You are not logged in. Please register or login.
- Topics: Active | Unanswered
#111 Re: Guns N' Roses » Hard School Physical Release » 178 weeks ago
Shipping dates have changed, according to the GnR merch site.
Surprisingly for this band, all items are shipping earlier than originally scheduled, on January 28 (so it's a month earlier for the CD and six months earlier for the 7'' and the cassette).
#112 Re: Guns N' Roses » Slash: GNR has not written any new music, everything completed is CD 2 » 180 weeks ago
Not sure but it may have been done again during the Illusion sessions
Yes, it was. A version with vocals is on one of the UYI era bootlegs (the one titled "Axl's advance copy").
It was in a UYI tracklist in April 1991, so it seems it was intended to be included in the albums. Slash said in 1994, when he was promoting the pinball machine, that they didn't finish it during the UYI sessions, so I guess that's why it didn't make the albums and was used for the pinball machine.
I suppose the UYI demo will be in the box set, although it doesn't necessarily mean it will be released as a single.
#113 Re: Guns N' Roses » Slash: GNR has not written any new music, everything completed is CD 2 » 181 weeks ago
There is a new Slash interview in Classic Rock magazine (not available online yet). He repeats that GnR haven't worked on brand new songs, but says more re-recorded material from the CD era is coming out. It seems they'll keep releasing songs and not an album at once, and (maybe) that they haven't finished recording yet. Here are the related parts:
Were there any songs or riffs on the new Conspirators record that you thought: “Maybe I should save this for the Guns N’ Roses album”?
No. Guns is a completely different process. That happens more like collectively sitting around and Guns going: “Okay, we’re gonna make a record”, and sort of compiling ideas in that moment. But we haven’t really done that yet. So I just did the Conspirators thing because I’d written all this material for it.
Two new Guns N’ Roses songs, Absurd and Hard Skool, were posted online in 2021. These are songs from the Chinese Democracy era. What was the thinking behind that?
You know, that’s a whole other interview!
Can we at least get the story straight – were these songs re-recorded with the current GN’R line-up?
The bass and the guitars are all re-done, for the most part, but the original drums are still intact, and the vocals.
Will these songs be on the new Guns N’ Roses album? Or do they at least give an indication as to how that album is shaping up?
Hmm. I don’t know. Like I said, that’s another interview. That involves a whole other mind-set to get into. Basically, the material [Absurd and Hard Skool] was there, and I just got in there during covid and re-did the guitars, Duff did the bass, and we went from there and just put it out. And there’s some more stuff coming out too. But there’s not sort of a mental trajectory. It’s just that Axl wanted to get this material done because it was sitting there. He said: “Okay, we can rehash it.” So there you go.
[…]
The big question is whether Guns N’ Roses can pull it off with the new album you’re making. You’ve said you can’t really talk about it, but can you say, for sure, that it’s definitely happening?
Yeah! There’s new Guns material coming out as we speak, and we’ll probably keep putting it out until the entire record’s worth of stuff is done and then put it out solid.
Nobody is expecting another Appetite for Destruction, of course. But how does this sound: fifty per cent Use Your Illusion I and II and fifty per cent Chinese Democracy? Is that the kind of thing we can expect?
I really don’t have the vantage point to be able to have that perspective. I’m just not able to sort of objectively look at it like that. It’s just what it is. But it’s cool. I’m enjoying working on the stuff and having a good time doing it.
#114 Re: Guns N' Roses » Slash: GNR has not written any new music, everything completed is CD 2 » 191 weeks ago
Also no music news websites quoted it...
Stereogum says that "all the members of a previous GN’R lineup have songwriting lyrics on "Hard Skool" ", but of course they don't have any source for it
It appears that they sent the press release later on the day HS was released in the US. But, in the meantime, most sites (like stereogum) had already reported about it, since it had been released in other parts of the world earlier (and before that Slash had shared a soundcheck clip). Those sites seemingly got the information on the credits from Genius.com, which listed all the members of the 1999 lineup as writers. Genius works like wikipedia (but the edits are not really monitored) and, apparently, fans had added the Village demos in the Genius database and edited the credits according to their "best guess" (despite the guidelines requiring having a source, either the liner notes or the data on ASCAP). And then Aien, who recorded cover versions of the leaks and released them on youtube, spotify, etc., also got the credits from Genius.
But after the press release most sites quoted the information in it, e.g.
#115 Re: Guns N' Roses » Slash: GNR has not written any new music, everything completed is CD 2 » 191 weeks ago
Where can we read the press release? I couldn't find any mention of it
There was a press release? First I've heard of it...
Here:
#116 Re: Guns N' Roses » Slash: GNR has not written any new music, everything completed is CD 2 » 191 weeks ago
Hard School seems to be an argument they could do whatever they want regarding who gets credit, but if the song goes back to 96 then the likelihood is the original riff is from Slash, so yes who knows indeed. I doubt Dizzy actually wrote anything on it though. This GN'R being a different legal entity to NU GNR might play a part?
I guess if Slash had originally written the riff he would have said so in this interview instead of saying "Axl has all these songs and I wrote my own parts to what else was going on." There's also that press release that says it was written by Axl. It was probably one of the songs Axl was working on and had that studio band (the so-called "shadow band") record in the mid 90s and then Slash left before the then band did anything with them.
I can't imagine what Dizzy might have contributed to it either, but then he also has a credit on I.R.S (he shares 25% with Paul Tobias) - so, again, who knows.
#117 Re: Guns N' Roses » Slash: GNR has not written any new music, everything completed is CD 2 » 191 weeks ago
Do we know for a fact that Pitman did not write anything on Absurd? The riff comes from his instrument so I assume he wrote at least that part. But maybe it's enough for them to just erase his work, cover it and say Slash wrote it? Because I don't see much actual writing Slash did on that track.
[...]
Who knows... There's been speculation that Pitman wrote only the intro, which is gone (and was gone already in the version with Bumblefoot playing over in 2006) - and probably the bridge, which has been shortened enough so that maybe can pass as a sample and not as a proper credit? Dizzy was quoted in early 2006 saying that the (synth) riffs were his:
Dizzy: Umm... it was passed back and forth on our [Dizzy's and Pitman's] computers. yeah.. you know, we do a lot of work now on computers. We pass it back and forth and I had a couple riffs so... yeah [...] It kind of went away. I mean we actually played it a few times live... but... I'm sure it'll up at some point.
Unless the songwriting credits/shares of the former members have somehow been bought out (which doesn't seem to have happened in the case of Josh Freese, based on what he said in his recent interview). I guess we'll have to see. If, for example, Soulmonster is released and the credits are only Axl, Slash and Duff, then it will be this scenario.
#118 Re: Guns N' Roses » Slash: GNR has not written any new music, everything completed is CD 2 » 191 weeks ago
Blackstar wrote:If Absurd and Hard Skool is anything to go by, it looks like they have picked songs that were written mainly by Axl (and/or Dizzy, who is still in the band) and could be redone to such an extent that they wouldn't have to give writing credits to NuGnR members - and, on the other hand, Slash and Duff could get a credit. If that's a pattern (and I think it is) and not just a coincidence, I suppose songs like Atlas and Perhaps fall in the same category, but I don't see how songs that were (instrumentally) written entirely by former members could fit in. Because there couldn't be an album with Slash/Duff and the songwriting credits on ASCAP and the similar databases being all Finck, Buckethead, Stinson, etc. - they can't get away just by putting "written by Guns N' Roses" in the liner notes, as these databases are in the public domain. I also don't think Slash and Duff would have agreed to do it otherwise.
So there may be an album of "leftovers," but not necessarily exactly the same that was intended to be released as "CD2".
The argument against this theory is that the vast majority of instrumentals must have been written by people other than Dizzy and Axl. If Slash says "a bunch of stuff" that suggests more than just a part. And what about Paul? His fingerprints are all over those sessions. Do you think Axl would accept just cutting him out? He's still "a member" of sorts is he not?
I suppose that, say, 3 songs out of 12 where Paul Tobias (or Brain, or Tommy Stinson) would have a credit could be acceptable. But not the other way around.
Aside from Atlas Shrugged and Perhaps, there are songs like Oklahoma, or Nothing (if Axl finished it), or maybe even State of Grace, and probably others that potentially fit in this pattern.
As for Paul Tobias, no one knows what his current status is. I also don't know how big his input was. I always assumed that he co-wrote Hard Skool (which is probably from the batch of songs that originate either from 1995/96 or from the transitional period between "old" and "new" GnR, like Oklahoma, I.R.S., Oh My God and, possibly, State of Grace). But, although the credits for Hard Skool haven't appeared yet on ASCAP, GMR and SESAC, there are credits in the Billboard charts (which, based on other entries, seem accurate) and they are the same as on Absurd, i.e. Axl, Slash, Duff and Dizzy are listed as songwriters.
#119 Re: Guns N' Roses » Slash: GNR has not written any new music, everything completed is CD 2 » 191 weeks ago
If Absurd and Hard Skool is anything to go by, it looks like they have picked songs that were written mainly by Axl (and/or Dizzy, who is still in the band) and could be redone to such an extent that they wouldn't have to give writing credits to NuGnR members - and, on the other hand, Slash and Duff could get a credit. If that's a pattern (and I think it is) and not just a coincidence, I suppose songs like Atlas and Perhaps fall in the same category, but I don't see how songs that were (instrumentally) written entirely by former members could fit in. Because there couldn't be an album with Slash/Duff and the songwriting credits on ASCAP and the similar databases being all Finck, Buckethead, Stinson, etc. - they can't get away just by putting "written by Guns N' Roses" in the liner notes, as these databases are in the public domain. I also don't think Slash and Duff would have agreed to do it otherwise.
So there may be an album of "leftovers," but not necessarily exactly the same that was intended to be released as "CD2".
#120 Re: Guns N' Roses » Hardschool single coming September 24th. » 193 weeks ago
When Axl did the interview with Rolling Stone in late November 1999 (published early Feb. 2000), the title track was already called "Chinese Democracy". It's not clear from the description if any of the songs had vocals yet, but it seems at least some of them had lyrics:
Song after song combines the edgy hard rock force and pop smarts of vintage Guns N Roses with surprisingly modern and ambitious music textures. In addition to the album's almost grungy title track, tentative song titles include ''Catcher in the Rye,'' ''I.R.S,'' ''The Blues'' and ''TWAT,'' which he says stands for ''there was a time.'' Another song, called ''Oklahoma'' - heard tonight only as an instrumental - was inspired by a court date with ex-wife Erin Everly.
