taylor-mayed's Full Review: Appetite For Destruction [PA] by Guns N' Roses
Guns N Roses didn’t last as long at the very top as most of the other first rank heavy rock bands such as Aerosmith, Queen, Def Leppard and so on have done, but while they were there they certainly made an impression. This, their debut album, was one of the most explosive arrivals the music scene had ever witnessed, full of powerful anthems for a whole new generation of rock fans that shook the established order up a little – for better or for worse.
The scene is set with “Welcome to the Jungle”, a powerful anthem that immediately sets out the two distinctive features of the band – Axl Rose’s unique, screeching voice and Slash’s virtuoso lead guitar playing, which would combine to propel the band into the stratosphere of rock stardom during the late 1980s and early 1990s.
“It’s So Easy” is a catchy, almost hypnotic number with a spaced-out lead vocal from Rose but some awesome guitar work from Slash. The change of pace in the middle to a slowed-down chorus that gradually speeds up again into a rip-roaring rock song, a comment on the fact that stardom can be frustrating when everyone just wants to please you and everything is so easy. The only thing I dislike about this song, and indeed the band in general, is the utterly pointless use of swearing, where it has no purpose in the song other than to be a bit controversial and grab them some extra publicity.
The third track is “Nightrain”, a pacey rock number that moves along with the speed of a train, led by a powerful drumbeat and Rose’s energetic lead vocal. “Out Ta Get Me” is more of the same with a really rip-roaring guitar opening and head-banging drumming that builds up to a heavy rock crescendo before the vocal begins, again carrying the song along at an energetic pace. The swearing again spoils the song for me because it just seems to jar against the rest of the lyric and indeed the general ethos of heavy rock, it’s that gratuitous. It’s this sort of thing that opened the floodgates for the appalling modern thrash rock groups such as Limp Bizkit and Blink 182, who although they may have some musical credibility, feel they can swear their way through songs and that constitutes having a lyric.
“Mr Brownstone” breaks out from the established formula of the first few songs with an introduction that almost sounds like jungle drums and a rather more calmed-down atmosphere to it – still energetic rock, but not quite at the same breakneck speed as the last couple of songs. The chorus is the catchiest of all the songs so far with what could almost be called a nice melody to it. OK so it’s a song about drugs, but then again so were several of John Lennon’s most famous Beatles tracks and they’re regarded as classics, so you can’t really fault the song on those grounds.
Speaking of classics, track six on this album has made its way into the upper echelons of musical legend as one of the all-time great heavy rock songs – “Paradise City”. Possibly Guns N Roses’s finest hour, like all the best epic songs you get the feel of something special from the opening seconds, as the scene-setting guitar is supported by the booming drumbeat that is almost reminiscent of Queen, one of the bands who inspired the young Guns.
Slash’s lead guitar on this track is something awesome and although Rose’s vocal is a little difficult to make out in places, the whole atmosphere and pace of the song more than makes up for that, with the strength and energy of the music sending the adrenaline pumping. And of course the chorus is legendarily anthemic, a real crowd-pleasing chant that anyone who was teenaged when this song was released will doubtless have etched on their memories forever, even if they weren’t particular fans of the band.
The slow intro to the next track, “My Michelle”, is actually some quite pleasant guitar work to listen to, but after a few seconds the hard rocking inevitably kicks in, with another squawking Axl Rose vocal about, surprisingly enough, a girl named Michelle. Like all the best rock songs the chorus is catchy and the music is undeniably good, but it just lacks that certain ‘something’ that classics have, and it doesn’t particularly stand out amongst the other similar songs on the album.
“Think About You” has hardly dated and could almost have been released yesterday by one of the modern thrash bands, but again it seems quite anonymous amongst the other songs on the album and not a particular classic.
Something that is very definitely a classic is the album’s second legendary track and perhaps the song Guns N Roses will always be best remembered for – “Sweet Child O Mine”, a pounding, powerful but at the same time emotional and not too heavy rock ballad, with probably Rose’s best showing on lead vocal on the whole album and more of the excellent guitar work which characterises the whole record. You can’t help but be swept along by this magnificent track, and while I personally am more of a fan of “Paradise City”, I can well understand why for many people this is Guns N Roses’s finest hour.
“You’re Crazy” immediately evokes strong memories of the old Queen classic “Stone Cold Crazy”, although Rose’s screeching vocal doesn’t even remotely compare to Freddie Mercury, as his performance of “We Will Rock You” and the heavy sections of “Bohemian Rhapsody” at the 1992 Freddie Mercury Tribute Concert would later prove of course.
“Anything Goes” is a fairly bog-standard Roses number, as is the album’s closing track, “Rocket Queen”. But saying that it not to denigrate these songs – the Roses proved with their dramatic arrival on the scene with this album that even a standard song by them was better than most of the other heavy rock material being produced at the time by other, less adventurous and energetic bands.
This album sent shockwaves through the rock world by announcing the beginning of a new wave of bands, the descendants of whom we are still seeing today with groups such as The Offspring, Limp Bizkit and Blink 182, while Guns N Roses themselves have passed into the annals of rock legend, having eventually and inevitably imploded during the mid 1990s.
A new album is due out soon, featuring a brand new band line up of Axl Rose accompanied by an assembly of session players, but it is highly unlikely that anything they do will be able to even come close to the glory days of “Appetite for Destruction”. Despite the floodgates it opened for the appalling thrash rock outfits, despite the questionable tone of some of the lyrics, this remains one of the all-time classic heavy rock albums, and with “Paradise City” and “Sweet Child O Mine”, it gave the world two truly legendary anthems.
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