1987.11.15 - Greensboro Coliseum, Greensboro, USA

Eddie Huffman wrote:Guns N' Roses coming to Winston-Salem

Guns N’ Roses, the volatile hard rock band that exploded onto the American music scene 30 years ago this summer, returns next week to a region where they played one of their most legendary concerts.

The band that created the classic rock staples “Sweet Child O’ Mine,” “Welcome to the Jungle,” “Paradise City” and “November Rain” performs at BB&T Field Aug. 11. It will be the first major concert there in years, and the only Guns N’ Roses show this summer between Pennsylvania and Florida.

“That’s a show where most people would be going, ‘Oh, I’ve gotta go to Atlanta to see that,’ or ‘I’ve gotta go to D.C. to see that,’” said Brian Meyer, a Greensboro singer and longtime Guns N’ Roses fan. “And here it is in Winston.”

Guns N’ Roses—also known as GNR—play a mix of blistering metal and melodic, yearning rock ballads. Front man Axl Rose has a voice once described as “a power tool with attachments” by rock critic Robert Christgau. But he also has a hard time keeping his band together, and the current “Not in This Lifetime Tour” has reunited original members Slash and Duff McKagan with Rose for the first time in two decades.

The group has always had a strong appeal with young men and adolescent boys, and many of the band’s current fans weren’t born when the group played its earliest shows in the Piedmont. All of GNR’s previous appearances in the Triad were at the Greensboro Coliseum, where they opened for Motley Crue in 1987 and headlined in 1991 and 2006.

Meyer saw that 1987 performance before he heard their debut album and was leery of the hype that had GNR pegged as the new Aerosmith. Meyer sings for several tribute bands: Deconstruction, Alexis Machine and AC/DCeased, which combines zombies and AC/DC songs.

“At the time I was a huge Aerosmith fan and thought, ‘No way. This guy with the sprayed-up tall hair is not Steven Tyler. No way,’” Meyer said. “I went to see them with Motley Crue and they were pretty good, then ‘Appetite for Destruction’ came out and I was like, ‘Wow, this album’s great. Maybe I was wrong about these guys.’”

Patrick Collins saw the 2006 show, in which Rose was the only original member left in the band. Collins, a former Greensboro resident, is now an outpatient therapist who lives in Asheville. He had been obsessed with GNR as a teenager growing up in Maryland.

“Axl was the like the Mick Jagger of our generation,” Collins said.

The 2006 concert in Greensboro was solid but not spectacular, he said.

“It didn’t have the edge, but I wouldn’t say it was like a shell of the band,” Collins said. “You expected them to play Guns N’ Roses songs without the characters of Slash and Duff, and that whole energy and cohesion that they had. As long as you didn’t have your expectations high, and realized it was really ‘Axl Rose and Company,’ I think they pulled it off as well as they could.”

The concert that entered GNR lore was the 1991 show, an epic performance before the group splintered. The band came to Greensboro ahead of “Use Your Illusion” I and II, albums that were delayed in what would become a pattern for the band. Clay Howard saw back-to-back GNR shows in Charlotte and Raleigh that summer.

“Greensboro was like twice as long,” said Howard, a Kernersville resident and veteran front man for several area bands who now performs under his own name. “They were good shows, both of them. In Greensboro they played forever.”

He’s only exaggerating slightly: The band played for nearly four hours that night, taking the stage long after the opening band, Skid Row, finished its set. The crowd was as volatile as the band that night, with multiple fistfights breaking out during the lull between acts.

“That was back in the days when you could drink and smoke in the coliseum,” Meyer said. “Beers didn’t cost $9, and you go load up in the parking lot, then come in and see a show.”

He wondered what was happening backstage. The band had a reputation for heroin abuse and other extreme behavior. Original drummer Steven Adler had just been replaced by Matt Sorum. Izzy Stradlin, a founding member and rhythm guitarist who co-wrote the band’s biggest hits, would leave before the end of 1991.

“You didn’t know if somebody had OD’d in the back, or if there was a fight,” Meyer said.

Parke Puterbaugh, a veteran music journalist and author, gave the show a glowing review for the Greensboro News and Record.

“They are as electrifying as any band that has ever taken a stage,” he wrote at the time. “Quite simply, they are the heirs apparent to the rebellious rock and roll tradition of the Rolling Stones and Aerosmith — and to be honest, neither of those band has ever exuded the raw power and outright danger the Gunners summon at will.”

Tim Beeman of Winston-Salem also attended that 1991 show. He is a singer and host of multiple podcasts on The Less Desirables network. He remembers Rose promising a memorable show.

“He said, ‘We’re gonna make it up to you because we’re so late,’” Beeman said.

The band proceeded to deliver, playing songs from “Appetite” as well as every song from the then-unreleased “Use Your Illusion” I and II.

“Some of the new songs chugged along in the bluesy, boozy vein of ‘Exile on Main Street’-era Stones,” Puterbaugh wrote. “‘Bad Obsession’ featured a sinuous slide-guitar intro from Slash, while ‘Dust ’n Bones’ was sung by rhythm guitarist Izzy Stradlin while Rose shook a tambourine. Another new one, ‘Perfect Crime,’ was taken at a manically fast tempo; Axl Rose sang it as throttlingly hard as I’ve ever heard anyone sing.”

Beeman noted the stark contrast between the onstage personae of Slash and Rose.

Slash was “just so laid back about it,” Beeman said. “To borrow a youngster’s term now, he’s just chill. He would play his bluesy, soulful solos and let Axl run around like a chihuahua.”

Rose went through several outfit changes over the course of the show, taking the stage wearing only cycling shorts and Doc Marten boots along with his trademark head bandanna. He donned a kilt during another segment of the show, and sang some songs wearing a baseball catcher’s mask and chest protector. During the encore he wore a stopwatch around his neck.

“After the last note of the last song, he looked at the stopwatch and said, ‘Yeah,’” Meyer said. “He announced to the crowd, ‘That’s the longest we’ve ever played.”

The show’s instantly legendary status was confirmed the following day on “MTV News.” Beeman woke up to the report after a very late night at the Greensboro Coliseum. The news anchor noted that it was the first time GNR had played every song from both “Use Your Illusion” albums.

“Kurt Loder said, ‘Guns N’ Roses played an epic show in Greensboro, North Carolina, last night, blah blah blah blah blah,’” Beeman said. “I’m like, ‘Whoa, that’s us!’”