GUNS N' ROSES: Chinese Democracy

Produced by W. Axl Rose and Caram Costanzo

Released: 2008

I was tossing up whether to even bother reviewing this album but in the end I decided that it would almost be remiss of me not to do so. With almost a decade and a half of hype and expectation behind it, Chinese Democracy is without doubt the most anticipated album in history and trying to look at it with an open mind is virtually impossible.

In many ways Chinese Democracy is rather like the rock music equivalent of Heaven's Gate: a long delayed, massively over-budget ego-project that was underwhelmingly received when finally released. There are significant differences with Michael Cimino's turgid and ill-fated 1980 Western however, not the least of which is that Chinese Democracy is a far better record than Heaven's Gate is a film. At the same time, this is not a particularly groundbreaking album and certainly isn't the indomitable classic release that a recording that took as long as this to make -- with the people who helped to make it -- should be. Yet, while it might not stand the test of time the way Appetite for Destruction or the Use Your Illusion albums have done, this is actually a very good album.

One of the most oft-heard criticisms of Chinese Democracy is that it doesn't sound like Guns n' Roses; while it's true that Slash's signature raw dirty blues guitar tone is missing, anything with Axl Rose singing on it is going to sound like Guns n' Roses. And this does, only it sounds like the overdramatic parts of the Use Your Illusion albums with tape-loops, hip-hop beats, nu-metal parts and industrial stuff added to it. Axl's sneaky little coda to that album, "My World", practically pre-sages the first and title track of this, a stomping pseudo-industrial rocker with a mean lead riff stolen directly from "Owner of a Lonely Heart" by Yes. "Shackler's Revenge" opens with a tired-sounding nu-metal motif that shows how long these songs have been around for, and then "Better" kicks off by mining hip-hop for inspiration before taking a sharp right into sleazeball rock. Driven by Dizzy Reed's piano, "Street of Dreams" is the first track that really displays Chinese Democracy's true sound, coming across as it does like a sequel to "Estranged" but, in spite of the ludicrous amount of production and the fact it now takes five guitarists to do what two once did, the album never actually sounds as pompous as some of the stuff on UYI.

Yes, "There Was a Time" has strings and a choir and stupid amounts of guitar and a bunch of other stuff going on, but somehow it all just seems to work. And "Scraping" and "IRS" show that underneath all the gloss, the walls of keys, sub-bass snarling and masses of guitar-shred, there is still a very angry rock beast. Indeed, like all their previous albums, Chinese Democracy is driven by Axl's demons, his despair, his rage and his self-indulgent, my-way-or-no-way, middle-finger-wagging defiance. It may have taken seven times longer than anyone expected for it to come out, but this is Axl's music, Axl's way and he clearly doesn't care if you like it or not.

1. Chinese Democracy
2. Shackler's Revenge
3. Better
4. Street of Dreams
5. If the World
6. There Was a Time
7. Catcher in the Rye
8. Scraped
9. Riad n' the Bedouins
10. Sorry
11. IRS
12. Madagascar
13. This I Love
14. Prostitute

Rating: 90%