2006.12.10 - Everett Events Center, Everett, USA

Axl Rose fights off history of letdowns

Assuming the Gun N' Roses frontman starts the band's show in Everett on Sunday, GNR fans will get an extraordinary concert.

By Victor Balta
Special to The Herald

Yes, Axl Rose has angered us.

Yes, Axl Rose starts shows late - if ever.

Yes, Axl Rose took apart what many fans considered to be one of the single greatest rock bands of all time and replaced the original members with what appears to be a bunch of hired hands under the banner that still says "Guns N' Roses."

But when the lights eventually go down Sunday night at the Everett Events Center and that memorable opening guitar echoes throughout the place and a single spotlight illuminates the walking drama that is Axl Rose and he screams that familiar question, "You know where you are???"

You know, you're in the jungle, baby. And just about all is forgiven.

Take it from someone who knows. Guns N' Roses' show at the Continental Airlines Arena in East Rutherford, N.J., last month was nothing short of extraordinary. But be prepared to make a full night of it.

The band hit the stage after 11 p.m., which is the time most shows end. Guns N' Roses is not "most shows." But that's better than not happening at all, which is a reputation built on 15 years that Rose and his crew are trying to overcome.

Two shows have been canceled on this tour - one for what seemed to be a legitimate reason and one for what seemed to be a "here we go again" reason. Two weeks ago, Rose canceled a show in Milwaukee because he was suffering from an ear infection and strep throat. Fair enough.

But last month, he canceled a show in Portland, Maine, because of a mix-up with local fire marshals, which reportedly included anything from the types of pyrotechnics the show employs to whether the band could drink alcohol on stage - depending on whom you ask.

Rose didn't do any pre-show interviews, but Sebastian Bach, the former lead singer of Skid Row who is opening the show, did; he talked about all the things that make the Guns N' Roses experience what it is.
Rose "is one of the most intense human beings I've ever met," said Bach, who is regularly performing a duet with Rose on the Guns' song "My Michelle." "He has a lot of presence when he walks into a room and he is one of the most creative persons I've ever met. I'm telling you people in Everett ... get ready to see one of the most intense concerts of your whole life."

Bach, who is in a similar situation as Rose in that he's fronting an entirely new band, said he wouldn't necessarily prefer seeing the original Guns N' Roses or Skid Row lineups in their current incarnations.
"Nobody wins if you just want nostalgia; it's got to be about something new," Bach said. "So it would depend on the music. If they were just doing old songs, then, no, who cares? I've already seen that. But if it was new songs that kicked (butt), then, yes."

With a slate of Guns N' Roses classics and a dash of tunes from the band's long-awaited album, "Chinese Democracy," fans in attendance on Sunday will get the best of both worlds.

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Old Skid Row frontman pleased with solo career

By Victor Balta
Special to The Herald

It's been one heck of a ride for Sebastian Bach.

Nearly 18 years after he made a splash as the lead singer of Skid Row and released a debut album that would sell more than 5 million copies, he comes to the Everett Events Center on Sunday with a new band under his own name as an opener for Guns N' Roses - and he couldn't be happier about it.

Bach, 38, said in a phone interview from a hotel room in Ames, Iowa, last week that he wants to use this tour to establish himself as a solo artist in the way that Ozzy Osbourne and David Lee Roth did after breaking their ties with the bands that made them famous.

The hard-working Bach is not only opening every date on the Guns N' Roses North American tour, he's also sprinkling in his own headlining shows at smaller venues on some the tour's off nights, including a visit to the Big Easy in Spokane on Saturday night.

Since he parted ways with Skid Row in the late 1990s, Bach has made his name on Broadway in productions of "Jesus Christ Superstar" and "Jekyll & Hyde," in a few VH-1 reality shows and on the TV series "Gilmore Girls." (He thinks Lorelai should absolutely be with Luke, by the way.) Now, he's playing arenas for the first time in more than a decade and loving it.

"Doing rock 'n' roll, I'm the one in control of the stage," Bach said, comparing his music to Broadway. "If I'm doing 'Jesus Christ Superstar,' it's Andrew Lloyd Webber who's in control. With rock 'n' roll, I can go on anytime I want, or if I don't feel like singing the chorus, I'll tell the crowd, hey, you sing the chorus. I can always pick what feels right in my heart.

"After doing rock for 15 years, to have something so disciplined (as theater) actually felt good. But after doing four of those (Broadway) shows, it starts to feel constricted, so I need to rock, dude."

Fans who want the full experience won't want to miss the opener at this show as Bach rolls though classic Skid Row tunes, including "18 & Life," "I Remember You," "Monkey Business" and, of course, "Youth Gone Wild," while testing out a couple of new tunes, including a trademark power ballad, "By Your Side."

They'll appear on Bach's solo album, "Angel Down," which has been recorded and should be released next year once his management settles on a record label deal.

Axl Rose rocks like there's no tomorrow

Guns N' Roses may have taken the Everett Events Center's stage late, but they give their fans a show they'll remember for a long time.

By Christina Harper
Special to The Herald

EVERETT - Fans of Guns N' Roses hoping to see the band on the remainder of their 2006 World Tour have been living under a rock if they turn up to a show and don't know that they're gonna rock and roll all night. And I mean all night.

Sebastian Bach, that long-haired, boyish, ex-Skid Row frontman, one of three opening acts, whipped the crowd into a rock 'n' roll frenzy, all the while telling them how much ass Axl Rose, Guns N' Roses' frontman, was going to kick when he came on stage, whenever that would be.

Yawn.

Notorious for not arriving on stage until he is absolutely ready, Rose, has been chided throughout this tour for starting his set at 11 p.m., midnight and even 12:30 a.m., being difficult at best, and sometimes even canceling gigs.

Well, people, get over it. Guns N' Roses might not have anything close to their original line-up but they do have a show that will blow your mind and take you to a place you haven't been for about 20 years. You either don't like them to begin with or you'll go to your grave growling an anthem like "November Rain" and loving every moment of this long-awaited tour.

Sunday night's audience at Everett Events Center was in for the long haul, happy to air thump through opening acts Suicide Girls - described as a tattooed, half-naked, hard-to-grasp group of women - and Helmet, a hard-core thrash-rock band. Bach pumped up the audience with lashing screams and renditions of hits like "18 and Life" and "Youth Gone Wild."

After a not-so-brief interlude, the lights went out, not down, and at 11:40 p.m. search lights and smoke got the audience ready for liftoff. And what a blast it was, beginning with booming balls of fire, blasting strobe lights and that all-too-familiar Axl Rose scream welcoming the audience to the jungle.

Rose, dressed in jeans, black shirt and red boots to match his red microphone and stand, and was in great form. His voice, at times, was more here and there than on, but no one seemed to care.
This is not the Guns N' Roses of old. These hand-picked musicians are not trying to cover anthems played by Slash and Izzy Stradlin.

Ron "Bumblefoot" Thal and Richard Fortus blazed through "Sweet Child O' Mine," "Used to Love Her" and "November Rain." Those guys could have played "Jingle Bells" and it would have been a head banger's high. They rocked.

During the night, a baby grand was rolled out and Dizzy Reed, long thin dreads and tattooed bare arms, stopped the show with a piano solo of the Rolling Stones classic, "Angie." He played madly and beautifully at the same time.

And where was Rose in all of this? He's the central character in this tour that for the most part is full of pure musical genius, a whirling dervish kind of character thumping his leg and sway dancing in time to the throbbing rock sound of "Paradise City."

Some think Rose is a rock god, maybe a rock demon. He has the Jim Morrison mesmerizing effect on his audience that pounds the air with fists and screams out his songs into the lights. You can't help but watch him and know that, for all his problems (and there have been many), he's the master of the night no matter what he looks like or if his voice is not exactly up to par. He can whistle the beginning of "Patience" and that's what fans have been waiting for, that and the 10-years-in-the-making new album "Chinese Democracy."

This tour has been criticized for being a platform for a Guns N' Roses cover band or the same songs just 20 years later. It's not. It is a comet full of rock music blasting, expertly, through the night with fire and booms. This Guns N' Roses sent a charge so hard and strong that the energy lasted into the streets of Everett well after the show.

The old Guns N' Roses might have been one of the best rock bands ever. The new one is.

Strip show came as a surprise

Guns N' Roses' opening act gives a risque performance at the Everett Events Center.

By David Chircop
Herald Writer

Sherryl Kenney wasn't expecting Disney On Ice when she attended the Guns N' Roses show Sunday at the Everett Events Center.

But she wasn't expecting pierced and tattooed Goth women stripping down to G-strings and pasties and slathering each other with chocolate syrup, either.

"I've been to a lot of hard-core rock 'n' roll concerts, and they certainly don't start with strip acts," said the 45-year-old Lynnwood woman who shelled out $75 to attend the show Sunday night.

Since November, Suicide Girls, a burlesque troupe of women who model for the online erotica site www.suicidegirls.com, has opened for Guns N' Roses on its North American tour.

A phone call and an e-mail to the Suicide Girls' public relations contact in West Hollywood were not immediately returned.

Kenney said the Everett performance included seductive dancing and simulated sex acts as well as nearly naked women licking chocolate syrup off each other.

While the Suicide Girls were listed on event fliers, parental warnings of adult content were not.

Even so, were the scantily clad dancers pushing the envelope for a Guns N' Roses show, a band known for pioneering "sleaze rock"?

Yes, said Kenney, who decided to "boo loudly" at the dancers.

She said her objections to the nudity prompted members of the audience to lash out by shoving her.
"If I was outside stripping in front of children, I'd go to jail," Kenney said Tuesday, her voice still hoarse from the concert. "If they want to be sleazy, that's fine. But you better card everybody going through the door."

That didn't happen at the all-ages show.

It isn't clear whether the performance was in violation of city ordinances regulating adult cabaret performances.

City rules require businesses with nude or sexually oriented entertainment to obtain licenses and to follow strict rules, including barring the admission of minors to shows.

Global Spectrum, the Comcast-Spectacor subsidiary that manages the publicly owned Events Center, issued the following statement Wednesday:

"The support acts performing with Guns N' Roses are part of a national tour. As Operators of the facility, we don't control the content of the artists' performances."

Tammi Bryant Olson, Global Spectrum's director of marketing in Everett, said her office received about 10 complaints following the show.

The complaints are being forwarded to Guns N' Roses' management, tour promoters and the Everett Facilities District's five-member board of directors.

The special facilities district owns the ice rink and the arena, and oversees the conference center for Everett.

Earl Dutton, president of the district, was among the 5,300 people who attended the Sunday concert.
Dutton, 79, caught the Suicide Girls performance but left his executive suite at the arena well before the 11:40 p.m. appearance of Guns N' Roses frontman Axl Rose. That was way past his bedtime.

While he was shocked by the dance number, which he said was in "bad taste," Dutton said he thinks it would likely fall under protected speech if put to a decency test.

"A bunch of ladies got up on the stage that didn't have much on," he said. "As far as the upper part is concerned, I don't know because my eyesight isn't that good anymore. Damn it."

Kenney filed a complaint with the Everett Police Department, alleging she was assaulted by spectators who pushed her. Everett police are investigating.