1991.01.DD - MTV Rock In Rio Special (Axl, Slash, Izzy, Duff and Matt)

Transcript:

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TRANSCRIPTION:
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1^st video – Interviews with Slash and Duff (Segments)
 
Kurt Loder: Duff and Slash from Guns N’ Roses. That sounds real good. I understand you paid a visit to a snake farm in Sao Paolo the other day. Did you get any snakes?
 
Slash: 55,000 dead snakes.
 
Loder: Dead?
 
Slash: (Laughs) 90 years’ worth of snakes sitting in jars and formaldehyde.
 
Loder: Did you pick up any specimens?
 
Slash: Huh? No, I didn’t pick... What it is, is a sort of like a research center, and because I think... Well, because the biggest snake funnel in the whole world is in South America, so...
 
Duff: Do you like being asked about snakes? (laughs)
 
Loder: We could surely go on for a long time.
 
Slash: They have more anacondas that I’ve ever seen. It was sick.
 
Duff: Sick?
 
Loder: That will be the snake question for the night.
 
Slash: Yeah.
 
Loder (Laughs): What do you make of the audiences down here? They seem to be, like, crazy coco bananas. Are they more demonstrative than other...?
 
Duff: I think they probably save up for, like, five years for some poor ticket. It appears to me, I mean, cuz they go bananas over that we played. We didn’t know...
 
Slash: Bananas? Brazil?
 
Loder: (?) This kind of talk (?)
 
Duff: (?) nervous? I’d hit... No!
 
Loder: You’ve been sitting here, you’re doing two shows here. You’ve been spending a lot of time kind of sitting around. Seen anything interesting in Rio?
 
Slash: I watched that snake thing. Let me tell you (laughs).
 
Loder: Yeah, yeah, we know. What about you, Duff?
 
Duff: No. The gig.
 
Loder: You’ve been to the beach or anything?
 
Duff: No.
 
Slash: We haven’t really... You know, everybody always says, well, now that you are in Brazil, what do you think of this and this and this and this. All I know is what the airport looks like, and then there’s some scenery, and then the hotel. And then from the hotel to the gig...
 
Duff: Room service.
 
Loder: How is your room service?
 
Duff: Different. A monetary thing on the right.
 
Loder: Did you get to listen any of the music down here, I mean the samba stuff or some wild sounds...?
 
Duff: Outside of the hotel (laughs).
 
Slash (laughs): Actually, I take it back. It’s gorgeous here. When we first got here it was sort of miserable cuz it was raining...
 
Duff: (Looks where to put off his cigarette)
 
Slash (to Duff): I’m just putting it on the floor. It was raining and all that, so... And it was really overcast and for some reason it being overcast here changes the whole personality of the place. As soon as the sun came out it was gorgeous. So we went out, we got sun and, you know, just basically hung out cuz we have a lot of friends here that, you know... because of all these bands and stuff. So we just hang out with crew guys and so on. And we get a pretty good idea of the scenery and what goes on there cuz there’s a mountain right by the hotel...
 
Duff: (?) slums and then the rich people...
 
Slash: And we’re right on the beach, as well, so...  
 
Loder: Does getting back on stage again make you want to get out there and start playing for a year-and-a-half or something?
 
Duff: (Chuckles)
 
Slash: Can you tell? (Chuckles)
 
Loder: We will be seeing you soon while we hope we will. We won’t even ask that question. We hope we will.
 
Slash: Oh, that’s (?)
 
Loder:  Okay, it’s coming your way. That’s it for now. We will be back with another report real soon here on MTV.
 
[Cuts to another interview clip]
 
Loder: I’m backstage here at Maracana Stadium with Duff and Slash of Guns N’ Roses, who I think are the big hit of the event, if I’m not mistaken? This is the very same one, too. How does it feel that you’re playing...?
 
Duff: (inaudible)
 
Loder: How does it feel that you’re playing your first gigs, since, like, last spring, in front of 200,000 people? Does it make you nervous?
 
Duff: Yeah.
 
Slash: (Shrugs and smiles)
 
Loder: Real nervous?
 
(Slash and Duff laugh)
 
Slash: No, everybody’s is a jazz. We’ve had a great time event. One of the nicest things was at the gig the other night, we all got into the dressing room and it was almost like a football team without a coach (chuckles). And sort of all hung out for a little while and went out and... I mean, for what it was, you know, we didn’t have a setlist or anything, we just do it all together...
 
Duff: New drummer...
 
Slash: Keyboard player... Neither he had ever played on stage with us before. It’s like, you know, they have no idea how the formula is, which is, like, non-formula (chuckles). So we’re looking at Matt going, “Play!” He says, “What song?” “Uh...” “Okay!” Then we (?)
 
Duff: Drum solo!
 
Slash: Yeah, torturous (laughs).
 
Duff: (Laughs)
 
Loder: Matt’s working well, alright?
 
Duff: Yeah.
 
Slash: Yeah, Matt’s great.
 
Duff: If anybody could do it (?)
 
Slash: So we were all jazz.
 
Loder: What kind of stuff are you playing here?
 
Slash: What kind of stuff are we playing?
 
Loder: Like, your greatest hits, covers, any surprises?
 
Slash: We have a pick list, all the songs that we know. A little piece of paper in front of the stage and we just sort of, like, pick them at random.
 
Duff: New songs.
 
Slash: We played Sweet Child (?) (laughs)
 
Duff: (Laughs) I think we did. Yeah, we played, like, Jungle and Sweet Child. But, I mean, half of it is new material. People just kind of stared at us.  
 
Slash: We opened with a new song (laughs).
 
Loder: Does it sound as good when you do it as you thought it would?
 
Duff: To us.
 
Slash: To us (?)
 
Duff: To us. I mean, we know the songs.
 
Slash: The record, um, Duff and Izzy and Matt and I, before we went into pre-production, we went to rehearsal and we worked all the songs out in a more or less live kind of a feel. So what happens now it’s down to basics again, when it’s like doing basic tracks. So it’s... whatever we did on basic tracks is what you’re basically hearing up there.
 
Loder: Could you give us some outro music, maybe a fast power chord or something? Because I think we’re done. We’ll be back with more reports from Rock in Rio real soon (laughs). Keep watching MTV.
 
Slash: (?) 15 minutes left (?) (laughs)
 
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2^nd video – Interview with Izzy
 
Loder: Thanks Martha. And still backstage here at the Maracana Stadium and in one of the hundreds of the little shops that (?) the concourses here. This is a record store, of course. And all the acts playing Rock in Rio have albums on sales here; one of the hottest moving items is probably by one of the groups with the hottest buzz at Rock in Rio, Guns N’ Roses (shows the Appetite of Destruction album with the original cover art). Here they are. After almost a year of not playing together, they’re back. They are performing at Rock in Rio. And we had a few words with Izzy the other day. Here is what he had to tell us.
 
[cut to interview with Izzy]
 
Loder: Izzy, are you thrilled?
 
Izzy: Yeah, very excited.
 
Loder: How excited are you?
 
Izzy: Um, I’m into it.
 
Loder: It must be great to get back together. It was hard to get everybody together and say, “We’re gonna go play this gig” cuz you didn’t have to, right?
 
Izzy: No, we didn’t have to. It was something we wanted to do, I think. Actually it’s kind of mixed. I don’t know who wanted to do [it or] might not have wanted to, but everybody’s here, you know.
 
Loder: Did everything fall into place as soon as you walked out on stage of it, just like it was?
 
Izzy: Yeah, it was great. You know, we hadn’t played together with everybody for a while. And, you know, we’ve got Diz playing keyboards and Matt, you know, on drums so this is the first time we’ve all played like that. It was great. It felt so comfortable.
 
Loder: A new drummer changes the attack of a band. What has Matt done for the group?
 
Izzy: Um, as a drummer I would say... I don’t know, it’s good, you know? (chuckles)
 
Loder: Was it different from Steven?
 
Izzy: Yes, different style. But, you know, they’re both good drummers and Matt is working good.
 
Loder: Does he write too? I mean, is he contributing songs?
 
Izzy: Um, he hasn’t with us. You know, he’s been busy learning a lot of songs, I think 30 songs or something like that; as well as the band too, you know.
 
Loder: Really you’re the one that’s actually been going out here in Rio and seeing stuff.
 
Izzy: Yeah, yeah.
 
Loder: Have you been to any night clubs? It’s an all-night town, right?
 
Izzy: I haven’t been to any night clubs. I usually get out early. I went to the Boogie Boarding down to the beach somewhere, where all this sewage goes and they say... I haven’t seen any.
 
Loder: How are the waves here?
 
Izzy: It was good. Big crushers, you know. And... What else? I went to a skate park. They got a skate park here. It’s, like, open; there’s no admission fee or something like that.   
 
Loder: Really?
 
Izzy: Yeah, there’s no rules, nothing. You just go there and skate, like, you know, you would go play tennis or something. I thought that was pretty cool.
 
Loder: Would you come back here, like, on vacation, if you ever had a vacation?
 
Izzy: Yeah, yeah. I mean, it’s a good place. I like it.
 
Loder: Are you the guy in the band that’s in charge of getting everybody’s butt together and saying, “Let’s go do this”, “Let’s go do that”?
 
Izzy: No, I don’t think so. Not so much, you know? I’m usually the first one who wants to get on the plane, like, a day earlier or something. Let’s go check the place out, you know? For the gig. But, yeah, I wouldn’t say that.
 
Loder: Are there any surprises in the set that you’re playing here in Rio?
 
Izzy: Every night, you know. I mean, like we said, there’s a list of tunes and it’s kind of, you know, whatever Axl is in the mood for, you know, seems appropriate.
 
Loder: We know you’re doing Theme from The Godfather. Is there any other stuff like that, that you’ve tried, like, in rehearsals and just didn’t have the guts to do on stage?
 
Izzy: (Chuckles) I don’t know. Slash, he’s the one... He came up with that at rehearsal and I was kind of like, you know... I said okay... But like I said, I didn’t get the point, you know, with Sweet Child O’ Mine. I think we ended up playing it before Double Talking Jive the other Sunday. So, you know, it was switched. So it’s, you know...
 
Loder: There’s never a dull moment with Guns N’ Roses.
 
Izzy: (Chuckles) Yeah.
 
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3^rd video – Segments of MTV Brazil interview with Axl [The video is edited and the questions, except in the beginning, are missing]
 
Interviewer: (Talks in Portuguese about Guns N’ Roses second show in Rio) So, hi Axl (giggles). Nice to meet you. How did you like this second show in Rock in Rio?
 
Axl: It was the funnest show that I’ve ever played. It was the funnest show. And the reason I wanted to talk with you so much was to thank Rio.
 
Interviewer: (Giggles) Sorry.
 
Axl: I want to thank Rio for being so responsive, so into it. It was great. It’s amazing. I had a blast. We did two hours and it was a blast. It was the best show, funnest show I’ve ever played. I really like it, I really like it down here. It’s like, I hope to come back here in a year and play again. You know, play more shows and play in Sao Paolo.
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Yeah, we want to come back definitely. We really want to come back, and hopefully we will tour for about two years starting in April. And, you know, we can come here again and play more cities.
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This was the biggest crowd that we’ve ever played to and one of the most responsive. Donnington was like, they knew all the words but, I mean, a lot of people down here don’t know English and they could still sing all the songs and everything. Like, Sweet Child; they sing every chorus with me. It’s so much fun.
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We’ve been asked to do so many different things, and, you know, in America it’s real big to talk about the rainforests and stuff. But the poverty down here is like nothing I’ve ever seen. And I imagined my... You know, when we were first coming to the stadium to do soundcheck the first day, we went under the tunnel, and when I looked up and saw the houses, I thought of myself as a little kid here and having, you know, to try to make a life and starting that way. And it, like, ripped my heart out, right? So we’re trying to find whatever angle we can to get involved and... Cuz we haven’t really ever taken on any cause, you know, charity cause or anything, and it’s something I’m interested in. And since we do want to come back and we know we can make a lot of money playing the shows, maybe we can do something to help a little bit if we can find the right way to place things where we know the people are going to get the money. When we put Civil War out, we put it on The Romanian Angel Appeal and George Harrison and his wife were, like, handling it directly to make sure that 400,000 babies got the medical supplies and stuff. We’d like to see if we can possibly help something, like first start something like that here. We don’t know... We don’t really know who to talk to. Everybody we talk to gets scared, you know, of where the money will go.
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Yeah. So we wanted to possibly if... It’s something I’m really interested in and then I asked the band, and the whole band is into it. We just don’t quite know who to talk to yet.
 
[MTV Brazil hosts talk in Portuguese]   
 
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4^th video – MTV Week in Rock
 
Kurt Loder: Well, as you can see, there’s been some great music here at the Rock in Rio festival, but there have been problems too and they’ve all been brought to light by the local tabloid press, which is a copy which is being held up by our lucky contest winner, Jackie (?). Problems with drugs, violence, free sex and disorganization – a major problem. There have also been four reported deaths and a lot of problems for some acts selling tickets; particularly, believe it or not, George Michael. One group that didn’t have any such problem was Guns N’ Roses. They’re back together for the first time since they played Farm Aid in the States 9 months ago and they sound better than ever, as you’re about to see.
 
[Cut to interview with Axl]
 
Axl: I like New York, L.A., Paris, Tokyo... and Rio now.  
 
[Cut to live footage and interviews with concert-goers
 
Male concert-goer: I like Guns N’ Roses...
 
Female concert-goer: The band is very, very hard. And I like it.
 
Female concert-goers: Guns N’ Roses! Why? He is very beautiful. Very beautiful!]
 
[Cut back to the interview with Axl]
Axl: A lot of people down here don’t know English and they could still sing all the songs and everything. Like, Sweet Child. They sing every chorus with me. It’s so much fun.
 
[Cut to interview with Izzy, Slash and Duff]
 
Izzy: Axl would try to talk to the people, you know, in-between songs, and you could tell there was having, maybe, difficulties understanding, but when it came to the songs, because they were right there.
 
[Cut to live footage: Knockin’ on Heaven’s Door]
 
Loder (voice-over): Guns N’ Roses performance at Farm Aid IV last April was also the band’s last with drummer Steven Adler. His drug problems finally forced him out of the group. His replacement was Californian Matt Sorum who, after a long search, was recruited from The Cult.
 
[Cut back to the interview with Izzy, Slash and Duff]
 
Slash: (?) like, why we can’t get a drummer like that, right? So I knew... My wheel started turning, like, two months later. And I said, well, who’s... I mean, they’re not on the road and he’s the best drummer I’ve seen so I went through whatever channels and found him. And submitted my offer that he couldn’t refuse.
 
[Cut to the interview with Axl]
 
Axl: He’s amazing. Can’t say enough nice things about him. He’s a great guy to hang out with, he’s always friendly, he’s usually always in a good mood.
 
Loder (voice-over): With a new drummer firmly in place, Guns N’ Roses took Rock in Rio by storm and unveiled some unusual new material for us backstage.
 
[Cut to the interview with Izzy, Slash and Duff – They jam the Theme from The Godfather]
 
[Cut back to live footage: Knocking On Heaven’s Door]
 
[Cut back to the interview with Axl]
 
Axl (voice-over): We don’t plan which song is going to be next ever, because I don’t know which song I want to be able to sing next, right? So we always just go from one song and go, “Hmm, let’s do this next”, you know? And that helps the crowd relax a little bit and keeps it from being just everything just so perfect, you know? And with this everybody can relax and go, “They’re real people.”
 
[Cut to live footage: Patience]
 
[Cut back to the interview with Izzy, Slash and Duff]
 
Slash: We got together to rehearse, we did the album, we all got back together and it was really nice. And then we came here, and the biggest thing, the biggest clincher is to, actually, to do a show, you know? And that really got... So this (?) to get special. A special night.
 
[Cut back to live footage: Patience]
 
Loder: This is the other side of Rio de Janeiro, a beautifully town square in the old part of town that dates back to Portuguese colonian times, so it’s not all sun and fun her. Some of this is really historically interesting. Guns N’ Roses will have a new album out sometime later this year. Can’t be more specific than that.
 
[Cut]