes 00:24:44.609 --> 00:24:47.029 referred to as Paul Huge. And what does Axl have 00:24:47.029 --> 00:24:49.730 Paul do? He has Paul record his own guitar playing, 00:24:49.930 --> 00:24:52.490 doubling and playing over Slash's parts. That 00:24:52.490 --> 00:24:54.710 is the ultimate betrayal for a musician, especially 00:24:54.710 --> 00:24:57.240 a lead guitarist. It is the ultimate sign of 00:24:57.240 --> 00:24:59.619 disrespect. Slash hears the final mix and realizes 00:24:59.619 --> 00:25:02.180 his signature sound has been erased and replaced 00:25:02.180 --> 00:25:05.700 by Axl's buddy. Slash's quote about that moment 00:25:05.700 --> 00:25:08.059 was simply, there was no democracy there. And 00:25:08.059 --> 00:25:11.200 that was it. Slash quits in October 1996. Then 00:25:11.200 --> 00:25:13.700 Matt Sorum gets fired in 1997 after getting into 00:25:13.700 --> 00:25:16.140 an argument with Axl about, you guessed it, Paul 00:25:16.140 --> 00:25:21.039 Tobias. And Duff McKagan. Poor Duff. He was the 00:25:21.039 --> 00:25:23.380 last original member standing besides Axl. And 00:25:23.380 --> 00:25:26.700 he resigns in August 1997. He had just become 00:25:26.700 --> 00:25:28.880 a father for the first time. He wanted stability. 00:25:29.240 --> 00:25:31.420 He looked at Guns N' Roses and saw nothing but 00:25:31.420 --> 00:25:34.380 chaos and Axl's whims. So he walked away. So 00:25:34.380 --> 00:25:37.500 by 1998, it's just Axl. He legally owns the name 00:25:37.500 --> 00:25:39.599 Guns N' Roses. And we enter what I like to call 00:25:39.599 --> 00:25:42.039 the wilderness years. A decade of silence interrupted 00:25:42.039 --> 00:25:44.819 only by extreme weirdness. The revolving door 00:25:44.819 --> 00:25:47.559 of band members during this time is insane. You 00:25:47.559 --> 00:25:49.660 have Robin Fink from Nine Inch Nails. You have 00:25:49.660 --> 00:25:52.000 Tommy Stinson from The Replacements. And then 00:25:52.000 --> 00:25:54.180 you have Buckethead. We have to talk about Buckethead. 00:25:54.220 --> 00:25:56.569 Please, let's. Buckethead is a guitarist who 00:25:56.569 --> 00:25:59.089 is, by all accounts, a virtuoso. He can play 00:25:59.089 --> 00:26:04.089 anything. But his stage persona is unique. He 00:26:04.089 --> 00:26:07.390 wears a white Michael Myers style mask and he 00:26:07.390 --> 00:26:11.400 wears a KFC bucket on his head. A literal. Fast 00:26:11.400 --> 00:26:13.339 food fried chicken bucket. Yes, and sometimes 00:26:13.339 --> 00:26:16.079 orange rubber raincoats. And he speaks through 00:26:16.079 --> 00:26:18.700 a hand puppet named Herbie. And Axl Rose, the 00:26:18.700 --> 00:26:21.079 guy who wrote Welcome to the Jungle, looked at 00:26:21.079 --> 00:26:24.079 this and said, yes, this is my new lead guitarist. 00:26:24.180 --> 00:26:26.160 It gets weirder. During the recording of the 00:26:26.160 --> 00:26:28.400 new album, Buckethead requested that a chicken 00:26:28.400 --> 00:26:30.660 coop be built for him inside the recording studio. 00:26:30.740 --> 00:26:33.299 A coop, like with wire mesh and straw and everything? 00:26:33.519 --> 00:26:36.279 Yes. A dedicated enclosed space for him to play 00:26:36.279 --> 00:26:38.119 his guitar parts in so he would feel comfortable. 00:26:38.339 --> 00:26:40.740 And Axl, because he was so deep into this project, 00:26:40.940 --> 00:26:43.059 allowed it. They built the coop. This is where 00:26:43.059 --> 00:26:45.359 the $14 million was going. Chicken coops in the 00:26:45.359 --> 00:26:48.059 studio. Exactly. This brings us to Chinese democracy. 00:26:48.539 --> 00:26:51.619 The album. The myth. It took over a decade to 00:26:51.619 --> 00:26:53.859 make. It reportedly cost somewhere between $13 00:26:53.859 --> 00:26:57.240 and $14 million. The most expensive rock album 00:26:57.240 --> 00:26:59.759 ever produced. It became a running joke in the 00:26:59.759 --> 00:27:03.640 music industry. Axl was hiring and firing producers 00:27:03.640 --> 00:27:06.460 like he was changing socks. He was renting out 00:27:06.460 --> 00:27:09.960 major recording studios for $2 ,000 a day and 00:27:09.960 --> 00:27:12.420 then just not showing up for weeks on end. And 00:27:12.420 --> 00:27:14.940 the world started to mock them. Do you remember 00:27:14.940 --> 00:27:17.920 the Dr. Pepper bet? Oh, I do. This was the peak 00:27:17.920 --> 00:27:21.400 of the absurdity. In 2008, the soda company Dr. 00:27:21.539 --> 00:27:23.720 Pepper put out a press release. They promised 00:27:23.720 --> 00:27:25.940 that if Chinese democracy actually dropped before 00:27:25.940 --> 00:27:27.759 the end of that year, they would give a free 00:27:27.759 --> 00:27:30.339 can of soda to everyone in America. Everyone 00:27:30.339 --> 00:27:34.079 in America except Slash and Buckethead. That 00:27:34.079 --> 00:27:35.940 was the official stipulation. It was a corporate 00:27:35.940 --> 00:27:38.759 troll job. Axel actually responded on his website 00:27:38.759 --> 00:27:41.380 saying he would share his Dr. Pepper with Buckethead, 00:27:41.440 --> 00:27:44.630 but not Slash. And then miraculously... In November 00:27:44.630 --> 00:27:47.009 2008, the album actually came out. It did. It 00:27:47.009 --> 00:27:49.750 was a Best Buy exclusive. And it was fine. That's 00:27:49.750 --> 00:27:51.910 the tragedy, isn't it? After all that time and 00:27:51.910 --> 00:27:54.049 money, it wasn't a masterpiece, but it wasn't 00:27:54.049 --> 00:27:56.589 terrible. It wasn't bad. There's some great songs 00:27:56.589 --> 00:27:59.890 on it. Better is a fantastic song. But it wasn't 00:27:59.890 --> 00:28:02.109 the second coming of Christ. It was a dense, 00:28:02.190 --> 00:28:06.170 overproduced, industrial rock album. It lacked 00:28:06.170 --> 00:28:08.289 that raw chemistry we talked about at the beginning. 00:28:08.509 --> 00:28:11.369 It lacked the friction of Slash and Duff and 00:28:11.369 --> 00:28:15.259 Izzy. So for years, Axl tours this new version 00:28:15.259 --> 00:28:17.799 of the band. People assume the classic lineup 00:28:17.799 --> 00:28:21.420 is dead and buried forever. In 2012, an interviewer 00:28:21.420 --> 00:28:24.000 asked Axl if the original lineup would ever reunite. 00:28:24.079 --> 00:28:25.960 Do you remember what he said? Oh, vividly. He 00:28:25.960 --> 00:28:28.160 said, not in this lifetime. Not in this lifetime. 00:28:28.359 --> 00:28:31.660 Which brings us to 2016. The impossible happens. 00:28:31.980 --> 00:28:34.539 Money has a way of healing wounds. Or at least, 00:28:34.559 --> 00:28:37.200 bandaging them for a very lucrative tour. Slash 00:28:37.200 --> 00:28:39.559 and Duff officially rejoin the band. It was the 00:28:39.559 --> 00:28:42.039 reunion nobody thought they would ever see. And 00:28:42.039 --> 00:28:44.279 in a stroke of marketing genius, they named the 00:28:44.279 --> 00:28:46.980 tour the Not In This Lifetime Tour. They owned 00:28:46.980 --> 00:28:49.740 the quote. Leaned right into it. And the revenue. 00:28:49.980 --> 00:28:52.319 My God. It became the second or third highest 00:28:52.319 --> 00:28:54.859 grossing tour of all time. We are talking over 00:28:54.859 --> 00:28:58.680 $580 million. But of course, it's Guns N' Roses. 00:28:58.880 --> 00:29:00.720 It couldn't start perfectly. There had to be 00:29:00.720 --> 00:29:04.319 some chaos. Of course not. The very first warm 00:29:04.319 --> 00:29:06.539 -up gig at the Troubadour back where it all started 00:29:06.539 --> 00:29:11.549 in 1985. Axl slips on a wet spot on stage. And 00:29:11.549 --> 00:29:14.190 breaks his foot? He shatters a bone in his foot. 00:29:14.269 --> 00:29:17.109 So for the kickoff of the biggest rock reunion 00:29:17.109 --> 00:29:21.009 in history, the frontman is in a cast. So what 00:29:21.009 --> 00:29:23.559 did he do? He called Dave Grohl. Right. Dave 00:29:23.559 --> 00:29:26.160 Roll from the Foo Fighters had broken his leg 00:29:26.160 --> 00:29:29.579 a year prior and had this ridiculous, giant, 00:29:29.700 --> 00:29:32.559 illuminated guitar throne built so he could sit 00:29:32.559 --> 00:29:34.920 and play shows. So Axl borrowed the throne. It's 00:29:34.920 --> 00:29:37.240 such a bizarre image. The most dangerous singer 00:29:37.240 --> 00:29:40.019 in rock sitting on a borrowed throne like a king 00:29:40.019 --> 00:29:42.539 on Game of Thrones, screaming his lungs out. 00:29:42.640 --> 00:29:44.380 But it worked. And more importantly, on that 00:29:44.380 --> 00:29:46.420 tour, they showed up on time. That was the big 00:29:46.420 --> 00:29:48.660 change, wasn't it? The chaos was managed. The 00:29:48.660 --> 00:29:51.000 production was slick. It was a well -oiled professional 00:29:51.000 --> 00:29:53.559 machine. And since... then they've kept that 00:29:53.559 --> 00:29:55.799 machine running. They released the appetite locked 00:29:55.799 --> 00:29:58.259 and loaded box set. They started releasing new 00:29:58.259 --> 00:30:00.250 singles. Yeah, they went back into the vault. 00:30:00.569 --> 00:30:03.710 Songs like Absurd and Hard School came out in 00:30:03.710 --> 00:30:06.289 2021. These were actually reworked tracks from 00:30:06.289 --> 00:30:08.490 the Chinese Democracy Sessions that didn't make 00:30:08.490 --> 00:30:10.690 the original album. Absurd definitely has that 00:30:10.690 --> 00:30:13.349 industrial Nine Inch Nails vibe. It does. It's 00:30:13.349 --> 00:30:15.109 aggressive. It shows they are trying to bridge 00:30:15.109 --> 00:30:18.430 the gap between the old sound and Axl's newer, 00:30:18.509 --> 00:30:21.049 more industrial vision. But it hasn't been entirely 00:30:21.049 --> 00:30:24.319 without hiccups. Glastonbury 2023. Yeah, that 00:30:24.319 --> 00:30:26.579 was a rough patch. They headlined the festival, 00:30:26.660 --> 00:30:29.220 but the reviews were scathing. Fans and critics 00:30:29.220 --> 00:30:31.420 complained about the sound mix. They said Axl's 00:30:31.420 --> 00:30:33.480 vocals were cutting in and out or that he sounded 00:30:33.480 --> 00:30:36.220 weak. The band blamed the BBC, right? They blamed 00:30:36.220 --> 00:30:38.539 the broadcast mix. But it was a reminder that 00:30:38.539 --> 00:30:41.279 these guys are getting older. Axl isn't 25 anymore. 00:30:42.019 --> 00:30:44.200 Maintaining that voice, which is an incredibly 00:30:44.200 --> 00:30:47.460 difficult and punishing way to sing, is a challenge. 00:30:47.660 --> 00:30:50.519 And the lineup continues to evolve, even now. 00:30:50.890 --> 00:30:52.329 We're looking at this from our vantage point 00:30:52.329 --> 00:30:56.069 in February 2026, just last year in March 2025, 00:30:56.589 --> 00:30:59.289 Frank Ferrer, and he had been their drummer for 00:30:59.289 --> 00:31:02.349 nearly 20 years. And Isaac Carpenter join. So 00:31:02.349 --> 00:31:04.849 they're still injecting new blood into the rhythm 00:31:04.849 --> 00:31:07.150 section. They aren't afraid to make changes to 00:31:07.150 --> 00:31:09.250 keep the engine running smoothly. And looking 00:31:09.250 --> 00:31:11.910 at the calendar right now, February 6th, 2026, 00:31:12.210 --> 00:31:14.950 they are fully operational. They did the tour 00:31:14.950 --> 00:31:17.589 with the incredibly long name last year. Because 00:31:17.589 --> 00:31:20.769 what you want and what you get are two completely 00:31:20.769 --> 00:31:23.390 different things to it. That is a classic axle 00:31:23.390 --> 00:31:26.609 title right there. And now a 2026 world tour 00:31:26.609 --> 00:31:28.920 is on the books. And we're waiting for Nothing 00:31:28.920 --> 00:31:31.940 and Atlas, these two new songs. It proves that 00:31:31.940 --> 00:31:34.359 they aren't just a museum piece. They are still 00:31:34.359 --> 00:31:38.000 creating, still moving forward. So let's wrap 00:31:38.000 --> 00:31:40.180 this up. What does this all mean? When you look 00:31:40.180 --> 00:31:43.099 at the 100 million records sold. the Rock and 00:31:43.099 --> 00:31:45.640 Roll Hall of Fame induction, which, strictly 00:31:45.640 --> 00:31:48.380 speaking, Assel refused to attend. Oh, he famously 00:31:48.380 --> 00:31:50.799 sent a letter declining the induction and banning 00:31:50.799 --> 00:31:53.140 them from using his likeness. The crowd actually 00:31:53.140 --> 00:31:55.819 booed his name during the ceremony. He is consistent. 00:31:55.940 --> 00:31:58.519 I will give him that. He is. But when you look 00:31:58.519 --> 00:32:01.039 at the whole journey, from eating onions on the 00:32:01.039 --> 00:32:03.079 side of the road on the Hell Tour, to sharing 00:32:03.079 --> 00:32:05.920 a single room in the Hell House, to selling out 00:32:05.920 --> 00:32:10.299 stadiums in 2026, what is the legacy? It's the 00:32:10.299 --> 00:32:12.180 survivor spirit, but more than that, it's the 00:32:12.180 --> 00:32:14.859 power of tension. Guns N' Roses was never about 00:32:14.859 --> 00:32:17.559 harmony. It was about conflict. The friction 00:32:17.559 --> 00:32:20.480 between Axl and Slash, between the punk attitude 00:32:20.480 --> 00:32:23.079 and the piano ballads, between the street and 00:32:23.079 --> 00:32:25.740 the stadium, that friction created the sparks. 00:32:26.000 --> 00:32:28.359 And now? Now, they seem to have professionalized 00:32:28.359 --> 00:32:31.299 the friction. They are a massive, smooth -running 00:32:31.299 --> 00:32:33.500 corporate touring machine. Slash and Duff were 00:32:33.500 --> 00:32:35.920 back. The checks are clearing. But the question 00:32:35.920 --> 00:32:39.480 remains, have they tamed the jungle? Or is the 00:32:39.480 --> 00:32:41.680 danger just sleeping? Yeah, it is the question. 00:32:41.759 --> 00:32:44.259 The multi -million dollar question. Because with 00:32:44.259 --> 00:32:47.460 this band, even in 2026, you always get the sense 00:32:47.460 --> 00:32:48.759 that the wheels could come off at any moment. 00:32:48.880 --> 00:32:50.619 And let's be honest, that is why we still buy 00:32:50.619 --> 00:32:52.519 the tickets. We want to see if the car crashes. 00:32:52.960 --> 00:32:55.200 Well, if you haven't listened to Appetite for 00:32:55.200 --> 00:32:56.880 Destruction in a while, I encourage you to go 00:32:56.880 --> 00:32:59.259 back and do it. But don't just put it on in the 00:32:59.259 --> 00:33:02.779 background. Listen with fresh ears. Listen for 00:33:02.779 --> 00:33:06.099 the hunger. Listen for the desperation. Because 00:33:06.099 --> 00:33:10.890 that... Absolutely. The DNA is all in that first 00:33:10.890 --> 00:33:13.009 record. Thanks for diving in with us. We'll catch 00:33:13.009 --> 00:33:14.130 on the next one. See you then.