1992.07.14 - MTV - Interview with Slash and Lars Ulrich

TRANSCRIPTION:
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Riki Rachtman: Tonight we’re not messing around. This is no lightweight show today. Check it out. We had Megadeth play and they’re gonna play later on. And right now, this is like an added surprise I’m so stoked about, two of the biggest rock ‘n’ roll bands in the world. From Guns N’ Roses, Slash! And from Metallica, Lars!

[Live audience applauding and cheering]

Rachtman: So, this is kind of like an added surprise. First of all, obviously - stop laughing, get serious here – I wanna talk about something that starts off Friday in Washington DC. I’m gonna be there with MTV, so that will be good for me, I’ll get to see both bands. The Guns N’ Roses and Metallica tour. How did the whole thing come about?

Slash (laughing): I can’t hear a word you’re saying.

Lars: I can’t hear. (To the live audience) Guys, keep it down.

Rachtman (to the live audience): Everybody (?). I’m trying to talk to these guys.

Lars (to the live audience): Shut up (laughs).

Rachtman: I want to talk, obviously, about the Guns N’ Roses and Metallica tour – Hey, Slash, it’s been a long time. How are you doing? How’s the family?

Slash: This is funny, I didn’t know -anyway, it’s a long story.

Rachtman: Anyway. The Guns and Metallica tour. It starts off Friday in Washington DC and we’re gonna be there. I’m gonna be there with MTV and I hope you’ll be watching, and you in Washington, everybody will probably be there. And I assume you guys will be there.

Lars: We will be there, yeah.

Rachtman: So tell me, how did the tour come about?

Slash: Just because we’ve been buddies for a long time.

Lars: Lot of late nights.

Slash: It was real - we’d go out, we’d get drunk and we’d go, “We should do a tour.”

Rachtman: I find it so hard to believe.

Slash: That’s the honest-to-God-truth. That’s what happened.

Rachtman: And was it pretty tough, I mean putting this type of show together? You know, in a lot of places...

Slash: It was really complicated, but we dealt with each other as friends.

Lars: Most of the times, when the managers, and the agents, and stuff like that would sit there and - you know, we’d have to call each other up and say, “Look, we gotta solve this” and stuff like that. So, me and him did a lot of the groundwork, and it’s working on good.

Rachtman: So it was kind of you guys saying, “Hey, we just decided that...”

Lars: “Hey, we’re going on tour together, so you guys figure it out!”

[Applause]

Rachtman: Just so everybody knows, this is, like, equal billing and it’s a complete Guns N’ Roses show and a complete Metallica show.

Lars: Yeah.

Slash: Yeah, that’s one thing, it’s a co-tour, right? So it’s Metallica and Guns, Guns and Metallica. That’s that.

Lars (talks over): Full stage (?). Both bands are playing full headlining shows.

Slash (talks over): Alright? So, it’s not like anybody is trying to pull some sort of star trip. It’s really just a summer concert that's gonna be cool.

Rachtman: And what are the kind of things, any special surprises you wanna give out, like about the stage? I know that you guys’ve had that snakepit stage before.

Lars: Yeah, we have our snakepit thing that we had indoors, and we have that kind of in stadium format (laughs).

Rachtman: So you’re still gonna let people in the middle.

Lars: Yeah. And we’re gonna be playing...

Rachtman: They’re gonna be in the middle for the Guns show too?

Slash: No.

(Laughter)

Rachtman: Right. “Sorry, now you gotta get out.”

Slash: No. The Metallica show - they do their trip and we do ours.

Lars: Yeah. That’s what the whole idea was. You know, we do 2 ½ hours of our thing, they do 2 ½ hours of their thing, and it’s completely different, you know?

Rachtman: Now, how long’s the set for you guys? I mean, this is, like, a whole day thing. It’s gonna start, like, at 3:00 and three hours a band.

Lars: And there’s also Faith No More.

Rachtman: Yeah, that’s another I wanted to ask. Cuz I know that Guns, you guys have always liked Faith No More and I know Faith No More opened up for you before.

Lars: Yeah, opened up for us a couple of years ago.

Rachtman: So how did that come about?

Slash: We had them in Europe. You know, we didn’t have them, but they... (laughs)

(Laughter)

Rachtman: So, now we know how they got the tour! (laughs)

Slash: The opened up for us in Europe and they were great. And Soundgarden as well.

Rachtman: But Soundgarden isn’t playing.

Slash: They’re not on this one. It’s just Faith No More.

Lars: Then we’d have to make it into, like, a 2-day event.

Rachtman: Exactly. But they'll go off for two days, man.

(Cheering)

Rachtman: One thing that I want to get cleared up so everybody knows: Axl is out of jail.

Slash: He’s out of jail. He’s in court right now.

Rachtman: Uh-huh.

Slash: That was like, “Hey!”

Rachtman: Has any member seen him?

Slash: The situation in St. Louis is, the prosecutor, which I don’t know his name, is – I don’t know what his point is. But he’s trying to make a point and luckily, on our behalf, Axl’s dealing with it.

Rachtman: Yeah, we saw Axl, he looked great. He looked like he had an okay time...

Slash: Yeah, cuz it’s a joke. He was having a great time. I talked to him yesterday. He was like, you know, this is funny.

Lars: A lot of people just don’t believe that this is happening.

Slash: Yeah.

Lars: And a lot of people in the last couple of days we’ve been hanging out, you know, “Is the tour canceled?” and blah blah blah. It’s like, we’re going down...

Rachtman: Washington DC on Friday.

Lars: We’re going down to DC to do soundchecks and stuff like that. They’ve been down working for, like, a whole week setting up this enormous stage and everything. We’re going down there, it’s reality.  

Slash: People think it’s some, sort of like, big hype thing. And it’s not, you know. We set this up for doing this tour.

Rachtman: I think it’s the type of thing for a rock fan to see your two favorite bands, in the world probably, playing together. It’s kind of amazing.

Slash: Especially with Guns N’ Roses, we have so many mishaps.

(Laughter)

Rachtman: I find it hard to believe.

Slash: For example, Detroit is flipping out, cuz they don’t know if we’re gonna play or not. Cuz we canceled there three times. And it’s not like we don’t wanna play Detroit. It’s just because we’ve had all these - you know, circumstances we’ll call them, which have prevented us from being able to get there. So we are playing, you know? (laughs) So if you got anybody in Detroit, that’s where, you know – we are coming.

Rachtman: They will be there. As far as you know. And we’re gonna be back talking to Slash and Lars in a little bit.

[Break]

Rachtman: I know you’ve been watching so you can find out all about Axl's arraignment, right? Anyways, we’re talking a little bit about this tour, which is probably the biggest tour to hit... ever.

Lars: Ever.

Rachtman: Guns N’ Roses, Metallica and Faith No More. And one thing that we were talking about a little bit earlier, is that there’s a lot of big cities that you guys aren’t going to hit and it’s not by your choice, right?

Lars: No. We sat down and , like, basically picked the 30 biggest cities in the country. And we it came down to, like, Cleveland, Philly, Atlanta, Kansas City, places like that, they just said, “Stay away.” And, like, we tried...

Rachtman: St. Louis...

Slash: St. Louis. We wanted to go there.

Lars: Yeah (laughs). Well, that was one of the cities that was picked. Believe me. But, like, the stadiums there, we tried, you know, race tracks. I mean, “If you have a field, we will show up and play in a field,” you know, “find us a sewer system and we’re there.” But I just want to tell all the kids in those cities that it’s not because we didn’t – you know, not for lack of trying, all you guys in Atlanta, and Cleveland... So you guys are gonna have to do a little driving, but, hey, we tried.

Rachtman: Yeah, cuz sometimes people in those cities say, “Oh god, Guns and Metallica, they’re forgetting about us.” But you guys wanted to play all these cities, right?

Lars:  Yeah, we sat down...

Slash: We wanted to play everywhere.

Rachtman: I mean, even in L.A., I know the Rose Bowl, it took forever to finally say, “Hey, it is Guns’ and Metallica’s show, it’s going to be okay, your neighbors don’t have to worry about anything.” Which is another thing you might wanna tell the people that go to the show. You love the screaming and yelling, but, you know, make sure that everybody’s...

Slash: You know, you gotta get to a point where it’s your show, yeah. But at the same time it’s gotta be organized. It’s gotta be formulated to a point where you can get as many people into one place without having any, like, upheaval, you know? And then finally you start to narrow it down to, “Okay, this city and this city; we’ve played there before.” So we know exactly how it’s gonna be organized.

Rachtman: Cuz, like, one other thing...

Slash (talks over): And the rest of the places (?)

Lars (talks over): (?) they’ll let other shows come in afterwards.

Rachtman: The other thing I think a lot of the people that go to the shows don’t understand is, when everybody goes nuts, it might be fun tearing out the chairs and throwing them up on stage. You guys have to pay for that.

Slash: Yeah. In St. Louis it was (?)

Lars (talks over): I know all about that...

Rachtman: “Yeah, let’s tear up the chairs.” Well, here’s the bill.

Slash: I have only one amp that works still. I’ve one amp, I’m on tour with one amp.

Rachtman: So scream and yell, go nuts, but...

Lars: Just remember, if you guys start – the thing is a lot of kids think, you know, if they start tearing up seats or screwing up the place, that they’re rebelling against the venue or the promoter. But what they’re really rebelling against is us, because we have to pay the bills. And it gives, like, all heavy metal a bad name, because they don’t want any more rock shows. It’s stupid.

Rachtman: Yeah, it’s why there’s not shows in places like Cleveland and Philly.

Lars: Yeah, because they don’t want it.

Slash: It’s a weird feeling.

Rachtman: Guys, thanks a lot for stopping by.

(Applause)

Rachtman: And we’ll see you in Washington. I’ll be there for the first Guns-Metallica-Faith No More show.