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Re: sp1at thread
Yeah, I transscribed the Guns bits, because they are quite interesting.
On the CD sessions songs
On Chinese Democracy, yes. I was adding to ideas that were already there. That entire record was written when I joined the band ten years ago. Except for, I wrote the chorus to Better [plays chorus], but Robin wrote that main riff, that [plays main riff], which is really interesting harmonically. So yeah, other than that, there were little bits and pieces that I added, but most of that record was done.
Because there's so much stuff that's recorded, there's so much stuff that was done, I mean, there's three albums' worth of material, easy...
I probably know them [CD sessions tracks] with different titles than you do... I don't know any that [of them] that I could play now that would make sense... There's some really good stuff. There's a song, my favorite one is a track that I don't even know it has a title, but it's one that Robin Finck wrote, and it's fantastic. [It's not Soul Monster,] no. This one hasn't leaked at all [while Soul Monster may have].
On more recently worked tracks
DJ and I've worked on stuff, nobody's worked on stuff with Ron, but yeah...
Really, what the focus has been lately is just been writing and stuff like that. And I've been pretty involved with the [Dead] Daisies, you know. Dizzy and I have been.
A lot of the new stuff that we've been working on, some other stuff that we've come in from nothing, and some of the stuff is stuff that we've been working on with ideas that were already there. Some of the stuff Slash did, you know [some 1996 session work???], that was like the beginning, the seed of the song, that's been around for a while.
But, the way he generally works is very... He's doesn't want to take the idea DJ sent. What'll he'll do is that he'll take a little piece that I sent, he'll take a little piece that DJ sent on another track, and he'll, like... and he's always done that, back even with the Appetite stuff, you know. He'd take a little piece of this, and a little piece of that, and they put it together... If you listen to it, you can sort of hear it, if you listen to different tracks. You can hear it, especially on Illusions, with the opuses, where he took little bits from different people and put them together. He's got a real talent for that.
Some of them he's working on as we're here, 'cause I know in this week, he's recording a lot of stuff, vocals, yeah...
Leaks, Team Brazil, Slash
There's a lot that hasn't leaked, thank God. Yeah, it's so weird that whole thing. Y'know, tracks getting leaked and the different versions and stuff like that, people making their own leak, there's a lot of that. And nobody from our camp really talks about it, so... meh. I'm sorry, I wish I could.
That camp is very... because, I don't know why, I mean, it's just that they're very... Axl's very secretive, I mean, he doesn't want the stuff getting out, he wants to create stuff and release it when it's ready. I get it, yeah, no problem. No problem. He's also a bit of a perfectionist, as you can imagine.
The thing with Slash is really between Axl and Slash, and none of the rest of us have any feelings about it whatsoever. No, it's not something we sit around talking, 'Oh, it's Slash doing it...' We all have a lot of respect for him and it's not something we talk about really. Axl tells stories all the time, you know? [About Slash?]
Live shows, Duff
[Leaving the stage after the show is] hard, especially when you're playing in front of a lot of people, that's tough to come down from. Y'know, it's tough to walk off-stage and that's why, like Guns N' Roses, Axl's thing is he doesn't want to come down, he wants to carry it on somewhere else and he goes to a party and that party goes to another... yeah, yeah. I rather just go to my room and meditate, get up early and all. Otherwise, you just end up in this quaqmire, the black hole, hours become days and days become weeks... yeah, it's not good.
As far as [playing future shows with] Duff, I really couldn't say. I mean, I love playing with him. He's a fantastic musician, and has also become one of my best friends. He's a really close friend, and a great human being. Really, really solid dude. He's become a great guy. But yeah, I really don't know, because Tommy's been busy with the Replacements stuff, so there was talk about Duff doing more shows... I don't know what's going to happen with that. That's very up in the air right now.
======
Richard makes very curious remarks. He's saying he and DJ have worked on the next album as of late, as has Axl. Hell, two weeks ago Axl was apparently in the studio! The aside is, Ron appears oblivious to all this.
Am I alone in feeling Ron's troubled relationship with the band has ostracized him from the song-writing process? Is this Ron going Gilby, in that the great collaborator in the form of Izzy/Bucket has left the building and Axl's wary on using the replacement as anything but a step up from a technician, someone who can walk in and fill the pocket, but doesn't really inspire Axl to collaborate from scratch?
Richard and DJ both have said they were hired because Axl wanted players he felt he could write with. Not Ron. He was the 'fuck-it-the-world-tour-is-starting-and-we-lack-the-lead' guy. He walked into a highly charged situation made worse by the Axl/Merck Mercuriadis way of managing Guns. That is, the band learned about Ron being, essentially, the guy, when he walked into the room a week before the shows.
For any self-respecting band on the verge of their show-yr-teeth moment, it's turbulent. It would help a lot if they'd already know the guy personally, or better yet, would've played with him in the past. Ron was the nobody hail-mary, as Axl felt Bucket's parts should be reproduced live - instead of allowing the band to gel into a tighter unit and find alternate ways to fill that pocket. They could've done it, I think - Fortus is Josh Freese, a right off the bat chameleon, who can quickly adapt to the players around him. The other guys had been together for six years, they'd written a pile of songs, toured...
The '06 band was dangerous in its own way, only the danger was inward. Imagine how charged the atmosphere is with the Guns legacy hanging about the venue, the crowd getting disgruntled with the wait, walking on to the stage with the guy you have issues with, and then having your crazy boss run past you like a man on fire, and you just try to lock in to the groove. The good thing is, the songwriting's solid. The Appetite tracks have that timeless rock bent to them that also characterized the best of Stones, among others. These guys found the songs and became good with them.
Still, Ron has mentioned in interviews that he was the redheaded stepchild; he decidedly rebelled against the way Guns operated internally. He was at odds with the band, who were a segregated, long-suffering unit from the rest of the organization. Who took him like Slash took Paul Huge. It's wasn't probably the same 'the guy can't play', but it definitely came across as similar to Slash's and Duff's sentiments that they were being forcefed someone they had no part in choosing. The difference is, Paul was Axl's boy, a 'made man', like Robin.
This, of course, is how Guns operates on Axl watch. As he explained it:
In working with these people. You know, I developed a kinda one on one individual relationships, and little.. Little groups in putting this thing together rather... I mean this isn't a band of a bunch of guys who met at a bar, or found each other through, you know, ads in the paper or anything. It's been, you know, I carefully looked for these individual people and their personalities and how exciting each one of them is and what they bring to this project. So then, the challenge was, you know, working with all those different personalities and bringing those personalities together. Especially personalities that, ahh you know, when they have to learn how to play other people's material, then that's difficult as well.
So there was a lot of challenges in bringing that together, but now everyone's pretty excited. Everyone got pretty excited doing the little mini-tour, and that brought us together more as an actually band rather than a studio band, where everyone is kind of working separetely maybe even on the same songs. In little clusters here and there, but it's not the same thing as actually being a stage and road band.
...With the guys, I mean. I do have, a really positive relationship with the individual members and each one of them ahh, you know excites me with what they bring to it creatively or just as a person and how each one of them works really hard, because I think anyone that watches this project at all, also sees, the abuse that this project goes through. And these guys shoulder that really, really well and... And they dont have a problem dealing with it, and I have to, you know, just respect the hell out of that with these guys.
The band is an extension of Axl's artistic vision, so recruits come through him and by the time they reach the band, the scales are already shifting. The interpersonal chemistry of the lineup is not something Axl bothers with much. His line would likely be, 'They're grown-ups, they can work it out by themselves.' While auditioning to a high-profile gig like Guns understandably takes a few sessions without the band in the room, would it hurt to have Tommy there in the control booth with Axl? As the bassist, Tommy could offer his two cents about in relation to the rest of the band, musically. He'd have an inkling on whether or not it could work. He could brief the band at the next rehearsal on what to expect. The band would be given the respect of having a vote.
But it's not a vote, it's the Axl band. And Duff's looking strong to come back to it. It's Duff's best gig at the moment, hands down. VR would be the optimum, but Slash doesn't want to play with Corey Taylor. Tommy's got Paul Westerberg calling him up, so it could be perceived as a win-win. I'd assume Duff would very soon carry the gravitas Axl doesn't give employees, not even made men.
Duff would be a peer.
Re: sp1at thread
Duff won't be a peer....Axl will never have any peers again business wise. He obviously wants full control and is too old and stubborn to change now. Duff is more of a peer on a spiritual level and a friendship level.
As for Axl collaborators, I don't put Bucket in that category or Fortus or Dj or Ron. From what we have heard (tracks actually released or leaked like Going Down), Axl's main collaborators for song ideas were Robin, Tommy, Paul, and Dizzy. Bucket pretty much came in as a hired gun to add solos and some riffs to already existing songs...big guns like SOD, IRS, TWAT, and Prostitute for example. Fortus did the same thing except he didn't lay down any mind blowing solos like Bucket. We have no clue what DJ's ultimate role will be.
By the time Axl actually releases something, those tracks recorded ten years ago or just yesterday for that matter could have any number of guitarists playing all kinds of different stuff.
Re: sp1at thread
Bucket, from everything we know, sat in the studio for at least two years with Brain writing music, Sorry, Scraped, SR and The General, that we know of. I'd say Bucket was a songwriting partner, just not in the Tommy, Dizzy, Chris, Paul crowd.
I've had no expectations of Ron contributing anything to the band. I still don't understand the mentality of wanting to sit around and wait for everyone to get in the same room. You have Richard and DJ working together, with pictures of DJ working with Mother Goose.
And if Soul Monster might have being leaked, could that be Checkmate?
Re: sp1at thread
Reminds me of Tommy chirping away back in 2004. He learned his lesson and clammed up for the next eight years.
Yeah, that's the problem. Fortus makes some off the cuff remarks to fans, then they get uploaded to the internet and quoted as click-bait headlines on the blogosphere. "Guns N’ Roses Tap Into Old Slash Material for New Album," etc. Axl sees the articles, flips out, then goes back to his mansion and no new material is released for another decade.
Re: sp1at thread
Bucket, from everything we know, sat in the studio for at least two years with Brain writing music, Sorry, Scraped, SR and The General, that we know of. I'd say Bucket was a songwriting partner, just not in the Tommy, Dizzy, CrispPaul crowd.
I've had no expectations of Ron contributing anything to the band. I still don't understand the mentality of wanting to sit around and wait for everyone to get in the same room. You have Richard and DJ working together, with pictures of DJ working with Mother Goose.
And if Soul Monster might have being leaked, could that be Checkmate?
Bucket has 3 writing credits out of the 15 officially released songs...Paul has 8, Robin and Dizzy 7, Tommy 5 and Brain and Mother Goose 2...according to ascap
Re: sp1at thread
misterID wrote:Bucket, from everything we know, sat in the studio for at least two years with Brain writing music, Sorry, Scraped, SR and The General, that we know of. I'd say Bucket was a songwriting partner, just not in the Tommy, Dizzy, CrispPaul crowd.
I've had no expectations of Ron contributing anything to the band. I still don't understand the mentality of wanting to sit around and wait for everyone to get in the same room. You have Richard and DJ working together, with pictures of DJ working with Mother Goose.
And if Soul Monster might have being leaked, could that be Checkmate?
Bucket has 3 writing credits out of the 15 officially released songs...Paul has 8, Robin and Dizzy 7, Tommy 5 and Brain and Mother Goose 2...according to ascap
Yeah, but I think he was brought in to write and by all accounts he did. Not just add solos. We have no idea how many songs Bucket contributed but it's clear it's more than Ron.
Re: sp1at thread
All this talk about writing songs, having finished songs. For years, decades. There's even some Slash material laying around. Yet nothing ever happens!
I could understand it with CD. Coming back with a new band, all the pressure, the gigantic media myth that grew up around it. I can understand why Axl wanted all that to be perfect.
But now? There can't be much pressure except in his own mind. Nobody is waiting for a new GN'R album. Nobody is expecting it will sell much. He can pretty much do it in any style he want. The Slashist have given up on him, and the rest are ready for anything. And from everything we know this is a guy that genuinely likes music. Frustrating.
He did beat Duke Nukem though. So it isn't totally hopeless.
Re: sp1at thread
Duff won't be a peer....Axl will never have any peers again business wise. He obviously wants full control and is too old and stubborn to change now. Duff is more of a peer on a spiritual level and a friendship level.
That's my point exactly.
Duff can knock on the door after over a decade and have Team Brazil tell him Axl's taking a shower. Nonplussed, he's the dude who can say, 'I've seen him naked before.'
Team Brazil know this. Duff and Izzy are guys who are beyond their reach. They want to talk to Axl, they will talk to Axl, because Axl wants to hear from them. Out of the two, Duff is the one who could become a returning member. He's dependable, eager to write, eager to work. Duff could be the magic bullet to push Axl into a respectable twilight of his career. Reunion could be never, but imagine the Axl band with Duff on bass full-time and Izzy guesting on a song. That'd be amiable.
As for Axl collaborators, I don't put Bucket in that category or Fortus or Dj or Ron. From what we have heard (tracks actually released or leaked like Going Down), Axl's main collaborators for song ideas were Robin, Tommy, Paul, and Dizzy.
Regarding the songs of the '99 album, you're right. But then came the Bob Ezrin 'three good songs' incident and more songwriting was encouraged. Bucket left his mark at this point, I think. Brain wrote The General, etc. Robin and Richard wrote Better, even if the main riff may have been around longer. This was all post-Sean Beavan stuff, it was the Roy Thomas Baker -produced album.
There can't be much pressure except in his own mind. Nobody is waiting for a new GN'R album. Nobody is expecting it will sell much. He can pretty much do it in any style he want.
True. Imagine if this Richard video had surfaced a decade ago. The wait for nothing between 2003 and 2005 was crowded, against all reason.
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Re: sp1at thread
TIME THE FUCK OUT! WE are going to finally hear songs from the 94-96 era that Slash started? Hoooo Leee Fuck!!! If Axl uses Slash stuff from 1996, wow... I wonder how that will go down. Will Slash get a writing credit??
