Last of the Giants

by Mick Wall

  In short, everybody’s fault but Axl’s. Didn’t he already have the right ‘players’ in Slash, Duff, Izzy and Matt? But that was a stupid question. Axl also expressed satisfaction with the final product while seeming to address criticisms that perhaps the original GN’R line-up might have put the album out more quickly, by pointing out, ‘It’s the right record and I couldn’t ask for more in that regard. Could have been a more enjoyable journey, but it’s there now. The art comes first. It dictates if not the course [then] the destination artistically. For me, once the real accompanying artwork is there with a few videos and some touring, the package was achieved and delivered. And to do so at this level in terms of quality, both artistic and performance-wise, both on record and live, is something that’s a miracle at minimum and something that wouldn’t have happened, no matter how anyone tries to convince others, with old Guns, regardless of anyone’s intentions. It was just as ugly in old Guns, regardless of our success.’

  This last was undoubtedly true, in its way. It also meant that those hoping for a reunion of the original line-up would see their hopes dashed against the rocks of Axl’s virulent refusal to set aside past grievances. In that same Billboard interview, he categorically stated that while he was open to collaborating with or touring with Izzy or Duff, he would never again make music with Slash, icily vowing, ‘What’s clear is that one of the two of us will die before a reunion and however sad, ugly or unfortunate anyone views it, it is how it is. Those decisions were made a long time ago and reiterated year after year by one man. There are acts that, once committed between individuals, they are what they are. To add insult to injury almost day after day, lapsing into year after year, for more than a decade, is a nightmare. Anyone putting his own personal entertainment above everything else is sickening.’

  In 2009, Axl brought in Sixx:A.M.’s guitarist, DJ Ashba, for the Chinese Democracy World Tour – a tour that had actually begun in 2001 but that, like the album, seemed impervious to the constraints of time and space. They would play 117 shows worldwide on that leg, although stretching back to 2001 the total number of shows played was 239, with 48 cancellations from 2001 to 2007 and five cancellations between 2009 and 2011.

  Business as usual then, GN’R style. But while Axl had publicly praised Azoff’s handling of Chinese Democracy’s release and its associated deal with Best Buy, that relationship, like so many others in Axl’s life, had now turned sour. In 2010, Azoff sued Axl, alleging that the singer had breached an oral agreement to pay him 15 per cent of the earnings from the tour, which Azoff estimated to be approximately $2 million. Axl swiftly countersued for $5 million, alleging that Azoff had deliberately botched the album promotion and had mishandled tour dates for the band. Axl insisted that Azoff had tried to force him ‘into a position where he would have no choice but to reunite with the original members of Guns N’ Roses for a reunion tour’. Axl also alleged emotional distress stemming from Azoff’s use of Axl’s real name, complaining that the use of the name ‘William Bailey’ was done ‘out of spite and vindictiveness to cause Rose emotional distress and harm’, because ‘Azoff knew that the name William Bailey carries significant emotional damage.’ Azoff, known for his practical jokes, responded by stating, ‘On advice of counsel I cannot respond at this time, but will discuss in my upcoming book, My Life with William Bill Bailey.’ Not to be left out, Azoff’s attorney, Howard King, when apprised of the substance of Axl’s allegations by Billboard, deadpanned, ‘He didn’t accuse Irving of being on the grassy knoll in Dallas on November 22, 1963?’

  Even Slash weighed in on the drama as it played out in the media, saying, ‘I don’t even know what that’s about. I don’t know where Axl is coming from. I mean, I know where Irving is coming from, he’s looking for commissions for a tour that he booked. [It’s a] pretty reasonable kind of thing. Axl’s countersuing, so I’m not sure exactly what the merit is that he’s countersuing, exactly. Anyways, I don’t keep up with that, I don’t follow it.’ Eventually Azoff and Axl settled out of court, with the terms kept largely confidential, although it was reported to involve ‘a comprehensive touring agreement’ for the band to perform at a number of venues favourable to Azoff’s position.

  It was now that another old face from Axl’s past tried to step in and save the day: Doug Goldstein. Having spent five years in Hawaii, as he puts it, ‘drinking umbrella drinks and helping raise my family’, Goldstein now felt ready to get back in the game and thought he saw a way of both solving Axl’s troubles and making him a ton of money. Unable, though, to get to speak to Axl personally, he wrote him a letter. ‘I wrote a letter to Axl, gave it to Beta, and said, “Don’t let anybody else see it”, and next thing I know it’s on the fucking internet. I’ve had some people since go, “Why on God’s green Earth would you put together a letter like that?” And I’ve gone through that letter a number of times and I thought I had some great ideas.

  ‘I told him, “Let’s go start by opening for the Van Halen stadium tour. Let’s kill ’em on their stage. Then the band would be solidified in the public eye and then we’ll go on and do our own thing.” And I mentioned having something called the Rose Fest, which basically was just ripping off the business model of Sharon Osbourne and Ozzy of Ozzfest. My point behind it was, you know, Axl, you’re getting to the point where you don’t like to tour, so Ozzy only does like one in every three Ozzfests. Yet every year it’s still called Ozzfest and he reaps the rewards. They make more money than any of the artists playing on the bill. Just by cruising the event. So that was all covered in the letter as well. And unfortunately I was never communicated with back in return to the letter that I sent him. All I know is he was really angry that Beta and I had met in private.’

  Goldstein also touched on the thorny subject of a reunion, but coming out on the side of not doing it. ‘What I said was, the Azoffs, the Doc McGhees of the world, they’re not gonna back your artistic play. They’re really only interested in the reunion. My point was, whatever you want to do professionally, I’ll be there for you. If you don’t wanna do the fucking reunion, fuck the reunion. That’s fine. The reunion will always be there, but if you wanna do Axl Rose’s Guns N’ Roses for the next twenty fucking years before the reunion, then let’s go. I’ll be your guy. I can do a great fucking job. You already know that.’

  But when the letter was published on the internet, Goldstein became a figure of ridicule. It seemed an unnecessarily harsh way to repay the 17 years he’d spent watching Axl’s back.

  Throughout the next leg of the Chinese Democracy world tour, the band criss-crossed the globe. Internet trolls had a field day with Axl’s physical appearance; no longer the lithe, sinewy frontman, writhing in skinny jeans and snug T-shirts, the singer had packed on weight over the years. He also continued his long tradition of starting shows egregiously late, often without explanation. As audiences grew less tolerant of this routine, the band’s appearance on the first night of the 2010 Reading Festival kicked their fury into high gear. The show had opened with riotous sets from NOFX, Biffy Clyro and Queens of the Stone Age. Guns N’ Roses were the hotly anticipated headliners, but as their set time approached then passed, there was no sign of the band. Waves of boos gathered force and crashed against the empty stage until finally, an hour beyond the scheduled start, Axl and co. turned up and launched into the title track from Chinese Democracy. But the damage had been done. The outraged fans continued the boos and catcalls through the opener and it was reported that some fans began leaving during the early part of the set. With a firm curfew from Reading Council controlling the performances the band were forced to cut short their set, stopping at midnight. The delay had cost the fans an entire hour of performance time.

  Nick Hasted, writing for the Independent, excoriated the band’s antipathy for the audience, writing: ‘Even “Welcome to the Jungle” is dribbled out with no meaning. Fireworks flare to fool the rubes, Axl sputters, and lets his career die. Only the bellboy still owed money at whatever Royal Berkshire hotel he’s s
taying after this nightmarish one-night stand might wish him well, for one night only. For “Sweet Child o’ Mine”, he changes into a red check shirt that would go down well in a country bar on a slow Monday. He tinkles away at a keyboard – as if he’s an artist – but never says sorry when he falls far short. The contempt of this tinny, redundant show by a blissfully ignorant ex-star is mutual long before the end.’

  Two days later, the band closed the Leeds festival, taking the stage 30 minutes late. If the Leeds fans were more forgiving than the noisy Reading crowd, the people waiting in Dublin two nights later would prove considerably more antagonistic when the band came on nearly 45 minutes late. In a video of the show that’s widely available on YouTube, the fans are heard to be already hurling abuse at the stage when DJ Ashba kicks off the set with the intro to ‘Welcome to the Jungle’. Irate at being forced to wait without any explanation or apology, some ticketholders began throwing plastic cups and bottles onto the stage. In the video, Axl runs out and begins singing but seconds later, another object falls dangerously close to him, prompting him to stop the show and say, ‘All right, here’s the deal – one more bottle, we go home. It’s up to you. We would like to stay. You want us to stay?’

  Speaking in a calm and measured tone, Axl tries to control the situation as the catcalls continue. ‘We want to stay. We want to have fun. If you don’t want to have fun, all you’ve gotta do is let us know and we got no problem. We’ll go on our way.’ The band starts the song again, another bottle hits the stage, and Axl says, ‘Have a good evening’ and leads the band offstage.

  Promoters rushed into damage control mode, laughably announcing that they were addressing technical difficulties, but later admitting that they were trying to coax the band, i.e. Axl, back out. Eventually the lights came up and announcements were made that the evening was over and that refunds would be given. Then, after many of the fans had already left, the band retook the stage at 11.30 and performed a full set. Huh?

  The promoters issued a statement the next day, confirming the band’s late start and blaming the support act for running late (though not explaining the 45-minute window between the support act finishing and Guns N’ Roses taking the stage). The statement confirmed that the band were being pelted with plastic glasses containing ‘unknown substances’, adding that ‘While the artist has a long history for being late on stage, NO artist should be subjected to missiles and unknown substances being thrown at them. However, despite this the band went back on stage after people stopped throwing items performing their full set of songs in full [sic]. MCD and The O2 wish to apologise for any inconvenience caused due to late running of the show.’

  Just before noon on 27 September 2011, Steven Adler stepped into the Rainbow on Sunset, where he was scheduled to do an interview for Metal Hammer magazine, and shouted, ‘We just got nominated for the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame!’ Discussion quickly turned to the induction – who would walk up on stage? Had Steven spoken with any of the other members? Could this be the first step in the long anticipated reunion of the original line-up? Only hours into the news, Adler had as much information as anybody, although he pointed out that in recent months, with a brand new stretch of sobriety, he had mended fences with most of his old bandmates, saying that he was even on speaking terms with Matt Sorum, his eventual replacement. One thing was clear – Steven Adler was not remotely entertaining an induction ceremony that did not include him standing at the podium, along with Slash, Duff, Izzy – and Axl.

  Nevertheless, it was implicitly understood that any Hall of Fame induction format would largely hinge on Axl’s willingness to share the stage with the original line-up – the four other men who had forged the band’s legacy through its game-changing debut album as well as the band’s fearsome reputation for drinking, drugging, brawling and dominating every room they entered. But if the worst thing you could give a control freak was complete control, the next worst thing was zero control, and this was what became the crux of Axl’s predicament.

  For their part, the other members of the original line-up were open to any of the obvious scripts – either going up as just the original line-up (indeed, they were the ones being inducted, not the new line-up), or sharing the stage with the current line-up. Speaking shortly after the nomination was made official in December, Duff described his reaction to the news with equal parts disbelief and apprehension: ‘It’s weird, you know? I’ve never striven to get into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. Never in my life have I thought, “Man, I gotta get a Grammy.” In sports you try to win it all, but music’s a different deal. So the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame was never on my radar.’

  With the official announcement came the decree that the members being inducted would be as follows: Axl, Slash, Izzy, Duff, Steven, Matt and Dizzy Reed. Nobody else. It appeared fairly certain that Duff, Slash, Steven and Matt would attend. Izzy and Dizzy Reed declined to attend, though. Reed was still playing with the current line-up and presumably under heavy manners from Axl. ‘Obviously there’s a lot of great, great people that I respect and grew up admiring and idolizing who are in and part of that institution,’ he was quoted as saying. ‘So just to be mentioned in the same breath as them, I take it as an honour.’ He also made sure to add that as far as he was concerned the then current GN’R line-up was ‘The best version of Guns N’ Roses that I’ve ever been in. I think everyone is just super-talented, and it’s just great chemistry. Everyone is a lot of fun to be around and a lot of fun to play with, so to me it’s definitely the best line-up we’ve had.’

  Meanwhile, the internet bristled with frothy emotional appeals to Axl to take the podium with his original partners, but almost inevitably such entreaties were ignored. On 8 January 2012, Axl tweeted, ‘I’d like to thank the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and our fans. This is your victory’, and remained pointedly silent thereafter, until the proverbial eleventh hour, when in vintage Axl fashion he announced his verdict via an open letter on 11 April – the day before the induction ceremony – stating, ‘I won’t be attending The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame Induction 2012 Ceremony and I respectfully decline my induction as a member of Guns N’ Roses to the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. Neither I or anyone in my camp has made any requests or demands of the Hall of Fame. It’s their show not mine.’

  As in the past, his letter appeared to presuppose the arguments for a reunion of the original line-up and anticipates the inevitable backlash, adding with a straight face, ‘There’s a seemingly endless amount of revisionism and fantasies out there for the sake of self-promotion and business opportunities masking the actual realities. Until every single one of those generating from or originating with the earlier line-ups has been brought out in the light, there isn’t room to consider a conversation let alone a reunion.’ To those insisting that he overlook his differences just for one night, his response was unambiguous: ‘So let sleeping dogs lie or lying dogs sleep or whatever. Time to move on. People get divorced. Life doesn’t owe you your own personal happy ending especially at another’s, or in this case, several others’ expense.’ Finally, with regard to the possibility of a reunion, Axl flatly wrote: ‘In regard to a reunion of any kind of either the Appetite or Illusion line-ups, I’ve publicly made myself more than clear. Nothing’s changed.’ Axl would finish the letter with a tribute to Armand ‘Butts’ Crump, the Slayer guitar tech who died just weeks before: ‘P.S. RIP Armand, Long Live ABC III.’

  Anybody surprised by Axl’s decision – or the way he delivered it – had not been paying attention over the past decade. And yet, with the uncertainty removed, it was as if the band, the fans and the rest of the watching world could finally breathe and move forward to honour the men who co-authored the immortal Guns N’ Roses sound, who co-wrote the band’s biggest and best-known hits and who, for a number of wild and untamed years, richly earned the reputation of the Most Dangerous Band in the World. The show would go on without Axl – a predicament with which the others were entirely too familiar. And so, on 12 April 2012, Slash, Duf
f, Steven and Sorum took the podium to accept their induction into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, also bringing up one-time guitarist Gilby Clarke for the honour. Green Day’s front-man, Billie Joe Armstrong – at first blush, a curious choice to induct the band – delivered a gem of an induction speech, hailing Appetite as ‘the greatest debut album in rock’n’roll history’. The cacophonous applause that followed showed that he was not alone in his opinion. ‘The opening riff of “Welcome to the Jungle” is a descending trip into the underworld of Los Angeles,’ Billie Joe continued. ‘It was all about the seedy underworld of misfits, drug addicts, paranoia, sex, violence, love and anger in the cracks of Hollywood. It was a breath of fresh air,’ he cracked.

  As he rattled off the names of the original line-up, Axl’s name drew a chorus of boos, but Billie Joe deftly derailed the catcalls by yelling over them, saying, ‘Shut up! Shut up. He was the greatest frontman to ever step in front of a microphone. But he is … crazy. And I can vouch for that.’ With broad, triumphant smiles, big waves and peace signs, the five men drank deeply of the applause – the first that they had received together as Guns N’ Roses in nearly 20 years. Diplomatically, in his induction speech, Duff said, ‘I don’t know that it matters who’s here tonight, because it’s about the music that these bands played’, also seizing the opportunity to criticise the Hall of Fame grandees for passing over bands like Kiss, Deep Purple, Rush and Iron Maiden.

  If anybody stirred up any controversy that night, it was Matt Sorum, who used the spotlight to lob some decidedly uncharitable barbs at Adler’s recurring addiction issues. Not only did such jabs come across as mean-spirited and cheap, but Adler had always been the fans’ hands-down, sentimental favourite of the two, and Sorum was forced to later issue a mea culpa, writing: ‘In my speech, I made references to drugs and Steven being dismissed from the band, in which I referred to, “How could someone be fired from Guns N’ Roses for doing too many drugs?” It was meant to be light-hearted. But knowing the struggles Steven has endured all these years I felt I needed to clarify that Steven was onstage, healthy, and ready to rock … Steven’s passion for GN’R is something that no one can explain but him: it’s a true love gone, but never forgotten. How many people have felt that in their lifetime?’