BUTT
Kreese
- Messages
- 5,709
- Reaction score
- 958
- Points
- 218
It's been a half-decade since the most hated album of all time was released.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UgK4mcYk3y8
I love ambitious hard rock albums, and nobody is making them anymore, so I still find lots of elements of Chinese Democracy appealing, particularly the piano ballads ("Street of Dreams," "This I Love," "Catcher in the Rye") which could fit in well on the Use Your Illusion albums. But the faster songs are pretty anemic ("Shackler's Revenge" sounds like Static-X and the title track is so overloaded with vocal and guitar tracks that it ruined the song, which originally was a cool sparse rocker and turned into a bloated mess by the time it was released) and that's unacceptable for a band calling themselves Guns N' Roses. Which I guess means they shouldn't have used the name, but that debate was tired ten years ago. I've also come to hate the self-pitying tone of the lyrics - almost every song is about how Axl Rose is the poorest, most put-upon victim in the world but he has overcome all the adversity because he's stronger than his enemies. Who wants to hear that from the guy who sang on Appetite for Destruction? But I still like 9 out of the 14 tracks on this album, so despite everything you've read, in my fanboyish opinion, Chinese Democracy is actually a good album if you're not expecting some sort of grand artistic statement. But you, the reader, have (probably) never heard it. That's why I linked to it. If you're just a GNR hater, you will not like it one bit. But if you like the old band, give it a chance. Its lows are no worse than the lows of the Use Your Illusions, even if the highs aren't as high. And if you don't like listening to music on YouTube, you can pick up one of the 700,000 copies Best Buy dumped at dollar stores to liquidate their inventory.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UgK4mcYk3y8
I love ambitious hard rock albums, and nobody is making them anymore, so I still find lots of elements of Chinese Democracy appealing, particularly the piano ballads ("Street of Dreams," "This I Love," "Catcher in the Rye") which could fit in well on the Use Your Illusion albums. But the faster songs are pretty anemic ("Shackler's Revenge" sounds like Static-X and the title track is so overloaded with vocal and guitar tracks that it ruined the song, which originally was a cool sparse rocker and turned into a bloated mess by the time it was released) and that's unacceptable for a band calling themselves Guns N' Roses. Which I guess means they shouldn't have used the name, but that debate was tired ten years ago. I've also come to hate the self-pitying tone of the lyrics - almost every song is about how Axl Rose is the poorest, most put-upon victim in the world but he has overcome all the adversity because he's stronger than his enemies. Who wants to hear that from the guy who sang on Appetite for Destruction? But I still like 9 out of the 14 tracks on this album, so despite everything you've read, in my fanboyish opinion, Chinese Democracy is actually a good album if you're not expecting some sort of grand artistic statement. But you, the reader, have (probably) never heard it. That's why I linked to it. If you're just a GNR hater, you will not like it one bit. But if you like the old band, give it a chance. Its lows are no worse than the lows of the Use Your Illusions, even if the highs aren't as high. And if you don't like listening to music on YouTube, you can pick up one of the 700,000 copies Best Buy dumped at dollar stores to liquidate their inventory.
