Guns N Roses - Chinese Democracy

I have to admit that I had no real desire to review Chinese Democracy. I mean yeah, Guns N Roses were a big part of my getting interested in music in my early teens and I still spin Appetite For Destruction pretty often but I’ve just completely forgotten all the mystique and controversy that made the band interesting. All I remember are some things about drug use, canceled shows and supermodels, and of course the lyrics of the songs I still like when I’m drunk. So when I first heard about Chinese Democracy I said “oh, good for them” but “them” turned into “him” and now the only remaining band member is Axel Rose. Nothing wrong with that, I have always loved his vocals, even when he was singing pretty stupid stuff with them (see Spaghetti Incident). Nah, the problem is that when you only have one original band member there should be a rule that says you need to call it a Solo Project. You know, those albums where an artist hires the best copycats money can buy so he can indulge in his particular interests while bringing a few fans of his old band along for the ride. I guess Axel has generated so much negative buzz around his name over the last few years that he figured that Guns N Roses was somehow a less loaded name for the project.

Still I have to admit that Chinese Democracy is not bad. It is miles away from perfect, with plenty of bad songs and even bad chunks on the good songs, but the good bits make it worthwhile. One thing it has going for it is the army of talented artists involved including crazy guitar mercenary Buckethead, alternative punk hero Tommy Stinson and industrial session drummer Josh Freese. The result is a completely schizophrenic album that switches moods and styles every few minutes, although that might be thanks to Axel himself. Either way there is a lot of time, talent and money pressed into this album, most of it is so overproduced that I feel cash flowing out of the headphones and into my ears. And yes, it feels incredibly unsanitary.

I mean why use a synthesizer when you can bring in a guy to play harp? Why bother with rhythm guitar when you can pile guitar solos instead? Hell, what’s a rock and roll album without some French horn? On songs like Shacklers Revenge, If the World and Madagascar you see Axel reach new heights of exquisite audio decadence. Still not every experiment works out, as is the case with Better.  It is weird to listen to somebody famous for his misogynistic lyrics completely emasculate himself by singing falsetto over a drum machine on the intro. As the song continues it goes after the subject from every possible angle and no matter what they do it just sounds bad, be it as a rock ballad with painfully predictable lyrics or as heavy metal yelling match. Also there a song called There Was a Time which is just plain awful, it is far too long with a chorus that gives me carsickness for reasons I can’t quite put my finger on.

One of the most interesting experiments on the album is a track called Scraped which sounds a whole lot like something from the first Alice in Chains album. In the end I wish I had a much longer time to review this album given how long it took to be delivered, but based on a weekend of repeated listening I can tell you that anyone who still listens to Guns N Roses should pick it up just to listen to Axel sing new songs. Those who are aligned with the rest of the band or who simply don’t care might want to skip this CD except as a weird case study for mixing and sound engineering students.