The current members were:
- Axl Rose - vocals
- Slash - lead guitar
- Duff Mckagan - bass
- Izzy Stradlin - rhythm guitar
- Steven Adler -drums
- Axl Rose – lead vocals, piano
- Dizzy Reed – keyboards, piano, synthesizer
- Tommy Stinson – bass guitar, backing vocals
- Chris Pitman – keyboards, programming, backing vocals
- Richard Fortus – rhythm & lead guitars, backing vocals
- Frank Ferrer – drums
- Ron "Bumblefoot" Thal – lead & rhythm guitars
- DJ Ashba – lead & rhythm guitars
The band started out on the club scene and release an EP called Live ?!*@ Like a Suicide which has become a collectors piece.
The bands first major album was Appetite for Destruction in 1987 with Welcome to the Jungle as the first single. The song did not do well initially but Geffen Records founder persuaded MTV to play it after hours. Rock fans soon started requesting it and the band initially became popular in Japan. Welcome to the Jungle was played in the Clint Eastwood Film, The Dead Pool.
Guns N' Roses performed at Monsters of Rock, Donnington along with Iron Maiden and Kiss and despite Axl Roses plea for calm two members of the crowd were trampled to death. This and some of the band members drink problems lead the band to be labelled dangerous.
The band released G N' R lies in 1988 which had conversational songs on namely One in a Million:
Guess I needed
Sometime to get away
I needed some peace of mind
Some peace of mind that'll stay
So I thumbed it
Down to sixth and L.A.
Maybe your greyhound
Could be my way
Police and niggers
That's right
Get out of my way
Don't need to buy none of your
Goldchains today
I don't need no bracelets
Clamped in front of my back
Just need my ticket till then
Won't you cut me some slack
Chorus:
You're one in a million
Yeah, that's what you are
You're one in a million, babe
You are a shooting star
Maybe someday we'll see you
Before you make us cry
You know we tried to reach you
But you were much to high
Much to high
Much to high
Much to high
Immigrants and faggots
They make no sense to me
They come to our country
And think they'll do as they please
Like start some mini Iran
Or spread some fucking disease
They talk so many goddamn ways
It's all greek to me
Well some say I'm lazy
And others say that's just me
Some say I'm crazy
I guess I'll always be
But it's been such a long time
Since I knew right from wrong
It's all the means to an end, I,
I keep on movin' along
Chorus
Radicals and racists
Don't point your finger at me
I'm a small town white boy
Just tryin' to make ends meet
Don't need your religion
Don't watch that much TV
Just makin' my livin', baby,
Well that's enough for me
The band nearly disbanded because of the drug problems of Slash Adler but they returned to the studio to record the Use your Illusions albums. Adler was replace by Matt Sorum from the Cult and Dizzy Reed joined the band on keyboards. When the albums released the debuted at 1 and 2 and stayed there for over 100 weeks. The band made very expensive videos with November Rain and Estranged. The music on these albums evolved to keyboard and horn sections in the songs. They then started on the longest tour in rock history of 28 weeks which had incidents of riots, late arrivals and rants by Axl who was very outspoken against critics and rivals.
The punk and rock album "Spaghetti incident" was released in 1993 which featured some contraversal songs which were thought to be pro Charles Mason.
The band then was in turmoil but finally after nearly 15 years whilst they recorded Chinese Democracy. Before its release most of the songs were leaked and available for download for intervals before they were removed from the sites. Chinese Democracy was not as elaborate as the Use your Illusions albums but nevertheless it still has keyboards and horns in some of the songs.
The band has attracted much controversy during there time but they were also highly spoken of by other musicians and the music industry
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