Random Thought While Listening To Guns N' Roses - Chinese Democracy

Preamble: I was never the biggest Guns n' Roses fan, although I did spend a very memorable scout camp sitting on a ledge on a rock face listening to G n' R Lies on a walkman with two little speakers attached when I was about 12. It was a a formative experience in my musical education, a memory which I genuinely cherish, although I can't say I've listened to that album since. But I have listened to Appetite For Destruction, which I didn't care for at the time (I was not a rocker as a child), but in later years have come to appreciate as one of the greatest rock albums of all time. So I approach Chinese Democracy with fear and a bemused anticipation. I fully expect it to be rubbish, like everyone else, but maybe this means it will pleasantly surprise me. Okay, here goes...

Track one doesn't begin with a bang, but with a whimper. Sound effects, one of which is possibly the sound of Rober Plant screaming 200 feet away. Here come the guitars, could be Nine Inch Nails, or more likely, one of their numerous copyists. The chorus has a strange multilayed vocal which sounds like Axl is duetting with a helium voiced version of himself. Or a woman. According to the lyrics, all the Chinese have to rule their nation, is an iron fist. Sounds like quite a lot to me. Axl is only offering time to counter this, so I'm betting on the Chinese.

Track two continues with the nu-metal sound, which means that the album doesn't sound outdated and like it was written 14 years ago. But it also means that it sounds rubbish. Guns N' Roses classics are so good because they tapped into the classic rock tradition, and stand with all those seventies classics. This sound will date real fast.

Track three. Well at least he is singing properly now. There is no doubt that Axl Rose has one of the great rock voices, until it goes into a sub-Soundgarden (Audioslave, then) chorus and he's doing the speaking/singing thing that will probably ruin this album. But when he actually sings, he's up there with Ozzy.

Track four is a piano led ballad with great singing, sorry screeeeaming. I hope it's like November Rain, rubbish but brilliant. This is definitely old school, even the title, Street Of Dreams is like an Kevin Costner movie. Big guitar solo there, although not a particularly good one. Lighters aloft everyone. Well, I prefer this to the nu-metal, which isn't saying much.

Track five begins all ethnicy, then those horrible synthy strings they use on every Bond movie theme nowadays. This is bizarre, it has a drum machine background, like the Thievery Corporation gone rock. That is a very, very bad thing.

Track six starts with a choir, which is always troubling, but a damn sight better than the last track. The guitars on this album are very pedestrian, chugging out the same old riffs, while poor old Axl is belting out over the top, without much support. Unless he doesn't want them to distract from him, of course.

God this track going on, 6 minutes according to my Itunes, but 20 minutes according to my brain.

Track seven, Catcher In The Rye, is not very interesting. Sorry.

Actually, I've changed my mind. it's quite catchy, I like the 'la la la' chorus.

Track eight. Oh dear, it's gone Audioslave again. But, I have to say it again, Axl's singing is magnificent. It's rare these days to here someone singing in such an unadorned, powerful way, and subsequently raises these otherwise pretty mediocre songs to a new level. Unfortunately, that level is fairly mediocre.

Track nine, Riad N' The Bedouins (nice title!) is a straightforward head down rocker with lyrics about "sweet salvation", which is the kind of lyric I want him singing. It does it's job okay.

Track ten, ballad time, but not particularly interesting, so I think it's time to talk about the cover. Considering this album has been fourteen years in the making, I don't think the cover could possibly be more underwhelming. This album is supposed to be the great rock album of our times, at least in Axl Rose's mind, and the cover expresses this to the world with a picture of a rusty bike and a giant basket. I think it's one of the strangest covers I've ever seen, not because it's stupid or tacky, but because it's so boring. I like to picture Axl Rose flicking through a book of photos, seeing this one, and having a Eureka moment "Yes, that sums everything I'm trying to say with this album. The bike, the basket, the rusty pipe, the wall, the traffic diverter sign thingy. Lets add some graffiti to the wall, so people know we are still rebellious. Perfect!"

Track eleven. The thing that is bugging me about this album is the production. Vocals, no problem. Songs, not bad, but I don't think there's a Paradise City anywhere to be found. But the production? It's too clean, too digital and there's too much sound, too many parts. This kitchen sink style coupled with all the synthasized elements make it sound, musically at least, pretty souless. But rock musicians have been making that mistake for nearly thirty years, and they don't seem to show any sign of learning.

Track twelve, Madagascar, is the theme song from the new motion picture Madagascar 2, and features the voices of Ben Stiller, Chris Rock, Jada Pinkett Smith, and David Schwimmer. It is the song of the story of the sequel to 2005's "Madagascar", in which New York Zoo animals, Alex the Lion, Marty the Zebra, Melman the Giraffe and Gloria the Hippo, still stranded on Madagascar, start to leave the island. All of a sudden, they land in the wilderness of Africa, where Alex meets the rest of his family, but has trouble communicating with them after spending so much time at the Central Park Zoo.

Track thirteen, This I Love, seems like full on power ballad time. I wonder if the big crushing guitars will come in anytime, or if this is real, soul baring stuff.

There's a solo at the end, which is pretty average, but otherwise this real classic G n' R, November Rain style balladeering. It seems that this is probably the track that ends being closest to the sound we really want from the band. Funny that, it being a ballad and all.

Track fourteen, the album closer and classily named Prostitute, begins with another godforsaken drum machine. However, not everyone agrees. Here is my favourite comment from a Guns N' Roses forum:

"It is another classical type of song. I love classical music because it has class. It truly is fire and ice."

Fire and ice, people. I can't argue with that.

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