So here we are- Its been ages since the last guns n roses album was released, and now finally in 2009 (2008) I'm finally listening to a new original album of theirs... Well.. Really its just Axel Rose. But regardless its a new album with Guns n' Roses on the cover- so that's a bonus right there!!
First thing I want to point out is that the sound of this album, well about 90% of it is completely new, there is little to NO songs, or even parts of songs that sound like paradise city or welcome to the jungle... so if your expecting daddy's classic GNR then you have another thing coming!!
At first listen to Chinese democracy I was not too impressed. After hearing the album title song and 'better' I was sort of let down by the rest of the album. Shackler's revenge sounds way too Linkin Park/ KORN like to me, and the rest of the songs didn't seem to fit anything that I once knew the great GNR sound to be.
but I didn't give up. Matter of fact as of writing this I am about 10 times through the entire album, with listening to 'sorry' 'better' and 'prostitute' probably about 40 times each. For some reason they just caught on with me. I'm finding that while I'm not entirely in love with this sound, the music, or even the songs in general ,that the overall message of some of these songs has connected with me in a sort of out of body experience.
I can't really explain it, and may never admit it in public, but Its a pleasent suprise. Chinese democracy gets to stay in my music collection. I think that throughout the years I will continue to enjoy this album that can even be described as a bit odd...
There are a few pretty dark spots on this album... If the world and There was a time are still two tracks I have a hard time listening to. I have a hard time believing that even Axel listens to these tracks...
Street of Dreams and Catcher in the Rye almost touches on a sound or riff from some of the lighter songs from Use your allusion....almost... I didn't care for these tracks much at first but now I quite enjoy them...
Both Scraped and Riad are pretty odd tunes with some decent rock guitars, I'm kind of meh about both songs...
not a fan or IRS or Madagascar (the fuck kind of name is that anyway??) although madagascar does pay some tribute to older songs towards the end.. "What we've got here is failure to communicate"
This I love is a decent tune, kind of like the older November Rain, just nowhere near as good...lol
but yea for the most part I like it, don't hate it...
And hell-
Its way better than Spaghetti incident!!