Guns N’ Roses 4: The Spaghetti Incident

They had only just finished the massive Use Your Illusion tour, and the “Estranged” video hadn’t even been released yet when Guns N’ Roses released their long-threatened covers album. Much of what made up “The Spaghetti Incident?” originated during the album sessions, and could have ended up on those albums, but they eventually decided that “Live And Let Die” and “Knockin’ On Heaven’s Door” would be the extent.

While most of the album runs the gamut through punk and glam, it opens with “Since I Don’t Have You”, the venerable doo-wop nugget with a profane Axl aside before the solo and an unnecessary atmospheric coda. That out of the way, Duff does a decent job shouting the Damned’s “New Rose”, and Axl puts on a bad cockney for U.K. Subs’ “Down On The Farm”. He cleverly adds a kazoo in lieu of sax for “Human Being”, which they stretch out even longer than the New York Dolls version. Duff helps Axl with the Stooges’ “Raw Power”, and Michael Monroe makes his second appearance on a GN’R album, duetting on the Dead Boys’ “Ain’t It Fun”, though Axl makes sure he himself gets the line with the c-word.

Slash takes his first-ever lead vocal on “Buick Makane” (from the T. Rex album that inspired his hat), which gets a twist by bringing in the chorus of “Big Dumb Sex” by Soundgarden in a nod to grunge, but more a reason to drop more eff-bombs. Nazareth’s “Hair Of The Dog” is an inspired choice, right up to Slash’s “Day Tripper” quote at the end. Duff returns for the Misfits’ “Attitude” and Johnny Thunders’ “You Can’t Put Your Arms Around A Memory”, the latter brought over from the sessions for his own solo album. The Sex Pistols are said to be the source for “Black Leather”, but in reality it was a Steve Jones and Paul Cook collaboration first covered by the Runaways. The final listed track is a plow through the Fear classic “I Don’t Care About You”, which would have been a fine ending, but Axl decided to sneak on a song written by Charles Manson as a hidden track. (As if that wasn’t enough, the typed gibberish on the album’s front cover uses the code invented by the Zodiac Killer.)

What helps the album succeed is, of course, Slash, who plays his butt off everywhere without seeming showboaty, and Duff should get some credit for some of the more arcane selections. If the intention really was to pay homage as well as generate royalties for some of these people, good for them. But their sell-by date had passed. Outside an unnecessary carbon copy cover of “Sympathy For The Devil” released on the Interview With A Vampire soundtrack a year later, this was the end of the band as we knew them.

Guns N’ Roses “The Spaghetti Incident?” (1993)—3

Duff McKagan: Believe In Me

For a while, Duff McKagan was the dumbest man in rock ‘n roll, stumbling around drunk and/or high, laughing at some inside joke, with hair and clothes that suggested something of a male version of Kelly Bundy. But his marginalized role as the bass player in Guns N’ Roses belied his varied musical background, kinda like we always underestimated what Izzy Stradlin brought to the mix. This wasn’t exactly utilized to the fullest on Believe In Me, his first solo album, as epitomized by the song titles and the cartoony portrait of the artist on the front. No expense was spared for this project, seemingly created during studio and touring breaks; along with most of the current lineup GN’R except Axl, special guests included members of Skid Row and the girl from Warrant’s “Cherry Pie” video. But he does play the majority of the guitars and drums on the album, and quite well too, along with his usual bass.

Unfortunately, he also sings with confidence but not competence, his lyrics trite and cliché. Sometimes he speaks (or yells) asides when melodies just can’t suffice. These traits combine to erase most of the appreciation one could muster for the quality of the arrangements. Much of the album is heavy rock or power ballads, but he does detour into funk for Jeff Beck to shred on for “(F-cked Up) Beyond Belief” (censorship ours) that’s mostly instrumental but gets its title from the near rap in the midsection. (Beck also turns up on “Swamp Song”.) “Punk Rock Song” is a one-man thrash that lasts just over a minute and a half, and would have been shorter if he stayed true to the genre and didn’t break it down halfway through. Lenny Kravitz sings (and screams) “The Majority” with little fanfare, which is surprising considering his ubiquity at the time. Co-writer and contributor Gilby Clarke—a.k.a. Izzy’s replacement—can share half the blame for “10 Years”, and Sebastian Bach takes the Izzy role on “Trouble”. “F-uck You” (censorship again ours) is a loud metal number with a profane rap by one Doc of something called Haus Mob. The closing ballad “Lonely Tonite” is manna for those whose favorite song on the Use Your Illusion albums was “So Fine”.

Since getting mostly sober by the end of the century, Duff managed to clean up his look, resurfacing in various offshoots with old and new friends—most successfully with Velvet Revolver—and even went back to school to emerge as something of a financial adviser to his fellow burnouts. Back then, though, not a lot of people believed in Believe In Me, and it was soon overtaken by a more bankable release.

Duff McKagan Believe In Me (1993)—2

Aerosmith 2: Get Your Wings

This was more like it. For Aerosmith’s second album, they were placed under the care of producer Jack Douglas, who’d already worked with Alice Cooper and John Lennon. And while it still offered breadth of style, Get Your Wings came loaded with hooks.

To wit, “Same Old Song And Dance” begins with one of those, made for air guitar or to be actually learned by budding pimply faced axemen. The Brecker brothers, plus Stan Bronstein of Elephant’s Memory, on horns don’t distract from the rock at all. Beginning with what would become a familiar drum pattern, “Lord Of The Thighs” (pretty clever title, that) takes its sweet time for everything to fall into place, including subtle rhythmic piano and guitars playing single sixteenth-note patterns. Steven Tyler has found his swagger, and his voice is mixed up front, unlike on the first album. While the spooky extended intro for “Spaced” is about as contrived as the mildly existential lyrics, they do combine for a hell of a track. Acoustic guitars blend with electrics for “Woman Of The World”, which is very well constructed but doesn’t stick as well the rest of the album. Joe Perry does get in some cool licks over the fade.

At almost half the length, “S.O.S. (Too Bad)” accomplishes what “Woman Of The World” couldn’t, knowing enough to get out of the way when it’s made its point. And a good thing too, because the one-two punch in the middle of the side dominates. First, “Train Kept A-Rollin’” starts with the intro of the Yardbirds version, then settles into trademark Aerosmith stank for two minutes before going into strict Yardbirds tempo. (Douglas brought in audience noise from the Concert for Bangladesh to cover the transitions, and apparently Dick Wagner and Steve Hunter from Lou Reed’s band play the solos.) From there they could only go with a slow one, and wind soon drowns out the fake audience for the doom-and-gloom acoustic intro to “Seasons Of Wither”. There’s excellent doubling of instruments, subtle keyboards (or layered vocals?) on the choruses, and a superior lyric. Then Tyler’s back to being horny on “Pandora’s Box”, which distills the rockers on the album into a decent closer with an extremely complicated ending. (Before that, however, listen for the clever spoonerism on “city slickers”, and even more closely at the start of the track for a clarinet playing “I’m In The Mood For Love” for some reason.)

Get Your Wings nails down the classic Aerosmith sound, and the template they’d follow for the rest of the decade. And for the most part, that’s what they did, and well.

Aerosmith Get Your Wings (1974)—3½

Mike Campbell 1: Blue Stingrays

Surf music received something of a revival in the ‘90s thanks to Quentin Tarantino movies, and while it didn’t enjoy the massive sales windfall of the swing revival, it also didn’t tank as quickly. Bands like Shadowy Men On A Shadowy Planet, Laika & The Cosmonauts, and Man Or Astro-man? were just a few outfits who rode the trend and created new music, while independent labels searched for little-known practitioners from back in the day to reissue.

One such outfit was Blue Stingrays, whose Surf-N-Burn collection came with a mysterious bio and catalog listings for long-lost albums, but just one listen to the CD made it clear that these were not thirty-year-old tapes. In reality, it was a new album by Mike Campbell of Tom Petty’s Heartbreakers, heavy on the twang and whammy bar, with former Heartbreaker Ron Blair on bass and Mudcrutch drummer Randall Marsh. (Benmont Tench is mentioned as being involved as well, but we don’t hear any keyboards; it’s been suggested he ordered the pizza.)

A dropped needle on vinyl opens the album, and party noises are heard throughout “Monsoon”; thankfully they don’t persist, but both reappear on the closing “Super Hero”, which sounds a little like the Mighty Mouse theme. Speaking of which, the theme from Goldfinger had already featured in Petty live sets, and it was something of a surf song already anyway; “Russian Roulette” has a similar secret agent theme quality as well. Every now and then there’s a riff and chord sequence that’s just screaming for a Petty lyric, especially “Brave New World”, and we could swear we’ve heard “Blue Venus” somewhere else before. “Surfer’s Life” and “Zuma Sunset” have distinct Brian Wilson qualities, and help break up the tempo. Fifteen songs in 47 minutes make it longer than most actual surf albums. (Two outtakes from the sessions, the more rockabilly than surf “Grits And Eggs” and “Dawn Patrol”, were released as a 45rpm single in 2021 alongside the album’s reissue on three varieties of limited edition colored vinyl.)

Overall the album is pleasant, but occasionally emulates the period incidental music concocted for the previous year’s hit movie That Thing You Do!; if Mike was in Tom Hanks’ radar he likely wouldn’t have opted to score a movie soundtrack so close to She’s The One. Throughout his time in the Heartbreakers, and despite the occasional session gig, he never dared pursue a solo project, which is why this one was a badly kept secret for such a long time.

Blue Stingrays Surf-N-Burn (1997)—3