November Rain

by **Soulmonster** Sat Aug 07, 2010 5:22 pm

NOVEMBER RAIN

Album:
Use Your Illusion I, 1991, track no. 10.

Use Your Illusion I Remastered, Use Your Illusion Deluxe and Super Deluxe Editions, 2022 (new mix with 50-piece orchestra).

Appetite for Destruction Remastered, 2018. Sound City Demos 1986 (piano and acoustic guitar demos).

Written by:
Axl Rose.

Musicians:
Drums: Matt
Bass: Duff
Lead and Rhythm Guitars: Slash
Rhythm Guitar: Izzy
Vocals, Piano, Keyboard Orchestra: Axl
Synthesizer Programmers: Axl, Johann
Background Vocals, Choir: Axl, Matt, Shannon, Stuart Bailey, Izzy, Duff, Dizzy, Reba Shaw

Live performances:
This song was premièred live at Deer Creek Music Center, USA, May 29, 1991 and has been a staple at live shows since then. In total it has, as of {UPDATEDATE}, at least been played {NOVEMBERSONGS} times.

Lyrics:

When I look into your eyes
I can see a love restrained
But darlin' when I hold you
Don't you know I feel the same
'Cause nothin' lasts forever
And we both know hearts can change
And it's hard to hold a candle
In the cold November rain

We've been through this such a long long time
Just tryin' to kill the pain
But lovers always come and lovers always go
And no one's really sure who's lettin' go today
Walking away
If we could take the time to lay it on the line
I could rest my head
Just knowin' that you were mine
All mine
So if you want to love me
then darlin' don't refrain
Or I'll just end up walkin'
In the cold November rain

Do you need some time...on your own
Do you need some time...all alone
Everybody needs some time...on their own
Don't you know you need some time...all alone

I know it's hard to keep an open heart
When even friends seem out to harm you
But if you could heal a broken heart
Wouldn't time be out to charm you

Sometimes I need some time...on my own
Sometimes I need some time...all alone
Everybody needs some time...on their own
Don't you know you need some time...all alone

And when your fears subside
And shadows still remain
I know that you can love me
When there's no one left to blame
So never mind the darkness
We still can find a way
'Cause nothin' lasts forever
Even cold November rain

Don't ya think that you need somebody
Don't ya think that you need someone
Everybody needs somebody
You're not the only one
You're not the only one

Quotes regarding the song and its making:

November Rain was a song Axl had been working on for many years and which could have been included on Appetite for Destruction:

When we were doing that EP for L.A. Guns, like '83? He was playing 'November Rain' — and it was called 'November Rain' — you know, on piano. The guitar solo is amazing. Way back then. It was the only thing he knew how to play, but it was his. He'd go, "Someday this song is gonna be really cool." And I'd go, "It's cool now." "But it's not done", you know, he used to say. And, like, anytime we'd be at a hotel or anywhere, there'd be a piano; he'd just kinda play that music. And I'd go, "When are you gonna finish that already", you know? And he'd go, "I don't know what to do with it".

Spin, July 1999

[Prior to releasing Appetite for Destruction]: [...] Tom [Zutaut] did manage to get us into the studio with Manny Charlton, the guitarist for Nazareth, at Sound City Studios on Whitsett and Moorpark out in the Valley. We worked on demos of 'November Rain', which was about eighteen minutes long in its original version, so needless to say we really needed to sit down and focus on arranging it.

Bozza, Anthony, & Slash (2007). Slash. Harper Entertainment: New York. p. 151

They weren't just some bar band. They were a band with a capital "B". An important band is always greater than the sum of their parts. You take one part away and the chemistry is shot and it's never the same. The five guys worked together and produced something that was great as a whole. The word is chemistry. That's what they had. They had great chemistry and they were a great band. As soon as you took one cog out of the wheel, one link out of the chain, that was it. I thought the stand-out songs were "Welcome to the Jungle" and "November Rain." Axl was playing the piano and Izzy was doing a little bit of background vocals and it was fantastic. That's when I went, "wow, there's proper songwriting skills here," and I thought that I would really like to produce them.

Marc Canter, "Reckless Road", 2007

'November Rain' had been ready to go on Appetite for Destruction, but since we already had 'Sweet Child O' Mine,' the majority of us agreed that we didn't need another ballad. Besides, the original demo of that song was eighteen minutes long give or take, and none of us cared to conquer it in the studio at that point. It had been a song that Axl tinkered with for years, whenever there was a piano present; it had been around forever and it was finally getting its due. Axl had been annoyed when Tom Zutaut suggested that we hold it until the next album, because that song meant a lot to him. He let it go, though he resented that decision for years.

Bozza, Anthony, & Slash (2007). Slash. Harper Entertainment: New York. p. 298

The thing with 'November Rain' was that, back then, it was, like, this 20-minute epic that just went on forever. We were never able to edit it down until we did it for the Use Your Illusion albums. [...] Tom Zutaut [Guns N' Roses A&R representative at Geffen at the time] was the one who said, "Let's save that for another record." And I think Axl was a little miffed about that.

Classic Rock Magazine, July 2007

We knew Axl had been working on November Rain. You can hear it on Sound City demos, right? [...] You know, he worked on it. He perfected it and, and it was a process. It was a song he needed to get out and worked on for ever since the band, I think, pretty much started. [...] There were songs we knew that we're gonna push off to a second record.

Let There Be Talk, September 17, 2018

The song was eventually set aside for Use Your Illusions and Axl was adamant that it should turn out the way he wanted:

If it is not recorded right, I'll quit the business.

Rolling Stone, November 1988

[Being asked if he'd really quit the band if November Rain wasn't done properly]: Well, it wasn’t necessarily quit the band. It was just that, like, to do that song the way I wanted to do it. I knew that we were going to need a lot of freedom and a lot of time to learn how to do things that we didn’t know how to do, or I didn’t know how to do. I mean, there’s, like, 31 different string sections on there, and I had to do them on keyboards, because I knew I didn’t know how to communicate with an orchestra well enough. And just I knew that years ago in starting writing the song that it was going to take a lot for us to pull it off the way I could hear it in my head, you know. And that’s just like, I knew that, like, when I said I’d quit the business, it was because I knew that the only reason that I wouldn’t get this right is if I wasn’t allowed to. And the song came about just out of a relationship and of how I felt in the relationship and, you know, I really cared about this person. And not being with this person made me think about being in Indiana and walking in November rain, seeing the ice on the trees and, you know, it was just - it fit to how I felt about that situation.

Rockling, November 27, 1991

During the making of the Use Your Illusions, band members would talk about the song and its inclusion:

There’s a couple of softer songs, this piano, kind of, ballad that Axl wrote. It’s a real nice song.

Rapido, September 1991

[Being asked if there really gonna be a 15-minute song on the next album filled with synthesizers and strings]:[Laughing] Could be. There's talk. We constantly disagree and keep changing from one day to the next.

By Mike Greenblatt, 1991

[November Rain] was a song that, when it first surfaced – you know, first came up in Axl’s playing on the piano – it was way before Appetite for Destruction came in, and we’d been dicking around with it for years. It used to be, like, 25 minutes long. And, finally, everything that’s on the record - almost everything, all the melodies and all that - just came off the top of my head when I first heard the piano, and I did it all on acoustic. So that’s just the way that I heard it. And when we finally decided to record it, and we had an arrangement, it pretty much came naturally. There’s some new stuff in there, but not too much.

MTV, May 21, 1992

[Recounting an episode from rehearsing for Use Your Illusion when the band was spending time in Chicago]: Seven weeks and five days later, Axl finally arrived. We had two days left in the studio and were anxious to show him all of the new material. He sat there like we were putting him through some kind of torture. Plain and simple, Axl wasn't interested in our material! He just wanted to record a new song he had been working on called 'November Rain.' He sat at the grand piano in the studio and played it for us. I thought to myself, "That's nice, but that's it?" He had only like two verses written. Duff, Slash, and I had thirty-three songs in the can, ready to go, but Axl wouldn't give them the time of day.

["My Appetite for Destruction", 2010, p182

Axl came up with the skeleton form of it when the band was just formed, he came up with the piano version of it. But there was never any band version of it. [...] It's not an easy song to play as a rock and roll band. It's like heavy guitar, bass, drums, and you know all this loud shit and it's a gentle song. [...] It was difficult but I think we did a good job of bringing a certain subtleness to the song from the usual brashness of what Guns N' Roses is. [...] I play with a lot more...finesse. […] Like I said, we never approached it really until we were done touring with Appetite, and then it was time to approach all these new songs and all the old songs that we had not completed. One of those was November Rain. […] We didn’t, like, dive into it until we got back in line and got a new drummer. […] It’s a real subtle song and you can’t attack it like we attack most of our songs. […] There’s certain parts of the song that you do attack. I approached differently than I would the other songs.

November Rain: Makin' F@*!ing Videos Part II, June 22, 1993

When we went in to do [Appetite for Destruction] it was coming down to between [November Rain] and Sweet Child. And I knew November Rain wasn't done. I didn't want anybody to help me write it. And at the same time I knew that it was going to take a lot of work to do what I wanted to do and I really didn't feel capable, and that people around me where understanding what I wanted to do, so we decided to save it. [...] I knew the only reason I couldn't get it recorded right was if I couldn't gather enough belief in the people around me to take the time and put the effort in to get it right on tape. [...] Tommy Lee was a major influence on the song. The first time I saw 'Home Sweet Home' and watched the part he did on the piano it made me realize that I could take what I did know about piano and focus it into something simple but very serious. Because I think the part that he does on 'Home Sweet Home' is beautiful, it's very simple, but it's the right part. And that's the approach I took to 'November Rain', that's what got me started when I saw that video on MTV and started on 'November Rain'. What is really wild about it is being just overwhelmed by the sounds, and working with all these new sounds. I mean, I am a rock band breed, just working with, for the most part Guns N' Roses works with guitars, drums, vocals, bass, but working with strings, [?] horns and certain bells, it's almost like it is magical. […] I realized I only had one week, and I’m just no way I was gonna learn how to communicate with an orchestra. So we brought in, like, eight synthesizers. […] For eight hours I just sat there and played strings to November Rain over and over and over, and picked every single string sound to create my own 130 piece orchestra. […] We went through, like, three thousand sounds. We had to sit there and go, “Wait, is that one sound more real than that one?”

November Rain: Makin' F@*!ing Videos Part II, June 22, 1993

You know, the first time I heard November Rain, I thought: "What is this shit? What does Axl is doing behind the piano? I want rock!" But I was new in GNR and I thought "Matt, you leave The Cult and now you're in the greatest hard rock band of the world…" He sat at the piano and I was thinking "This is shit". Then the song came out, and it's the biggest thing we've ever done!

French magazine, 1996

It was such a long song. It was pretty hard to put together for Guns N' Roses, because it was all [...] Axl playing piano. That was totally new and different to Slash and Duff [...] Needs a lot more drums, needs a lot more tom-toms. I set up more tom-toms. 'Cause Axl said to, 'Try to make this sound like Nigel Olson type drumming'. [...] "Don't Let The Sun Go Down On Me", that type of thing, big fills, big huge tom fills. One of Nigel's trademark back on these albums was the way he played the same fill a bunch of time. If you listen to 'November Rain' it is the same tom fill about 25 times. Pretty much a signature fill. [...] And that is the only time Axl said 'play it sort of like this'. […] And then when he played the piano and everything, I did get that hint of, like, his Elton John influence, cuz he was heavily influenced by Elton John to write that song.

November Rain: Makin' F@*!ing Videos Part II, June 22, 1993

I mean, it’s a really good song. It’s like, you know, when you’re doing a song ten times or whatever, sometimes you lose it. But every now and then, when you have your moments, you’re listening to the words, and that’s when special; you know, that’s when it’s really good. […] I mean, the words of the song are great. I heard it’s a song they wrote a long, long time ago and they brought it back, and there’s a reason why. It’s a great song.

November Rain: Makin' F@*!ing Videos Part II, June 22, 1993

'November Rain' has been around since before Appetite. It's been worked on here and there. It used to be twenty minutes long. I came up with most of the picking lines that go throughout the song when Axl was playing on piano and I played it on acoustic. Usually you get an idea in a day, whether or not the song's worth doing. If you decide the song is worth doing, then you work hard on it during the course of a night, to get it to where's everybody's comfortable. It evolves after that. When we'd finally gotten an arrangement for 'November Rain', years later I came up with a couple of new parts. When we went in the studio, I came up with most of those solos. The tail-end solo, that high-pitched thing, I came up with when Axl came up with the piano chords a long time ago.

No Illusion, Guitar Magazine, April 1992

Vocally, l purposely wanted the sound I have on that. I'm very happy with it, even though it's very abrasive. (...) One of the things like about the vocal roughness in 'November Rain' is that anyone can think that they can sing it as good or better. They can feel like a part of it.

RIP - Sep/Oct/Nov, 1992

It’s a song that when it first surfaced it was Axl playing the piano. It was way before Appetite For Destruction came out, and we’ve been ditting around with it for years. It used to be like 25 minutes long. Everything’s that’s on the record, most of it, all the melodies and all that, just came off the top of my head. When we finally decided to record it, it pretty much came naturally. There’s some new stuff in it.

Guns N' Roses: The Hits - 1992

The songs that are more subtle are the ones where I really have to buckle down and make sure I've got it, especially if the guitar part's the main voice of the song. On songs like "Estranged" and "November Rain," I have to stop for a second and slow myself down, make sure that I hit the notes correctly so that they don't go out of tune, or the vibrato's not too hectic.

Guitar For The Practising Musician, November 1992

'November Rain' is about not wanting to be in a state of unrequited love, 'Estranged' is about acknowledging it, and being there, and having to figure out what the fuck to do.

Making fucking videos, 1992?

There were a few songs that were very involved guitar-wise on those albums. 'Estranged' was a big, long song. I used a Les Paul Gold Top on it; I recorded all of the melodies on the rhythm pickup with the tone turned all the way down. 'November Rain' was tough, too, as was another Axl song called 'Breakdown.' Those were all piano driven and they needed accompaniment; the guitar and bass parts had to be thought out and done precisely. Those songs were all pretty fucking cool, I have to say, but they took some work. (...) 'November Rain was recorded in one day but we put in long hours ahead of time to get all of the arrangements just right. The funniest thing is that the guitar solo that ended up on the record is the exact same one that I played the first time I heard the song years before.

Bozza, Anthony, & Slash (2007). Slash. Harper Entertainment: New York, pp 316

[Axl] did the same [adding synthesisers] for 'November Rain' with all of those fucking string arrangements - they were all synth. I've heard songs with real strings that sound less authentic.

Bozza, Anthony, & Slash (2007). Slash. Harper Entertainment: New York, pp 318

[Talking to the crowd during the break before the outtro of November Rain]: It's a long song. Those lighters get pretty fucking hot, don't they? [laughing].

Roskilde, Denmark, 29 June, 2006

At one point I ate a whole bowl of spaghetti while playing November Rain.

AFD Q&A, August 2010

I think you give [“November Rain”] to Axl. That was his thing. He worked on it for so long, but that’s Axl. It’s a three-chord song, you know? But it took seven years or something, and at some point, you’re kind of like, “All right, dude, it’s a beautiful three chords.” The guy’s one of the best vocal melody writers ever, I think. By the time we finally recorded that song, it was like, “Okay, good, we finally got that up and out of the way.” You could tell it was gonna be a big song when we recorded it.

The Onion A.V. Club, May 2011

[Commenting on him, Slash and Matt being apparently at a loss to articulate their feelings about the song in the documentary "The Making Of November Rain"]: I’ve never seen that video. I think I was at a loss to articulate anything when that video was made, ’92 or ’93. Those were the dark years.

The Onion A.V. Club, May 2011

Right from its inception, when Axl and I first played November Rain, the same guitar melodies that are in the recorded version came through. There was definitely a spark between the two of us. It was hard to arrange that song and Estranged, because they were so open-ended and we had to cut November Rain. But those were Axl's epic piano pieces and they were both breakthrough guitar solos for me. Real melody solos, y'know? I had some good sounds and they were melodically very spontaneous.

Music Radar, September 2011

Talking about coming up with the guitar solos:

It came about when we started rehearsing the song. That was the first idea I had, like almost most of what I do (laughs). Generally, the first take is the idea I'm most comfortable with and ends up being the final product.

La Nacion (Argentina), May 3, 2019

Matt talking about that drum fill:

The track I get the most amount of grief for, from drummers, is November Rain. The reason I did that tom fill so many times is I felt it was a musical part. A lot of drummers were like, 'Why'd you play the same fill so much?!'" Me and Axl were sitting in the studio late one night, having a couple of drinks and listening to Elton John, a song called Don't Let The Sun Go Down On Me." Axl goes, 'Do you hear that?' I'm like, 'Yeah, I love Nigel Olson, man'. He says, 'Do that on the song we're going to record tomorrow!' We'd rehearsed it but I didn't have all the fills and stuff, it was just a groove. In the end of November Rain I get into that whole marching band trip.

6 Career Defining Record of Matt Sorum, Rhythm Magazine, July 2009

that fill was Axls idea As a musical phrase that carried on through the trilogy , Don't Cry and Estranged. Those albums UYI 1 n 2 Have sold 20 million combined. [...] remember kids drumming isn't all about fancy drum fills and splash cymbals ask Charlie Watts, Ringo and Phil Rudd.

Twitter, August 2012

People joke with me a lot about ‘November Rain’ asking why I did that tom fill so much. I wanted to create a signature, a musical part of the song that was a hook so I kept doing the same fill. That same fill leads through ‘November Rain’, ‘Estranged’ and ‘Don’t cry’. The reason I did that was because those three songs were a trilogy so I tied them together. [...] Axl told me they were a trilogy and the videos were all connected so I said, ‘lets make a drum sound that’s connected.’ That’s the kind of s**t we’d talk about!

MusicRadar, June 18, 2012

It was in Axl's mindset to make this grandiose piece of music. And at first, when I joined the band and the pianos were involved, and the strings, I was like, "Whoa!" you know, I thought I was joining a two guitar, bass and drum band. But then I understood, you know. For songs like November Rain and Don't Cry and Estranged, these big sort of epic pieces, me and Axl sat... I believe we were over there on the floor. We ordered some Russian caviar. We had a bottle of vodka. We sat here, me and Axl late at night, and we listened to Don't Let the Sun Go Down On Me by Elton John. He was a huge Elton fan. You know he loves Elton. We're eating the caviar and drinking shots of vodka and this big epic tom fill came by, Axl goes, "I want you to do that, something like that on November Rain, and I want you to mark every section with this signature musical fill that would be representative of not only that song but I want you to use it again as a little snippet in Don't Cry and I want you to do it again in Estranged." I said, "You want me to do the same drum fill?" He said, "Yes." Sounds like OK. So I did the most famous fill that drummers give me shit for all the time. It's called the Pat Boone, Debby Boone. And it goes Pat Boone, Debbie Boone, right? And when I played that Axl said, "I love that, and I want you to do here, here, here and here." And then he sat in there on the piano and I was out there. And we went around the cymbals too, and he played notes on the piano, "And when I go to this chord, I want you to hit that cymbal." And I'd hit it and he'd thought he heard like a G note or maybe it was a C. "When I go to this court, I want to hit that cymbal." And so we worked out this whole thing, just me and him. And the rest of the band came in for doing whatever. And we had it all worked out. And we recorded that piece of music, November Rain, and then Estranged was originally part of November Rain, it was segwayed into Estranged and it was this huge 20 some minute epic thing. And we cut it in half and made it separate. But it was part of what he called The Trilogy, which Don't Cry was included in that. So it all sort of was a story that went interspersed. And on that particular trilogy I used this snare drum that's sort of become famous and my my tech and good buddy Mike Fasano had this drum and we named it Big Red. And it was this Birch deep drum. And the color of it was red and it was a [?]. And we used that on all three of those tracks and it had this real thumpy low end to it and it was just a great ballad thing.

Spitfire, January 25, 2016

Mike Portnoy would chime in:

'November Rain' is an all-time classic song... but why on Earth did Matt Sorum play the SAME EXACT fill every 4 bars? (23 times, to be exact!)

Twitter, August 4, 2012

And Matt would respond:

That fill was Axl's idea as a musical phrase that carried on through the trilogy, 'Don't Cry' and 'Estranged'. Those albums UYI 1 n 2 Have sold 20 million combined.

Twitter, August 6, 2012

remember kids drumming isn't all about fancy drum fills and splash cymbals ask Charlie Watts, Ringo and Phil Rudd

Twitter, August 6, 2012

Mike Portnoy:

Agree 1000%!! Ringo is one of my greatest heroes!! No disrespect meant, bro... Just making an observation of that song. Peace! : )

Twitter, August 6, 2012

And later Frank would defend Matt:

I know there was like something on the Internet or Twitter that Matt Sorum got some shit for November Rain, I mean, dude, I would have loved.... if they would tell me like, "You get to record November Rain but you got to play these drum parts," I'd be happy as hell to play those drum parts, because it's a great song. You get to play on a great song, you know, I mean, to be honest, I don't really get the whole 'comparing musician thing' anyway to begin with cuz I don't know where this whole sports competitive thing comes into play in music, in art, that makes no sense to me. So I don't really buy into it. So it's mind-boggling to me. I just want to play on a really goddamn good song, that's all I want to do. And if all I'm doing is playing four-on-the-floor and not anything else and I get to play on a great song man, I'm happy, I'm ecstatic, you know.

One On One With Mitch Lafon, July 31, 2015

Matt would talk about hearing the song for the first time:

Axl first played the finished version of November Rain for me in the parking lot of El Compadre on Sunset Blvd. He had a killer car stereo . Slash n Duff stayed inside drinking

Twitter, November 4, 2011

At El Compadre , in the parking lot where Axl played me November Rain for the first time. 20 yrs ago. Slash and Duff were inside drinkin Tequila shots And I sat in his car to hear the mix

Twitter, November 4, 2011

Matt would also claim November Rain and Estranged had originally been one song:

Piece of trivia November Rain and Estranged were originally one complete song, a very long song

Twitter, November 4, 2011

And Bumblefoot would say he loved playing it:

[Talking about the best solo in the setlist]: End of November Rain Smile

REDDIT AMA, December 2013

by **Soulmonster** Sat Oct 01, 2011 8:37 am

by **Soulmonster** Tue Nov 27, 2012 7:47 pm

November Rain is currently the 9th most viral track on Spotify in the UK:

UNITED KINGDOM

1. Bon Iver, "Beth/Rest (Rare Book Room)," (4AD)

2. Masters in France, "Playin' With My Friends" (A&H Records)

3. Jakwob, "Blinding" (Boom Ting Recordings)

4. R. Kelly, "I Look To You" (Arista Records/RCA Records)

5. Christina Perri, "A Thousand Years (feat. Steve Kazee, Part 2)" (Chop Shop/Atlantic)

6. Ben Pearce, "What I Might Do (Club Mix)" (MTA Records/Mercury Records)

7. Matt Corby, "Brother" (Atlantic Records UK)

8. C2C, "Down The Road" (On And On Records)

9. Guns N' Roses, "November Rain" (Geffen Records)

10. Avenged Sevenfold, "Carry On" (Warner Bros.)

http://omg.yahoo.com/news/spotifys-top-10-most-viral-tracks-184511978.html

by **Soulmonster** Thu Jun 28, 2018 1:02 pm

by **Soulmonster** Thu Jun 28, 2018 1:03 pm

Really like the piano version, Axl's vocals and the ending piano riff. And now they have fixed the mistake at the ending, too.

by **Soulmonster** Sat Jul 28, 2018 3:52 pm

The Youtube video now has more than one billion views.

by **Soulmonster** Mon Nov 05, 2018 8:55 pm

From Mick Wall's book, an interview with Axl from January 1990. Axl talks about wanting Jeff Lynne to work on November Rain:

Mick Wall wrote:‘We’re looking for Jeff Lynne,’ he announced suddenly.

I was confused. Jeff Lynne? Electric Light Orchestra and Travelling Wilburys Jeff Lynne? I enquired, somewhat taken aback.

‘Yeah,’ he drawled, pleased by my surprise. Ί want him to work on “November Rain”, and there’s, like, three or four possible other songs that if that works out I’d like to use him on...’

For string arrangements, I hazarded a guess?

‘Yeah. This record will be produced by Guns N’ Roses and Mike Clink, OK? But I might be using synthesizer – but I’m gonna say I’m using synthesizer and what I programmed. It’s not gonna be like, “Oh, you know, we do all our shows live,” and then it’s on tape. That’s not the thing. I just want to... you know, jump into today. I have never had the money to do it before. And I thought maybe someone like Jeff Lynne could help.’

Mention of ‘November Rain’, already being touted by those supposedly in the know as one of the major highlights of the next Guns N' Roses album, reminded me of something Axl had been quoted as saying in Rolling Stone, to the effect that if ‘November Rain’ wasn’t recorded to his complete satisfaction he would quit the music business.

'That was then.’ He bowed his head. ‘At that time it was the most important song to me.’

Did he still stick by his threat to leave the music business if it wasn’t recorded properly, though?

'Yeah. That's the the fuckin' truth. That's the fuckin’ truth, all right. But the worst part of that is if, like, you’re gonna look at it in a negative way, man, is I got four of those motherfuckers now, that I don’t know how I wrote. And I like them better than “November Rain”, and I’ll crush that motherfuckin' song... And it’s like, now I’ve got four of them that I gotta do and they're all big songs. We play ’em and we get chills and go “How did we do that? Let’s go have a drink!”

‘It happens all the time. We'll fuckin' write a whole song, we’ll write the whole goddamned song out, the music, the words, this and that, the melodies, everything. We’ll play the song, we’ll learn it, we’ll get it all completely down and then all of a sudden we'll go, “But what if we do this?" Like, uhhhh...' he grimaced, throwing up his hands in mock despair. 'And I did that in another way. I came in with this heavy piano part... It's like, real big. And it fits this blues-ish gospel thing that was supposed to be a blues-rocker, like "Buy Me a Chevrolet” by Foghat or somethin'. Now it's turned into this thing like “Take Another Piece of My Heart" [by Janis Joplin] or somethin’. We’re like, how did we do this? We don't know but we'll just do it. And there’s, like, four of those...’

I was still mulling over the giddy prospect of Jeff Lynne working on the next Guns N' Roses album. Why him? Was Axl a closet ELO freak, then?

'Oh yeah, I'm an old ELO fanatic!’ he enthused, hands slicing the air like machettes. 'I love old ELO... Out of the Blue, that period. I went to see 'em play when I was kid and shit like that. I mean, I respect Jeff Lynne for being Jeff Lynne, but Out of the Blue is an awesome album.'

I was still baffled. What qualities did Jeff Lynne embody for Axl that he admired so much?

'Well, one: he's got stamina. Two: he’s used to working with a lot of material. Three: he's used to working with all kinds of instrumentation. Four: he's used to working with all kinds of different styles of music. Five: he wrote all his own material Six: he produced it.’ He became wide-eyed for a moment. ‘That’s a lot of concentration and a lot of energy needed. Hopefully, I would like, if he’s available, to have him. He's the best. I don’t know if we can get him or not, but I’d like to try.’

And if they could find Jeff Lynne and actually get him to agree to work on the album – an unlikely outcome in the cold light of day – Axl would like him involved only for certain tracks?

‘That’s what we’d like to start with. I mean, who knows? Maybe him and Clink will hit it off just great and everybody’ll be into it. Then great, welcome to it, you know?’

Source: https://www.a-4-d.com/t536-1990-04-21-28-kerrang-stick-to-your-guns-axl#12523

by **Soulmonster** Mon Nov 19, 2018 7:36 pm

by **Blackstar** Mon Nov 19, 2018 11:08 pm

Nice cover. Being a fan of both GnR and Mark Lanegan, I like it.

by **Soulmonster** Tue Nov 20, 2018 11:34 am

Blackstar wrote:Nice cover. Being a fan of both GnR and Mark Lanegan, I like it.

I am a huge Lanegan fan, too Smile

by FRANSAD Tue Mar 26, 2019 3:03 am

The 'unknown' video was taken from 1993-04-03 ARCO Arena, Sacramento, CA

by **Soulmonster** Sat Aug 17, 2019 10:29 am

Manny Charlton describing hearing November Rain during the Sound City Sessions in 1986:

"They weren't just some bar band. They were a band with a capital "B". An important band is always greater than the sum of their parts. You take one part away and the chemistry is shot and it's never the same. The five guys worked together and produced something that was great as a whole. The word is chemistry. That's what they had. They had great chemistry and they were a great band. As soon as you took one cog out of the wheel, one link out of the chain, that was it. I thought the stand-out songs were "Welcome to the Jungle" and "November Rain." Axl was playing the piano and Izzy was doing a little bit of background vocals and it was fantastic. That's when I went, "wow, there's proper songwriting skills here," and I thought that I would really like to produce them" [Marc Canter, "Reckless Road", 2007].

I can't remember if there is background vocals on the version found on the bootlegs.

by **Soulmonster** Sat Dec 25, 2021 7:48 am

Matt would talk about hearing the song for the first time:

Axl first played the finished version of November Rain for me in the parking lot of El Compadre on Sunset Blvd. He had a killer car stereo . Slash n Duff stayed inside drinking

Twitter, November 4, 2011

Matt would also claim November Rain and Estranged had originally been one song:

Piece of trivia November Rain and Estranged were originally one complete song, a very long song

Twitter, November 4, 2011

by **Soulmonster** Sun Feb 06, 2022 5:06 pm

The track I get the most amount of grief for, from drummers, is 'November Rain'. The reason I did that tom fill so many times is I felt it was a musical part. A lot of drummers were like, 'Why'd you play the same fill so much?!' me and Axl were sitting in the studio late one night, having a couple of drinks and listening to Elton John. a song called 'Don't Let The Sun Go Down On Me'. Axl goes, 'Do you hear that?' I'm like, 'Yeah, I love Nigel Olson, man'. He says. 'Do that on the song we're going to record tomorrow!' We'd rehearsed it but I didn't have all the fills and stuff, it was just a groove. In the end of 'November Rain' I get into that whole marching band trip.

Rhythm, November 2007

by **Soulmonster** Tue Feb 08, 2022 8:13 am

People joke with me a lot about ‘November Rain’ asking why I did that tom fill so much. I wanted to create a signature, a musical part of the song that was a hook so I kept doing the same fill. That same fill leads through ‘November Rain’, ‘Estranged’ and ‘Don’t cry’. The reason I did that was because those three songs were a trilogy so I tied them together. [...] Axl told me they were a trilogy and the videos were all connected so I said, ‘lets make a drum sound that’s connected.’ That’s the kind of s**t we’d talk about!

MusicRadar, June 18, 2012

by **Soulmonster** Tue Feb 15, 2022 8:39 am

Mike Portnoy:

'November Rain' is an all-time classic song... but why on Earth did Matt Sorum play the SAME EXACT fill every 4 bars? (23 times, to be exact!)

Twitter, August 4, 2012

Matt:

That fill was Axl's idea as a musical phrase that carried on through the trilogy, 'Don't Cry' and 'Estranged'. Those albums UYI 1 n 2 Have sold 20 million combined.

Twitter, August 6, 2012

remember kids drumming isn't all about fancy drum fills and splash cymbals ask Charlie Watts, Ringo and Phil Rudd

Twitter, August 6, 2012

Mike Portnoy:

Agree 1000%!! Ringo is one of my greatest heroes!! No disrespect meant, bro... Just making an observation of that song. Peace! : )

Twitter, August 6, 2012

by Demoniac Wed Nov 02, 2022 8:51 pm

The ending of November Rain is one of the best solos / leads ever.

by **Soulmonster** Thu Nov 03, 2022 8:42 am

Demoniac wrote:The ending of November Rain is one of the best solos / leads ever.

I agree. Iconic!

by **Blackstar** Fri Nov 04, 2022 2:15 am

by **Blackstar** Fri Nov 04, 2022 2:18 am

Steven Wilson:

by **Blackstar** Fri Nov 04, 2022 2:23 am

The orchestra is conducted by Christopher Lennertz.

https://twitter.com/CLennertz/status/1572280631316615170

by **Blackstar** Sat Nov 05, 2022 5:40 pm

Things That Are Different About New Version of Guns N’ Roses’ ‘November Rain’

Lauryn Schaffner
Published: November 4, 2022

"November Rain" isn't exactly the most celebratory song, but Guns N' Roses have shared a new version of the track to commemorate the start of the month. Included on the 30th anniversary edition of Use Your Illusion I, the updated rendition features a full orchestra, so there are some things about it that sound a bit different.

A lot of people like to blame epic ballads such as "November Rain" and "Estranged" as being one of the main catalysts that drove a wedge between the members of Guns N' Roses in the early '90s, but the beginnings of "November Rain" dates all the way back to the mid-'80s. Axl Rose wrote the skeleton of the track before the band had even formed, and there are piano and acoustic demo versions you can hear when it was in its infancy. It was only a matter of time before Rose was going to release it, and he certainly knew it didn't belong on Appetite for Destruction.

By the time Guns started working on the Illusion albums, they were already one of the biggest bands on the planet, so Rose was extremely meticulous during the recording process. What many also don't realize is that he composed "November Rain" entirely on his own, and created the orchestral sounds and string arrangements on a synthesizer. The video shows scenes of them playing it with an orchestra, and they have performed it live with one before, but the 1991 studio version was all Rose in the studio.

Slash added his own touch with his solos, but the singer even suggested to Matt Sorum to play the drum fill similar to Elton John's "Don't Let the Sun Go Down on Me."

The updated version of the track features the same performance by the band, but the orchestration has been re-recorded with a 50-piece orchestra, conducted and arranged in 2021 by Grammy award-winning composer Christopher Lennertz, which replaces the original synthesized orchestration done by Rose. It was mixed by Steven Wilson of Porcupine Tree.

So, what actually sounds different about it?

The Intro

Well, this one's kind of obvious, given the whole intro is made up of orchestration. But the very first piano note even sounds different than the original because the mix is so much clearer. That being said, the intro still stays incredibly true to the original, but the string section is a bit more pronounced, and around the 1:01 mark, you'll hear an ascending string melody that matches that of the piano, which didn't exist in the original version. The flute melody is a bit more muted too.

Rose's Vocals

No, they weren't re-recorded, so they're not actually different. But, the mix makes them stand out a bit more, so the spotlight really shines on them. That rasp is chef's kiss.

The Strings During the Final Verse

During the last verse, where Rose sings, "And when your fears subside / And shadows still remain / I know that you can love me / When there's no one left to blame," there's another string melody that didn't appear in the original.

The Outro

Perhaps the best part of the entire song, the outro of the new rendition is where things get really spicy. The build-up to Slash's explosive guitar melody is somehow even more dramatic than on the original — mainly because the string section sounds like it's gearing up for war. Because of the mix, more of Rose's vocal harmonies can be heard, as some of the upper-register vocals must've been drowned out in the older version. We've confirmed that no new vocals have been added.

So there you have it. Guns N' Roses managed to re-release "November Rain" while still keeping how Stephanie Seymour's character dies in the video a secret. We may never know. Check out the new version of the song below to see if you notice any other differences. The 30th anniversary editions of Use Your Illusion I and II will be out Nov. 11 — pre-order your copy here.

https://loudwire.com/things-different-new-version-guns-n-roses-november-rain/

by **Blackstar** Sat Nov 05, 2022 11:24 pm

The music video for “November Rain” resynced with the new 2022 orchestral audio

by **Blackstar** Sat Nov 05, 2022 11:27 pm

The credits from the video:

Drums: Matt Sorum
Bass: Duff McKagan
Lead and Rhythm Guitars: Slash
Rhythm Guitar: Izzy Stradlin
Vocals, Piano, Keyboard Orchestra: Axl Rose
Synthesizer Programmers: Axl, Johann Langlie
Background Vocals, Choir: Axl, Matt, Shannon Hoon,
Stuart Bailey, Izzy, Duff, Dizzy Reed, Reba Shaw
Music Conducted and Arranged by Christopher Lennertz
Orchestrated by Andrew Kinney
Orchestra Recorded by Jeff Vaughn
Copyist: Nick Fevola
Score Librarian: Steve Juliani
Programmer: Michael Wilson
Scoring Assistant: Alex Karukas
Music Editor: Dan DiPrima
Concertmaster: Mark Robertson
Violins: Alyssa Park, Neli Nikolaeva, Songa Lee, Yu-Tong Sharp, Cheryl Kim, Daphne Chen, Armen Anassian, Eun-Mee Ahn, Jackie Brand, Roger Wilkie, Maia Jasper, Susan Rishik, Sharon Jackson, Eugenia Choi, Tammy Hatwan, Charlie Bisharat, Radu Pieptea, Cheryl Norman-Brick, Akiko Tarumuto
Violas: Andrew Duckles, Luke Maurer, Stefan Smith, Corinne Sobolewski, Benn Ullery, Alma Fernandez, Aaron Oltman, Diana Wade
Celli: David Low, Cameron Stone, Tim Loo, Vanessa Freebairn-Smith, Charlie Tyler, Chris Ahn
Contrabass: Tom Harte, Eric Shetzen
Flutes: Amy Tatum, Gina Luciani
Orchestra Contractor: David Low
Orchestra recorded at Eastwood Studios, Warner Brothers Studios, Toluca Lake, CA – September 1, 2021
Mixed by Steven Wilson – September-November 2022

by **Soulmonster** Mon Apr 17, 2023 2:40 pm

Frank defending Matt:

I know there was like something on the Internet or Twitter that Matt Sorum got some shit for November Rain, I mean, dude, I would have loved.... if they would tell me like, "You get to record November Rain but you got to play these drum parts," I'd be happy as hell to play those drum parts, because it's a great song. You get to play on a great song, you know, I mean, to be honest, I don't really get the whole 'comparing musician thing' anyway to begin with cuz I don't know where this whole sports competitive thing comes into play in music, in art, that makes no sense to me. So I don't really buy into it. So it's mind-boggling to me. I just want to play on a really goddamn good song, that's all I want to do. And if all I'm doing is playing four-on-the-floor and not anything else and I get to play on a great song man, I'm happy, I'm ecstatic, you know.

One On One With Mitch Lafon, July 31, 2015

by **Soulmonster** Tue May 09, 2023 10:07 am

It was in Axl's mindset to make this grandiose piece of music. And at first, when I joined the band and the pianos were involved, and the strings, I was like, "Whoa!" you know, I thought I was joining a two guitar, bass and drum band. But then I understood, you know. For songs like November Rain and Don't Cry and Estranged, these big sort of epic pieces, me and Axl sat... I believe we were over there on the floor. We ordered some Russian caviar. We had a bottle of vodka. We sat here, me and Axl late at night, and we listened to Don't Let the Sun Go Down On Me by Elton John. He was a huge Elton fan. You know he loves Elton. We're eating the caviar and drinking shots of vodka and this big epic tom fill came by, Axl goes, "I want you to do that, something like that on November Rain, and I want you to mark every section with this signature musical fill that would be representative of not only that song but I want you to use it again as a little snippet in Don't Cry and I want you to do it again in Estranged." I said, "You want me to do the same drum fill?" He said, "Yes." Sounds like OK. So I did the most famous fill that drummers give me shit for all the time. It's called the Pat Boone, Debby Boone. And it goes Pat Boone, Debbie Boone, right? And when I played that Axl said, "I love that, and I want you to do here, here, here and here." And then he sat in there on the piano and I was out there. And we went around the cymbals too, and he played notes on the piano, "And when I go to this chord, I want you to hit that cymbal." And I'd hit it and he'd thought he heard like a G note or maybe it was a C. "When I go to this court, I want to hit that cymbal." And so we worked out this whole thing, just me and him. And the rest of the band came in for doing whatever. And we had it all worked out. And we recorded that piece of music, November Rain, and then Estranged was originally part of November Rain, it was segwayed into Estranged and it was this huge 20 some minute epic thing. And we cut it in half and made it separate. But it was part of what he called The Trilogy, which Don't Cry was included in that. So it all sort of was a story that went interspersed. And on that particular trilogy I used this snare drum that's sort of become famous and my my tech and good buddy Mike Fasano had this drum and we named it Big Red. And it was this Birch deep drum. And the color of it was red and it was a [?]. And we used that on all three of those tracks and it had this real thumpy low end to it and it was just a great ballad thing.

Spitfire, January 25, 2016

by **Soulmonster** Sat May 13, 2023 9:33 am

Vicky Hamilton being asked what song she heard in the beginning impressed her the most:

Oh boy, you’re going to make me pick one song? (laughs) Well, when I heard Axl playing “November Rain,” it’s like I had this goosebump factor. You know when I get goosebumps on my arms hearing things, I know that it’s really strong. He was playing it on the piano and I was like, “God, what is that? It’s really beautiful.” First of all, I didn’t know he could play the piano like that. And secondly, it was like such a gorgeous song. That sticks out in my mind so I’ll just go with that one.

Glide Magazine, April 25, 2016

by **Soulmonster** Wed Mar 13, 2024 12:16 pm

We knew Axl had been working on November Rain. You can hear it on Sound City demos, right? [...] You know, he worked on it. He perfected it and, and it was a process. It was a song he needed to get out and worked on for ever since the band, I think, pretty much started.

Let There Be Talk, September 17, 2018

by **Soulmonster** Fri May 03, 2024 8:32 am

Talking about creating the solos for the song:

It came about when we started rehearsing the song. That was the first idea I had, like almost most of what I do (laughs). Generally, the first take is the idea I'm most comfortable with and ends up being the final product.

La Nacion (Argentina), May 3, 2019

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