GUNS N' ROSES - Ultimate Classic Rock Publishes Track-By-Track Rundown Of Use Your Illusion I And II
October 10, 2021, 3 years ago
Ultimate Classic Rock has published a track-by-track rundown of every song that appears on the band's 1991 albums, Use Your Illusion I and Use Your Illusion II. An excerpt is available below.
Ultimate Classic Rock: "The Use Your Illusion albums were also, like all things Guns N' Roses, wildly successful, debuting in the top two spots on the Billboard 200 and selling a combined 14 million copies in the United States. The accompanying Use Your Illusion Tour lasted a whopping two and a half years, drawing massive crowds and generating endless controversy. Use Your Illusion I and II showed Guns N' Roses variously at their most bombastic, tender and venomous, proving just how far they had come since the pre-Appetite days — and how much they stood to lose."
"Perfect Crime"
Guns N' Roses threw their headbanger fans a bone with the furious "Perfect Crime," a speed-metal maelstrom full of Slash's machine-gun riffing and Rose's furious screams. Stradlin brought the song to the Appetite preproduction sessions with Mike Clink, where they also cooked up future Illusion single "You Could Be Mine".
"There’s a song called 'Perfect Crime,' which has got a pretty 'out there' solo in it," Slash said in 1992. "There's a lot more going on in my guitar playing than there used to be, and hopefully it'll always be like that, where I keep expanding."
"Back Off Bitch"
Rose and Paul "Huge" Tobias cowrote "Back Off Bitch" in 1981, four years before Guns N' Roses formed. The song's blatantly misogynistic lyrics opened the band up to a yet another round of criticism, not long after the homophobic and racial slurs featured in "One In A Million" sparked widespread outrage and an onstage war of words with Living Colour.
Rose defended his right to tackle "dangerous" topics in a 1992 Rolling Stone interview: "I've been doing a lot of work and found out I've had a lot of hatred for women. Basically, I've been rejected by my mother since I was a baby. She's picked my stepfather over me since he was around, and watched me get beaten by him."
"Get In The Ring"
Guns N' Roses' various controversies were catnip for the rock press, and on "Get In The Ring," Rose struck back at the journalists he deemed unscrupulous. The campy blues-punk number originated with McKagan under the title "Why Do You Look At Me When You Hate Me?" But a furious mid-song rant where Rose name-checked journalists such as Kerrang's Mick Wall and Spin founder Bob Guccione Jr. generated the most attention.
"You be rippin' off the fuckin' kids while they be payin' their hard-earned money to read about the bands they wanna know about, printin' lies, startin' controversy," Rose raved. "You wanna antagonize me? Antagonize me, motherfucker! Get in the ring, motherfucker, and I'll kick your bitchy little ass! Punk!"
"Locomotive (Complicity)"
On "Locomotive," Guns N' Roses dabbled in the nascent funk-metal that groups like Faith No More, Red Hot Chili Peppers and Jane's Addiction had recently popularized. McKagan and Sorum's airtight grooves anchored the song, making room for Slash's dizzying solos and Rose's sneering vocals. The singer weaved a stunning tale of love gone bad, but it was no small feat.
"I'd get these phone calls from the studio, and Axl would say, 'I fucking hate Slash. Have you heard this song 'Locomotive' yet?'" former manager Doug Goldstein recalled. "'How the fuck am I supposed to write lyrics to this shit?' I'd go, 'Hey, man, I don't know. That's your gig, right? I do the management. You do the songwriting.'"
Read the complete rundown here.
Following up the August release of their single "Absurd", Guns N' Roses unleashed another single, "Hard Skool", on September 24th. Word has come down they will release a Hard Skool EP on February 25th, 2022 exclusively through their online store, found here.
The tracklist is as follows:
"Hard Skool"
"ABSUЯD"
"Don't Cry" (live)
"You're Crazy" (live)
"Hard Skool" is a reworked version of a track titled "Jackie Chan", recorded during the sessions for the band's Chinese Democracy album.
The previously released "Absurd" is available via digital providers here, and you can watch a visualizer for the song below: