Appetite for DestructionArtist: Guns 'n' RosesGenre: Metal Publisher: Geffen Released: 1987 |
A Review by Jody Beth Rosen
07/06/2001
—a couple of Indiana metalheads: one a manic-depressive with a history of juvenile delinquency and a shucksload of sexual and religious hangups (W. Axl Rose), the other a quiet, greasy-haired dude with major Keith Richards damage (Izzy Stradlin), both of whom moved to L.A. to become bad-ass rock stars.
—a tall, blond, androgynous-looking bass player from Seattle (Duff McKagan). Frequently seen in a cut-off CBGB t-shirt, swigging from a fifth of Jim Beam. Has a porn star wife.
—a hairy, Jewish drummer with a drug problem (Steven Adler)
—a mulatto Cousin It with a top hat and a Les Paul (Slash)—whose stage name conjures up associations to a seminal L.A. punk zine and a slang term for a bisexual. Slash is a chain-smoker, chain-drinker, chain-fucker. His real name is Saul. His mom designed costumes for David Bowie.
Put all those guys together in some cramped, dank West Hollywood studio with a producer and a few strippers, roll tape, and you get Appetite for Destruction.
At the time Appetite was recorded, Guns 'n' Roses were wasted and broke, having blown the advance from Geffen on all manner of Tinseltown sleaze. Their 1986 EP, Live Like a Suicide (released on the fake "indie" imprint Geffen set up for them, Uzi Suicide), had stiffed, and they were bumming around doing the decadent club-kid thing, maybe showed up to rehearsal if they remembered to. The Appetite demos were sloppy and unfocused.
Luckily, producer Mike Clink knew just how to whip these shiftless rockers into shape. The amount G' n' R improved and tightened up during the Appetite sessions (both live and on record) is unbelievable. I don't think the success of this record is because of "ghost" musicians or Pro Tools. Naw. Somewhere along the line, the boys got their shit together and learned how to play.
Regardless of Clink's contributions, the record works because of the songs. No question.
Axl's lyrics nail the hell out of L.A.P.D.-fearing gangsta paranoia and L.A.M.F./TSOL glam-punk nihilism, white whores on coke, paradise lost, degenerate sex, doing drugs before the show, doing drugs after the show, unrequited love, serpentines, booze, bravado, and, yeah, more degenerate sex. Like Exile on Main Street, but more Slim Dunlap than Slim Harpo. Hell, more Slim Shady!
"Welcome to the Jungle" is pretty dumb. Axl sounds like Beavis when he tries to put over a line like "I'm gonna watch you bleed!" It's not scary-sounding or Satanic in the least (or even Colonel Kurtz-ish, considering he's in the "jungle"), but it's a damn great song for other reasons.
The disco drumbeat.
Axl's orgasmic girl-shrieking.
The way he says "Cha" at the beginning, like Mick Jagger (he says "Foo-Cha" later on in the record, as well) and "sha-na-na-na-na-na" throughout the rest (not sure if this is supposed to be a tribute to a '70s novelty act or a tip of the hat to the speed freaks of "buh-buh-buh-Benny and the Jets" and "my ge-ge-ge-ge-generation").
He looks like the hermaphroditic child of Tori Amos and Michael Monroe in the video.
And he gets to say "You can have anything you want, but you better not take it from me," which, well, if there's any lyric that exemplifies the Axl aesthetic, it's that one.
Like any groundbreaking rock album, the premise of Appetite is established by the end of Side 1 Track 1, and "Jungle" sets us up for "It's So Easy": Axl sounding creepy in a lower register, bitching about how nothing seems to please him, and how bored he is, and how he intends to make use of the person (presumably female) who's a thorn in his side.
"Nighttrain" is more drinking/sex/poverty/snake imagery/bossing chicks around, and if Axl ain't singin' about it, Slash is playin' about it. The only thing wrong with the song? The employment of a cowbell as a percussion instrument. (Yeah. Real tough. The cowbell counts off "Think About You" on Side 2, too.)
But by the time "Out ta Get Me" blows into town, there shouldn't be any doubt about the statement Guns 'n' Roses are making. They're out to get me/They won't catch me/'Cause I'm innocent/So you can suck me. Take that one to heart, as the poet said.
The rest of Side 1 rages along with self-satisfied snottiness; even the dystopian escapism of "Paradise City" is sung in the imperative, like a command: "Take me home!"
Axl's voice is amazing. Always. He doesn't sound like anyone but himself (he has Robert Plant's register and Ozzy's fiendishness and Janis' possessed bluesness and Johnny Rotten's sneeringness, but he's too totally into himself to waste time fully emulating any of 'em). A voice teacher of mine once brought up his name as an example of "how not to sing if you still wanna have a functioning larynx in ten years." But I say larynxes are for sissies! Screech on, brotherman!
Side 2? A messed-up ex-girlfriend whose "daddy works in porno" ("My Michelle"), a deceptively good piece of uptempo love-song filler ("Think About You"), a Skynyrd-ish eyes/skies/rain/pain ballad with some phenomenal counterpoint playing from Slash and Duff and one of the best guitar solos ever to reside in a Number One song ("Sweet Child O' Mine"), a rave-up kiss-off that actually kinda sounds like The Pretenders ("You're Crazy"), a tasteless Zappaboogie grossout that's remarkable only because of how unapologetically offensive and misogynistic it is (but to paraphrase Tom Hanks in A League of Their Own, "There's no feminism in rock music!"—"Anything Goes").
And "Rocket Queen."
If I say I don't need anyone
I can say these things to you
Because I can turn on anyone just like I've turned on you
I've got a tongue like a razor
A sweet switchblade knife
And I can do you favors but then you'll do whatever I like
Of all the sex songs on Appetite, "Rocket Queen" is the most convincing. It's horny, desperate, somewhat defensive, and a bit ambiguous (I'm a sexual innuendo in this burned-out paradise). Legend has it that the orgasmic yelping over the instrumental break was recorded late at night while Axl and a female friend were "on a break" in the studio.
"Rocket Queen" is the moodiest, most (sexually and musically) potent song on Appetite, in a minor key right up until the closing coda, when it becomes an R.E.M. song (as fronted by David Lee Roth), ending with the strange lyrical turn "All I ever wanted was for you to know that I care."
Sorta hard to believe, coming from a guy who has kept audiences waiting 2 hours while he got serviced by hookers backstage, but, ya know. It's rock, and the best rock stars have historically been liars, or at least disingenuous bastards.
Punk's triumph was exposing/celebrating rock 'n' roll for the swindle that it is, reveling in the sham. Appetite is—admit it—punk, because it came out, like, only a couple of years after "Do They Know It's Christmas" and "We Are the World" and made all that bloated pseudohumanitarianism seem utterly ridiculous. It saved rock music from the mid '80s.
Appetite replaced yuppie guilt and baby-boomer philosophizing with every frickin' last one of those seven (only seven?) deadly sins.
And it's still one of the, oh, top three most important records of my life. I'd go so far as to call Appetite an indestructible piece of music, but my dad yanked my first vinyl copy of it off the living room turntable and broke it in half. I've saved the shards of that LP over the years as a relic from my early adolescence.
I've taken a lotta guff in my life for liking Guns 'n' Roses, and now that it's "hip" again to be an Appetite fan (as opposed to an Appetite suppressant?), I feel a certain amount of vindication. But I'm happy to introduce this now-classic album to a new generation of juvie troublemakers. It still holds up, and doesn't sound dated at all—it's weird how today's rock music seems dated in comparison!
My final words to you young turks: Get Appetite for Destruction as soon as possible—and learn how satisfying rock can be when someone can be arsed to do it right!
© Copyright ToxicUniverse.com 07/06/2001
