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Re: The Creative Crisis of Guns N' Roses
I wil also agree and disagree with you, guys. Robin wasn't clearly the best guy to play the old tracks in 2001-2, where he butchered many songs really horribly. but in 2006-7 he improved a lot, did a great job at the new songs, and he brought in something that was neccessary... I must say I loved the 3-guitar lineup (and when Izzy occasionally joined them onstage, it was like a steamroller). definitely, Richard stabilized the whole thing. he was kind of lost during 2002, but in 2006 he just became an inseparable part. and later from 2009 he stole me! 
Re: The Creative Crisis of Guns N' Roses
Yeah I agree with you. I'm not sure the NIN act of Robin was working in Guns 01-02. I'm one who does like the VMA performance, but catching some of the tour vids on YT they looked like an inconsistent mess. I did have tix to the cancelled Philly show, still would've liked to have seen them, but probably for the better.
The problem was no one was in charge. It was Axl, and 5 individuals doing their own thing, AND covering a previous band. So each had a song to play, but tried throwing in their own artistic liberties and it just didn't work. The hippy Robin was great tho, and his solo's really did get good, by the end I was a fan. Ashame Bucket never worked in Guns but they really needed him to help with new songs from scratch, not come in on half written tunes. He was fine on the old stuff, killed it.
Re: The Creative Crisis of Guns N' Roses
The gift of hindsight would say that Axl should've cast off his lead guitarist after every album cycle.
At a minimum, when he wipes someone's contributions off the record for petty reasons, he should stick with it and not get back together with them a hot second later. Instead, we got the same stop-and-go bullshit for years.
Axl could've had his cake and eaten it too. An ear for diverse music, an eye for talented young guitarists. A rotating cast of players that deliver good performances which benefit "GN'R" musically, the fans as new albums are released, and Axl with his reputation and legacy. I mean if he had produced some records in the mean time he could even have captured Bowie off-stage as well.
It's hard to imagine CD without Buckethead's contributions but we're through the looking glass. That option doesn't exist if the chickenman doesn't enter the roost. It'd merely be a fantasy scenario on music boards. And as great as his contributions are, it's a perfectly acceptable album without them. If you release CD Mk. I 1997-1999, it's a hit record.
So much fuckery.
Re: The Creative Crisis of Guns N' Roses
Zilla, you might be right, but the problem is simple - an "album cycle" just doesn't work for obvious reasons - Axl never releases anything properly. even the ChiDem release was quite forced and it should already have been released numerous times - summer 2001 was the first realistic date and fall 2006 the last one. another 2 years of delays were just ridiculous.
and yeah, Bucket was one of the neccessary pillars of the album and without him it would probably never materialize from the mess they were doing before he joined - remember that the pre-Bucket years, it was just a huge pile of ideas, not really transformed into songs yet, and he was one of the catalysts, maybe even the most important one, hard to say from 2017 perspective, lol!
Re: The Creative Crisis of Guns N' Roses
Too true.
But you had a full skeleton crew album sans Axl by 1998 per Barber and two albums with Axl by 1999 per May, Beavan, and others.
I think the 2007-2008 delay is an interesting time. Also interesting considering Robin was known to be departed before the end of the year.
Sigh. This stupid band.
Re: The Creative Crisis of Guns N' Roses
aye, aye. nothing works normally in this band's world. but meh, thank God that Axl's inactivity forced me to search for another bands and music styles, and in the end I don't even really care about what's he doing anymore, unless anything new gets released, either leak or official stuff. as a nostalgia act, it's not interesting for me and his poor voice has also already been discussed.
but it's cool to talk about old events here, no zerg waves of newbs and idiots (as on HTGTH or even MyGNR) and critical opinions are welcome, so this is the best forum for this
Re: The Creative Crisis of Guns N' Roses
The gift of hindsight would say that Axl should've cast off his lead guitarist after every album cycle.
Actually that's a pretty good concept. With the passing of the Steely Dan founder recently I honestly never knew they were mostly that. 2 guys & a rotating crew of session musicians, brought in for a certain task. I saw a clip where they brought in numerous guitarists just to try a solo on a certain song. Each rejected one was totally different from the final song. Most were technical strat sounding whereas the one ended up in the final mix was a bluesy Joe Walsh sound. Why they didn't just tell the first few guitarists 'Hey can u do a Joe Walsh sound?' I dunno but thats how they operated.
Re: The Creative Crisis of Guns N' Roses
Ozzy is the most obvious comparison. When he wasn't working with Iommi, Rhoads, or Lee he was getting songs written by Lemmy.
Axl even called Robin his Randy Rhoads as many would recall.
But you can't do industrial / nu-metal properly and then switch to piano ballads and do that competently as well. You need specialists.
To his credit, Axl realized how badly he fucked things up with Bucket if he tried twice to get him back.
this is the best forum for this
Amen.
I haven't been to one in a decade and the other one is a bunch of catty senior citizens recreating high school. Fucking awful. Never going back again. Damn you James, corrupting me with Fleetwood Mac references!!
Re: The Creative Crisis of Guns N' Roses
To his credit, Axl realized how badly he fucked things up with Bucket if he tried twice to get him back.
maybe he just had no clue what to do without him, had some kind of panic reaction and felt lost - I can imagine that. and as a reaction, he tried desperatedly to get BH back (to no avail, as we realised right when the 2006 tour started).
the truth is, ChiDem tracks are just made for 3 guitarists. they're thick with guitar melodies and they require a virtuoso. the songs sounded awesome live during Bumble's stint in GNR, because he did a great job in kind of imitating Bucket's parts, and of course nailed his own parts.
now, the ChiDem songs they play live, sound much more humble and scaled down, without that grandiose virtuoso touch. yeah, both Slash and Richard do their best, but this is simple not their league. especially poor Richard trying to play BH/BBF wicked solos just sounds sad, this is not what he's good at. and Slash trying to reinvent the rest is a big hit or miss thing - sometimes it sounds interesting, sometimes I wish DJ Ashba or his clone was still there imitating Robin's parts, because it worked well during his stint. oh well... this is fucked. it has been fucked since day one, but still it's so sad...
Re: The Creative Crisis of Guns N' Roses
I think the bullying of Bucket is the most shameful thing about the whole saga.
And I was saying that because he wanted him back pre-2006 and there was some gossip about him trying again post-2008.
Yes, right on though. They also supercharged the old material which sounded great. A damn shame, the whole affair. Now we have the leavings.
