1988.07.31 - Circus - Guns N' Roses Discover The Dark Side of Success (Izzy, Slash, Axl)

Guns N' Roses Discover The Dark Side of Success
by Paul Gallotta

AII things considered, you'd have to believe that Guns N' Rases are now qualified for the coveted title of "super-stars." Not only has their debut album (Appetite For Destruction, Geffen) muscled its way into the Top 10 without the benefit of a hit single (or for that matter, much airplay but it went platinum almost simultaneously.

MTV, the video channel that took a full seven months to play a censored version of the "Welcome to the Jungle" clip, aired an equally censored GNR concert last April—and reportedly ended up with their highest-rated Headbanger's Ball ever. Clint Eastwood personally asked the band to be in his latest motion picture, and Iron Maiden picked them to open the American leg of their world tour. So why do they still ride around L.A. on public busses?

"'Cause 85c will get you anywhere," laughs lanky rhythm guitarist Izzy Stradlin. It seems that nine months (as of this writing) after Appetite For Destruction was unleashed, the GN'R gang still haven't received a single royalty check.

"Amazing!" chuckles the affable Stradlin. "When we went gold, I was like 'OK! This is it! I'm getting me a car! No more busses!' Then I found out there's a bit more to it than that. First, we have to pay everyone back. Then it's sorta like, we'll get a check every six months or something like that."

But fans shouldn't have to worry about Izzy, Slash, W. Axl Rose, Duff McKagan or Steve Adler having to spend the summer on skid row. Out of necessity, anyway.

"Just the other day, I went down to our old studio on Sunset Boulevard by The Guitar Center," recalls Stradlin. An old friend of ours lives there now. We were paying $400 a month back then for this 12' x 12' room with no shower. The girl Michelle [immortalized in the song "My Michelle" off Appetite] still has her name and phone number carved into the wall! God, that place was a riot back then! When you consider that, I'd have to say that we're all doing a lot better now than we ever did before."

Stretched out on a battered couch in his Hollywood Boulevard apartment, Izzy is a striking contrast to his co-conspirator in guitar histrionics, Slash. Stradlin speaks in animated, jackhammer-like bursts; Slash, in a slow and deliberate monotone. Izzy sports a post-rigor mortis pallor and a new, shorter haircut. Slash is dark with a long, tangled mop of black hair. Yet the two, along with the band, possess a sort of brutal chemistry that has reverberated throughout the music industry like a well-placed pipe bomb.

"A year ago, people treated us like garbage," comments Slash, "because we had the worst reputation in town. Now they treat us like heroes. They act like we're larger than life because we have the worst reputation in town. It makes me feel awkward. It's made me about 50% more cynical than I was last year"

As a temporary remedy to Slash's never-ending quest for Life, Liberty and The Pursuit of Being Left Alone, the English-born guitar hero in training has been exiled to the L.A. suburbs.

"It was a mutual decision on behalf of my management and myself," he explains "They wanted to make sure I'd be here for the next tour—I'm an investment, now. And I wanted to avoid all the hassles that go with staying in Hollywood. I wanted to avoid...the people. So now. I spend most of my time practicing in the yuppie community of Hermosa Beach."

According to Slash, the part of the music business that's forced him to seek refuge in the 'burbs was primarily "the unnecessary bullshit that goes with dealing with promoters, industry people and other band."

The latter two might be particularly singled out. Last March 22nd, Vicky Hamilton, A&R consultant for Geffen Records and former manager of Guns N' Roses, slapped the band with a $1 million lawsuit. Hamilton (who let the band live in her apartment from October '85 to March '86) claims the band breached an oral personal management contract with her ("Wanna guess what we're gonna [have to] spend our first royalty checks on?" deadpans Stradlin).

In addition to the Hamilton complycations, the Gunners have had to constend with the now-legendary range war they've been entangled in with fellow lawsuit-plagued L.A. rockers, Poison.

"Christ..." groans Slash. "You should read the hate mail I get from their fans." Brushing away the hair from his eyes with one hand, the reclusive guitarist slowly shakes his head. "I wish someone would clear all that up." Take it away. Slash.

"Before I joined this band, I used to play in any band that I thought I could get exposure from. I developed a bad reputation as sort of a mercenary for doing that. I almost joined Poison at one point," he confesses. "Their old guitarist Matt [Smith] called me and said he was leaving the hand. and that if anyone could replace him, it was me. It was down to a choice between me and C.C. DeVille. They wanted us to do this thing where I'd play a riff and then go, 'Hi! My name as Slash' And I couldn't bring myself to do that. so they hired [C.C.].

"Later on down the line, I met him," Slash continues, voice unwavering. "And I couldn't understand him. He pissed me off, and the next day I made the mistake of mentioning it in another magazine The next thing I knew one sentence about C.C. DeVille had turned into an entire article!

"But the air has been cleared. It's over. I' not out to get them."

Axl Rose adds that the two hands "sat down and talked it out. Yeah. we do have our differences from when we were both on the street playing the club circuit. But they're doing their thing and we're doing ours, and we're not really in each other's way, so we don't have the time to deal with this bullshit anymore."

At the rate Guns N' Rosen are moving, they wont have time to deal with much else. either.

"We're going into the studio tonight for a four-day rush job," says Stradlin. "We're gonna try and cut four acoustic songs for the other side of the Live Like a Suicide Ep we're gonna re-release."

The tracks scheduled for recording include a revised version of "You're Crazy," "Move to the City," "One in a Million" and "I Used to Love Her, But I Had to Kill Her," and should be out later this summer.

Then its off on an equally rushed two-week cross-country headlining spin with U.D.O. and Zodiac Mindwarp and the Love Reaction, before hooking up with Iron Maiden for a month and a half. Immediately following the Maiden dates, Axl and Co. jet off to five headlining dates in Japan and return to the U.S. to open for Aerosmith. Then it's back to the studio for two weeks. followed by England's Castle Donnington Festival. To be followed by the European Monsters of Rock tour, after which...

"We'll be institutionalized," snickers Izzy.

"That's just the way we do things," adds Slash. "So we aren't picture perfect. So what?" he challenges. "It may seem strange to others, but it isn't to us. I figure, as soon as we have to do things the way other people tell us to, or if we have to try and desperately hold on to what we are, then its time to pack it in, quit and die."

There's something really weird about this interview. The first half discusses things that happened around the time of publication (mid-1988), like Slash having relocated to Hermosa Beach and Appetite just turning gold (Feb 1988), but then the quote from Izzy about recording for GN'R Lies is obviously from July 1987 and then the article mentions upcoming touring that started in April 1988. So I would guess most of the quotes is from an interview from 1988, but before April and after February, but then the author added a quote from Izzy about GN'R Lies and information about these songs, from an earlier interview. Just weird.