Guns N’ Roses 5: Chinese Democracy

Despite the rise of grunge, Axl Rose kept Guns N’ Roses in the spotlight till the mid-‘90s, courting controversy and creating events with each new cryptic video. Before long, each of the other members got fed up with him and quit, replaced by handpicked minions. 1999 saw the release of both the double-CD retrospective Live Era ’87-’93 (most of which was recorded towards the later year) and the very noisy “Oh My God”, released on the soundtrack of, yes, another Arnold Schwarzenegger movie. Rumors flew about the next album, which somehow and somewhere gained the title Chinese Democracy. Once the 20th century turned to the 21st, both the idea and the title of any new Guns N’ Roses album had become a joke. Much like Neil Young’s long-promised Archives, we’d believe it not when we heard it, but when we saw it in the wild. And besides, how could something that took so long to make, involving hundreds of thousands of studio hours, possibly sound any good?

Over 17 years after the Use Your Illusion albums made a splash by arriving the same day, Chinese Democracy started streaming at the band’s official MySpace page—now there’s a flashback for you—in preparation for its official release via the Best Buy chain, barring any last-minute crisis, of which Axl was the undisputed master. Just as amazing as the album finally going on sale was the simple fact that it didn’t stink. It sounded like him singing, and the guitars sounded like Slash. But that shouldn’t suggest that the album is “good”.

There’s a lot of music here—14 songs, most pushing five minutes, some over six. The first minute is atmospheric, until some power chords kick in for the title track, which sets the template for much of what follows: Axl doubling his angry vocals an octave apart, and one of the guitarists shredding constantly. There’s a chorus, but it’s not exactly “Paradise City”-level catchy. It also holds the record for the song with the most credited writers: eight. Only six people wrote “Shackler’s Revenge”, its industrial basis coming from two of them. “Better” slows the pace a bit, and could almost be a pop song, but we could really do without the singsongy falsetto verse at the start and end. Here’s a case where the minor key melody and chords serve the song well. That means it’s time for a power ballad, and “Street Of Dreams” is the album’s “November Rain”, complete with orchestral arrangement. Dizzy Reed, the only other member to play on the last album, is still on board to pound the piano; the rest of the band includes such famous stage names as Buckethead, Bumblefoot, and Brain, plus Tommy Stinson from the Replacements.

“If The World” probably irritated a lot of people, from the robotic drums to the Philly soul strings, the wrong kind of ‘70s homage for this brand. “There Was A Time” is even more divisive, with another drum loop and a damn children’s choir aah-ing along to hide what could be a half-decent tune, proof that a decade obsessing over an arrangement squeezes the life out of a song. Those of us familiar with the original novel were dubious of any song called “Catcher In The Rye”; here Axl manages to channel Oasis on the piano, clearly identifies with the protagonist, clearly misses the point of the book, and seems to chastise his fellow legendary recluse for writing it in the first place. But for those continual guitar lines and muddled message, it’s actually a cool track.

After a side away from hard rock, the hook of “Scraped” is vocally based around some of Sam Kinison’s most iconic yawps, and takes advantage of the layering capabilities of infinite tracks to have lyrics flying in from all over the place. It’s hard to picture anyone relating to “Riad N’ The Bedouins”, since the words are so muddled and obscure we don’t know who pissed him off this time. There’s another atmospheric intro, more Kinison-style “ah”s, and chorus chords that would be better served in another context. But no such ambiguity clouds “Sorry”, a mournful waltz complaining about everyone who’d ever doubted or underestimated him, specifically the other musicians on Appetite For Destruction. Despite the false alarm of the acoustic guitars, “I.R.S.” is a tirade against the government that might be more effective if he came up with a better title.

It’s been a while since we heard an orchestra, so “Madagascar” begins with one right out of a Russian symphony or Pink Floyd epic. From what we can gather from the lyrics, which don’t include the title once, he’s alone and lonely and misunderstood, and piles on movie samples and Martin Luther King quotes to illustrate his point. It’s got all the markings of a grand finale, but we’re not done yet. He’s got another love song in him with “This I Love”, another Elton John homage, loaded with heartbreak, and the only track on the album he apparently wrote all by himself. Finally, in the tradition of unfortunate title choices, “Prostitute” manages to encompass alt-rock and bombast, ranging from pensive to anguish, finally throwing all the ingredients we’ve heard so far into the soup for the big finish.

Chinese Democracy didn’t change the world, but in a universe where a Black man could actually be elected President of the United States and there was finally a new GN’R album, it seemed like anything was possible. And for a brief period, hope was truly alive and well. Yes, we could.

Guns N’ Roses Chinese Democracy (2008)—2½

Faces 6: Mahoney’s Last Stand

This enjoyable Faces side project snuck out four years after it was recorded, the soundtrack for a film that didn’t get a wide release either. Mahoney’s Last Stand was the brainchild of an actor best known for a couple guest star appearances on episodes of the cult TV series The Prisoner, and detailed the trials and tribulations of a man trying to get back to nature—a concept very appealing to Ronnie Lane. He and fellow Face Ron Wood recorded these tracks in 1972 while apparently “waiting around for Rod Stewart to show up to the Ooh La La recording sessions.”

Some of the music is very much along the lines of what the Faces might have done if Woody and not Rod had been so dominant. “Tonight’s Number” is a virtual Faces track, with Ian McLagan and Kenney Jones on board, along with Jim Price and Bobby Keys on horns, plus Pete Townshend on one guitar. “Title One” is a similar one-chord jam with horns, but not other Faces or Pete. “‘Mona’ The Blues” is an acoustic remake of an outtake from the first Faces album, whereas the Motown-flavored “Car Radio” could’ve come from their second.

Scattered throughout both sides, the rest points the gypsy folk direction Ronnie would pursue on his own. “From The Late To The Early” only has one verse despite several runs through the chords, mostly letting Woody extemporize on various acoustic guitars. “Chicken Wire” is a banjo-driven workout, while “Chicken Wired” is a slightly slower take with vocals and electric guitar. “Hay Tumble” and “Rooster Funeral” are another one-chord strum and a bluesy melody respectively, both with Ric Grech on violin, and “Woody’s Thing” features Ian Stewart on piano. Each side ends with a take of the wistful “Just For A Moment”, the second with a vocal.

By the time the album finally came out, Woody had already joined the Stones, while the packaging didn’t make it clear that this wasn’t a fresh reunion, that wasn’t enough to make it a hit. In the decades since it has been reissued a few times on CD, as well as streaming, so it can be appreciated again.

Ron Wood & Ronnie Lane Mahoney’s Last Stand: Original Motion Picture Soundtrack (1976)—3

Style Council 2: Internationalists

Straight out of the gate, the Style Council kept fans busy with singles, 12-inches, and a second album. As with its predecessor, Internationalists differed from the British version in title and cover—Paul Weller’s haircut clearly the influence decades later for Bill Hader’s Stefon—but only the mildest of track substitutions, which actually helped. Pointed political stances colored the lyrics, making it almost necessary to read along on the inner sleeve, where they appeared out of order and incomplete. (Like most Brits his age, Paul Weller really, really hated Margaret Thatcher.)

Just to be different, Mick Talbot takes the lead vocal on “Housebreakers”, probably because Weller’s phrasing wasn’t generally that measured. The jazz pop is about what we’d come to expect, but even from these guys, the bossa nova beat and harmonized flute solos in “All Gone Away” seem like parody. “Come To Milton Keynes” gets a more straightforward arrangement, but it’s a terribly sarcastic slam of a British town that didn’t deserve it any more than any others going through the same growing pains. (The trumpets always remind us of “Just Who Is The Five O’Clock Hero?”, which might have been intentional.) Weller pulls out the guitar and wah-wah pedal for the title track, but is accompanied by only a string quartet on the mournful “A Stone’s Throw Away”. The gravitas is killed by “The Stand Up Comic’s Instructions”, which are recited by comedian Lenny Henry over, though the chorus is catchy. “Boy Who Cried Wolf” is a little more standard, but the overly synthy backing is a matter of taste, but would appeal to fans of Sade and future pop stars Simply Red.

Side two is a little more consistent. Church bells right out of the Kinks herald “A Man Of Great Promise”, a surprisingly buoyant song for what’s essentially an obituary. “Down In The Seine” continues their Francophile tendencies, right down to the accordion solos. Besides being bestowed with another typically unwieldy title, “The Lodgers (Or She Was Only A Shopkeeper’s Daughter)” also features a front-and-center vocal by D.C. Lee, who got star billing when it was re-recorded in an inferior version for the single; here it’s solid R&B underneath more social commentary. With “Luck” we finally get a straightforward upbeat love song, and then “With Everything To Lose” brings back the bossa nova undercut by more complaints about the government. Here in the US, likely thanks to its appearance on the Vision Quest soundtrack, the Philly-infused “Shout To The Top!”—a single from the previous fall—replaced “Our Favourite Shop”, the instrumental title track of the UK version of the album. It makes a good lead-in for the equally snappy and punctuated “Walls Come Tumbling Down!” (By the time the album was issued on CD, it was the UK sequence, with “Shout To The Top!” added at the end.)

The best parts of Internationalists are the toe-tapping ones, but it’s still a very breezy and slick album, and Americans didn’t know what to do with it. They loved it in the UK, of course, where the eventual Our Favourite Shop Deluxe Edition was loaded with contemporary B-sides (of which there were always plenty) and some demo versions, a few of which were previously released elsewhere.

The Style Council Internationalists (1985)—2½

Morrissey 8: Maladjusted

In the early days of the Internet, various chat groups were dedicated to generating fake Morrissey song titles. His album titles weren’t so easy to concoct, but Maladjusted would be a good one if he hadn’t thought of it himself. Considering how all over place the songs are arrangement-wise, it’s fitting.

The title track is a bold opener, with pounding drums and feedbacky guitar from the Oasis album due out in a few weeks. He was due for a big anthemic-sounding single, and “Alma Matters” comes through on that score. “Ambitious Outsiders” is pinned to a somber synth orchestra arrangement that doesn’t make us want to decipher the lyrics any. Most people will hear the chords of Radiohead’s “Creep” in “Trouble Loves Me”, it’s actually very close to a song of a similar, shorter title from a Jayhawks album earlier that year. That aside, it’s very well arranged. The tale told in “Papa Jack” is open to lots of interpretation, none of which seem to match the soaring guitar parts over the second half.

“Ammunition” is similar musically to the other rockers, but stands out for being a song of confidence, even self-acceptance. “Wide To Receive” is a little dreamier and mopier, especially when the repeats of the first word of the title sound like “why, why, why, why”. “Roy’s Keen” would be a decent crowd chant to honor a Manchester United player of note, but the verses honor a guy who cleans windows for a living, so we’re at a loss. “He Cried” could be another one of those fake song titles, but it’s another catchy one reminiscent of older melodies. As good as the album’s going, it screeches to a complete halt with “Sorrow Will Come In The End”, wherein he recites a monologue of revenge over another faux-orchestrated backing. It would be unbearable even if it hadn’t been directed at the Smiths drummer who sued him and Johnny Marr over royalties, to the point where it was dropped from the UK release. Best to skip ahead to “Satan Has Rejected My Soul”, which is far catchier.

The band is the same as the last album, just as Steve Lillywhite produced it, so the sound throughout Maladjusted crackles. Yet twelve years later, he chose to reissue and repackage it with a new cover (as he also did with the one that came before it). In this case, the track list was dramatically shuffled and overhauled, going so far as to remove “Roy’s Keen” and “Papa Jack”. But beyond that, the new sequence flows better, even with the added tracks, all of which were contemporary B-sides, each excellent save the too-long and too-serious “This Is Not Your Country”. “Satan Rejected My Soul” was swapped with the worldwide reinstatement “Sorrow Will Come In The End”, making it easier for the listener to avoid that one altogether.

Morrissey Maladjusted (1997)—3
2009 Expanded Edition: same as 1997, plus 6 extra tracks (and minus 2)

Aerosmith 4: Rocks

When you get your sound down, the thing to do is work to perfect it on your next album, especially when you need a follow-up and fast. Rocks did just that for Aerosmith fans, delivering 35 minutes of guitars and stank, with Jack Douglas once again helping them get it all on tape.

With all the subtlety of crashing through saloon doors, “Back In The Saddle” is a perfect opener, right down to the whipcrack, stomping spurs, and neighing horses, you can practically feel the dust. (There’s even yodeling.) “Last Child” slows things down right away, but they fall into a stank of a groove with plenty of layers, mostly from the fingers of Brad Whitford. Some city sound effects link to the next track; “Rats In The Cellar” ups the tempo bigtime in something of a mirror to the title track of the previous album, with a cool extended ending. “Combination” is a sneaky one, since you really have to concentrate to discern the lyrics, but it’s actually a duet between Steven Tyler and Joe Perry, and something of a manifesto for their “toxic twins” image.

Don’t be fooled by the acoustics (and maybe a banjo?) at the start of “Sick As A Dog”, because it soon resolves into more chord-driven riffing that’s not too different from what we’ve already heard, but the twin solos in the break make a difference. After another atmospheric link, “Nobody’s Fault” would launch at least a dozen metal bands by the turn of the decade, only these guys keep some personality in the mix. “Get The Lead Out” sports a sassy strut they’d return to time and time again, while “Lick And A Promise” starts with one seriously complicated riff and just keeps going. Not until the end do they vary from the program. “Home Tonight” is a piano-based power ballad that would set another template for the band in the decades to come. At least they left out the orchestra, or at least mixed it low.

Throughout Rocks, the vocals are generally buried under all the guitars. Which is fine, but it makes it kinda hard to sing along. While it lacks the musical breadth of the two albums before, it delivers and keeps knees jogging. It’s clear why so many budding guitarists choose this as their favorite Aerosmith album.

Aerosmith Rocks (1976)—3

Beach Boys 4: Little Deuce Coupe

Perhaps feeling he’d exhausted the songwriting potential surfing offered, Brian Wilson decided to focus more sharply on that other Californian teen sensation: cars. What’s more, their label had already used “Shut Down” as the title track of an album that repackaged “409” and other songs about cars by other bands, as well as Robert Mitchum. So they figured they might as well repackage themselves, which is why an album released only a month after their last one repeated four songs from previous albums, including the title track of this one. Confused yet?

That title track is still primo Beach Boys, but here it’s followed by “The Ballad Of Ole Betsy”, a maudlin plaint for an automobile on its way to the scrapyard. While it may not specifically mention cars, “Be True To Your School” is one of the better high school rah-rah songs despite itself; the music makes it more than the words, which come off as the rantings of “some loud braggart”. (Co-writer Roger Christian is responsible for most of the lyrics on the album, being Brian’s go-to car expert.) “Car Crazy Cutie” is dominated by Dion and the Belmonts-style do-run-runs, and while it’s about a girl for a change, it’s not any more exciting than “Cherry, Cherry Coupe”, which was a rewrite of an earlier track and piles on the technical references.

“Spirit Of America” was supposed to pay tribute to racecar driver Craig Breedlove and his eponymous jet-propelled trike; fittingly, Capitol Records used it a decade later as the title track of the less musically successful cash-in follow-up to Endless Summer. While three of the repeats may have been worthy of hearing again, we won’t say the same for “Our Car Club”, but “No-Go Showboat” shows Brian trying to work more complicated arrangements into their albums than the usual three chords. Somewhat along the same lines, “A Young Man Is Gone” puts new lyrics eulogizing James Dean—who, or course, died in a car crash—to the lush Four Freshman-style harmonies of “Their Hearts Were Full Of Spring”. Finally, “Custom Machine” is more grandstanding, again over some unexpected chord changes.

Musically and vocally, Little Deuce Coupe certainly stands out as competent, even influential. But with only twenty minutes’ worth of new material, it offered little except to push them as a novelty act. Luckily, it was paired with a better album for its two-fer CD, which also included the rerecorded single version of “Be True To Your School”, featuring a simulation of a high school marching band and even more cheerleader chants.

The Beach Boys Little Deuce Coupe (1963)—2
1990 CD reissue: same as 1963, plus All Summer Long album and 4 extra tracks

Kinks 34: Did Ya and Phobia

Having somehow made it through the ‘80s, could the Kinks extend their longevity to a fourth decade? Their new manager hoped so. First, they’d need a new label, and Columbia stepped up. At a time when the CD was king, the band took the new opportunity to release an EP, with the single “Did Ya” as the lead track.

This charming little ditty was very reminiscent of “Sunny Afternoon” and “Dead End Street”, right down to the wheezing harmonium and backing vocals. This time Ray Davies’ concerns about the decline of British society were wrapped in wistful disappointment at the broken promises of the swingin’ sixties. As long as they were looking back, “Gotta Move”—originally the B-side to “All Day And All Of The Night”—is an outtake from The Road, and “Days” got a new acoustic busk with a not-too-raucous backing. But the irritating “New World” would be something of an extension of “Aggravation” from UK Jive, and a rant about Europe fifty years after the start of World War II. Much better is Dave Davies’ “Look Through Any Doorway”, instrumentally, lyrically, and musically, and deserves wider exposure than the end of an EP.

Eighteen months later, none of these were included on the band’s next album in the U.S., though “Did Ya” was added in some territories. Instead, Phobia was an entity all its own, and at 71 minutes their longest album since Preservation Act 2.

A forty-second “Opening” of dueling guitars gives way to the slow but big riffs of “Wall Of Fire”, an angry piece of social commentary. Following a brief pastoral opening, “Drift Away” is more of the same—neither a rewrite of “Loony Balloon” from UK Jive, nor is it remake of the Dobie Gray hit. While the sentiments in “Still Searching” seem genuine, and the performance is wonderful, the song is treacly and trite, two words we don’t normally associate with Ray Davies. (Plus, following a song that insists “sometimes I wish I could just drift away” with one that opens with “I’m just a drifter who has lost his way” is just sloppy sequencing.)

The title track brings back the crunch, and is one of his better litanies of neurosis, though we can’t imagine stadiums singing along. “Only A Dream” is this close to being one of his better tunes of late; all he’d have to do is jettison the spoken-word sections, where he rivals Pete Townshend in the creepy old man race. Titlewise, “Don’t” would be better extended to “Don’t Look Down”, as that’s the main hook, and an excellent metaphor we don’t think he’s touched on before. Along the same lanes, while “Babies” touches on all kinds of psychological ramifications of overpopulation, couldn’t he have found a better title?

The circus metaphors in “Over The Edge” don’t excuse a keyboard hook straight out of “Freeze-Frame” by the J. Geils Band, but he still manages to cram a lot of lyrics in. “Surviving” takes the other tack, being to find one hook and beat it into the ground. The best part of this six-minute opus is the breakdown over the final two, where they repeat a few wordless phrases over trilling acoustics and what sounds like at least one banjo. Dave’s guitar and harmonies have been prominent thus far, and “It’s Alright (Don’t Think About It)” provides something of a defiant determination with a spidery riff any grunge or hair metal band would have killed to have. “The Informer” comes completely out of left field, a gentle monologue by one pub patron to another, hinting at lots of back story and intrigue that’s only alluded to and never explained, unless we’re missing something really obvious.

Not so with “Hatred (A Duet)”, which seems to be the answer to some suit’s idea that it would hilarious if the Davies brothers sang a song about how they really feel about each other. It’s generally embarrassing. There’s no metaphor in “Somebody Stole My Car” unless you really want one; the best part is the “beep beep yeah” quote at the end. Only two tracks after yelling at each other, the boys were able to swap verses and harmonize on “Close To The Wire”, another example of Dave summing up a side’s worth of Ray’s angst in one song. The best is saved for last, as “Scattered” opens with a strum of “Lola” dobro and travels through rather dour subject matter—she’s gone and I’m alone, we all turn to dust someday—over a very jaunty tune, complete with accordion.

For the most part, Phobia isn’t a “bad” Kinks album, especially considering the handful that preceded it. The music is driven mostly by guitars, and the drums only occasionally sound canned, so on the surface, the album rocks. When you try to get into it, however, its flaws emerge, and you wish they had kept the songs tight and compact, rather than try to fill up a CD. It must have been too much for the band, as to date, it is the last Kinks album of new material. God rest the Kinks.

The Kinks Did Ya (1991)—2½
The Kinks Phobia (1993)—3