Fall To Pieces

by **Soulmonster** Sun Jan 30, 2022 5:11 pm

During his final sessions with Guns N' Roses, Slash would play parts of a song that would end up as Velvet Revolver's 'Fall To Pieces' on the band's debut album in 2004:

Which led to the trial period where Slash played the key bits of 'Fall to Pieces' but once I showed some interest that was over.

mygnrforum.com, December 14, 2008

As Axl states in the quote above, he had been interested in working more on this song when Slash left the band.

In 2012, Marc Canter would talk about Axl and him, in 2001, discussing the possibility of having Slash add guitar tracks to three songs that might end up on Chinese Democracy.

The day after Rock In Rio 2001 Axl and I were at the pool and he mentioned that there was a possibility that Slash could have played on a few tracks for Chinese Democracy [...].

Legendary Rock Interviews, April 22, 2012

The condition was that Slash must apologize for things said in the press:

[...] if he were willing to apologize in the press for the things that he said about Axl publicly. Axl was cracking the door open and saying to me “If Slash apologizes publicly for the things he said about me in the press I have three songs that he could play on the new album”. They were three songs that Slash had written on and Axl wanted to do something with them and include them on Chinese Democracy which would have been cool.

Legendary Rock Interviews, April 22, 2012

One of these songs were the song that became Fall To Pieces [Marc Canter, Personal communication, January 30, 2022]. This suggests that Axl has a version of this song, too, in the vault, in an unknown state, probably scrapped after Velvet Revolver released their version.

How cool would it be if they decided to work on this song now and finish it?

by **Blackstar** Sun Jan 30, 2022 5:30 pm

Wow, that's mind-blowing, if true.

by **Blackstar** Sun Jan 30, 2022 5:40 pm

For reference, here is what Slash said in his autobiography regarding writing Fall To Pieces:

During those months [=late 2001/early 2002] I started looking to put a new band together. Pete Angelus, who had managed Van Halen, David Lee Roth, and the Black Crowes, had taken an interest in managing me, so he hooked me up with Steve Gorman, the then former drummer for the Black Crowes, who was available because at that point they’d broken up. My old buddy Alan Niven gave me the number of a bass player that he thought I should hear, so we brought him in, and I can’t remember his name but the three of us started rehearsing, just jamming with no real agenda. I was on the straight and narrow, not really even drinking. It was the first time since before the final months of Snakepit that I had gotten myself back into gear: I was in a better head space than ever, I’d started to think about a band again, and I’d started writing material. During that time I came up with the music that evolved into the song “Fall to Pieces.” We jammed for a very short period of time, but I came up with a lot of ideas, the most complete one being that song. Those were the first signs of me taking any kind of a responsible, adult role in my life, because if there is one thing I am, it’s “the eternal teenager.” It was around this time that I heard Randy Castillo had died.

Slash's autobiography, 2007

And in another part of the book:

My period of rootlessness in the musical sense was about to come to an end. I had wandered and I had learned. I was ready to come back to my center and make a new start. It was time. I got together with Pete Angelus, who had managed the Black Crowes and had wanted to manage me. He got me together with Steve Gorman, the Crowes’ drummer, and Alan Niven turned me on to a bass player. We started to write and came up with the music for what became “Fall to Pieces.” All we needed was a singer—again. But then my good friend Randy Castillo passed away and I went to his funeral, and out of his death came a rebirth I could have never imagined.

Slash's autobiography, 2007

by **Soulmonster** Sun Jan 30, 2022 6:52 pm

I am sure Marc is telling the truth.

I wonder how much they worked on the song in 1996 before Slash left and how much Axl worked on it afterwards, if anything?

From how Marc states it, it seems like Axl had a complete song he wanted Slash to add guitars to.

Most likely, Slash had played the opening, descending riff to Axl back in 1996 and Axl wanted him to add this to the song and maybe more lead guitar work.

If that riff was all that had been played for Axl back then, the two songs could be very different with only that riff shared between them. How cool isn't that. Or maybe they worked out the song in 1996 and then Slash basically released it with Scott's vocals in 2004. If so, Slash has been less than honest when talking about how the song was written. I doubt it, since Axl might have caused legal issues if Slash released a song he had helped write without being credited.

Alternatively, nothing more had been done since 1996, Axl only remembered the cool riff, and Axl in 2001 wanted Slash to help write a song out of it.

But again, based on how Marc states ity, it seems like Axl had a song in 2001 based on the riff and whatever they did in 1996, and since Axl wasn't credited on Fall To Pieces, whatever Axl had was likely sufficiently different to fall to pieces.

It would be really cool if this is the case and they now finish and release it. Quite unique in the history of music, I would think, to have two released songs, from two different bands, based on the same signature riff but otherwise written independently.

by **Blackstar** Sun Jan 30, 2022 7:11 pm

Soulmonster wrote:I am sure Marc is telling the truth.

I wonder how much they worked on the song in 1996 before Slash left and how much Axl worked on it afterwards, if anything?

From how Marc states it, it seems like Axl had a complete song he wanted Slash to add guitars to.

Most likely, Slash had played the opening, descending riff to Axl back in 1996 and Axl wanted him to add this to the song and maybe more lead guitar work.

If that riff was all that had been played for Axl back then, the two songs could be very different with only that riff shared between them. How cool isn't that. Or maybe they worked out the song in 1996 and then Slash basically released it with Scott's vocals in 2004. If so, Slash has been less than honest when talking about how the song was written. I doubt it, since Axl might have caused legal issues if Slash released a song he had helped write without being credited.

Alternatively, nothing more had been done since 1996, Axl only remembered the cool riff, and Axl in 2001 wanted Slash to help write a song out of it.

But again, based on how Marc states ity, it seems like Axl had a song in 2001 based on the riff and whatever they did in 1996, and since Axl wasn't credited on Fall To Pieces, whatever Axl had was likely sufficiently different to fall to pieces.

It would be really cool if this is the case and they now finish and release it. Quite unique in the history of music, I would think, to have two released songs, from two different bands, based on the same signature riff but otherwise written independently.

Yes, I think the first hypothesis (the bolded part) is what most likely happened.

It's highly unlikely that Axl and Slash were substantially collaborating in 1996 to the point to write/work on a song together. And considering that Slash said then:

"At this point in time we have only been collaborating together. But we have been doing mostly Axl's material."

https://www.a-4-d.com/t624-1996-10-16-online-chat-with-slash

it was probably something Slash had come up with as an intro bit to one of the song ideas that Axl had. This scenario aligns with what Marc said about the songs being "songs that Slash had written on".

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