1985-Axl Rose (William Bailey)Vocals1985-
Slash (Saul Hudson)Guitar1985-1995, 2016-
Duff McKaganBass1985-1997, 2016-
Izzy StradlinGuitar1985-1991
Steve AdlerDrums1985-1990
Matt SorumDrums1990-1998
Dizzy ReedKeyboards1990-
Gilby ClarkeGuitar1991-1994
Tommy StinsonBass1998-2014
Chris PitmanKeyboards1998-2016
Richard FortusGuitar2001-
Ron "Bumblefoot" ThalGuitar2006-2014
Frank Ferrer Drums2006-
DJ AshbaGuitar2006-2015
Rose was married to Erin Everly, the daughter of Don Everly, from April 1990 until the marriage was annulled in January 1991. They met in 1986 and had a very tumultuous relationship that ended in court proceedings and allegations of abuse. In a 1994 People magazine profile, Everly claimed that Axl beat her repeatedly and even removed the doors to their home so he could keep an eye on her. She sued him in 1994 after she was called to testify in a lawsuit brought by Axl's ex-girlfriend Stephanie Seymour, which alleged similar abuse. Everly later dated David Arquette before disappearing from public life.
Rose and Stradlin formed the band. They took their name from two bands they used to play in, L.A. Guns and Hollywood Rose.
Axl Rose had a persistent stalker. Her name is Karen Jane McNeil, and she claimed to communicate with Rose through telepathy.
"Axl Rose" is an anagram of "Oral Sex."
Slash played on Michael Jackson's albums
Dangerous,
Invincible, and
HIStory. He also played at Jackson's 2001 reunion shows in New York City.
Their first gigs were in Seattle. About 100 miles outside of Los Angeles, their van broke down, so they hitchhiked to Seattle, where they played five sparsely attended shows.
Slash got his nickname from a family friend because he was always in a hurry.
In 2001, Rose reformed the band with all new members - he was allowed to keep the name because he owns the rights. He played with various versions of the new group over the next few years, working on Chinese Democracy, which was finally released in 2008.
In 2016, Slash and McKagan returned to the fold and the band hit the road on their Not In This Lifetime reunion tour.
Slash's first guitar was a one-stringed acoustic. When he was 15 his grandmother gave him a electric Les Paul copy.
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Alex - Little Rock, AR
Early in their career, they lived in a small apartment in Los Angeles they called Hell House because of alcohol, drugs, girls and all manner of sin.
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Micha - Opole, Poland
Before taking up guitar, Slash was mainly interested in BMX riding and competed at a professional level.
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Tom - Trowbridge, England
McKagan's pancreas exploded in 1994 because of his severe drinking habits. He has been sober ever since and now sticks to non-alcoholic beer.
After this incident, he started taking economics classes to better understand his residuals, and he became an expert on the subject, getting his own monthly financial column for Playboy.com in 2009.
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The "Guns" part of their name comes from Tracii Guns, who is a guitarist that was with the band when they first formed, but left before they settled on a name. Guns later formed the band L.A. Guns.
Axl Rose and Izzy Stradlin were both native from the small town of Lafayette, Indiana, which Axl has described as very "close-minded." Asked about small town values, Axl replied: "That's a load of s--t."
Steve Adler was the first to leave the band, getting kicked out in 1990 when his drug abuse got out of control. He sued the band, claiming he was owed royalties and that the other members exacerbated his downward spiral. At the 1993 trial, a lawyer asked Duff McKagan about "The Spaghetti Incident," referring to an offhand remark McKagan made in his deposition about leftover spaghetti (he and Adler lived above an Italian restaurant for a few months). The band thought this was hilarious and named their covers album, released later that year, "The Spaghetti Incident?" in tribute.
The case was eventually settled, with Adler receiving $2.5 million.
In the summer of 1988, they toured as Aerosmith's opening act. It was a thrill for G N' R, since they idolized Aerosmith and the bands got along great. At first, a system was put in place to keep the bands separated, since Aerosmith had been through rehab and their management didn't want them around drugs and alcohol. As the tour progressed, a mentor relationship formed as Aerosmith saw their young selves in Guns N' Roses. By the end of the tour, Guns was getting more media attention; Rolling Stone sent a crew to do a story, and Aerosmith was dismayed to find out it was Guns N' Roses who would be on the cover, not them.
Before he joined Guns 'N Roses, Axl Rose was so hard up for cash that he joined a UCLA medical study where he was paid $8 an hour to smoke cigarettes.
Slash told UK's Metro newspaper that Guns N' Roses 1989 concert at Cowboys Stadium in Dallas was the worst gig he's ever done. He recalled: "It was horrific. Everything that could go wrong went wrong and the band didn't have enough experience to handle it properly. It was a huge disaster in front of 65,000 people. We fell apart on stage. It's stuck with me ever since."
Slash's father, Anthony Hudson, is an English artist who created album covers for musicians, including several for Joni Mitchell. Slash recalled to NME: "I remember as a kid him having all the artwork spread out around the lounge in our house when he was working on them."
Axl Rose has developed a reputation for being temperamental and difficult to work with, but those who worked with him often praise him as well, noting his talents as a lyricist and singer. In a Songfacts
interview with Matt Sorum, he said: "When we got to the studio, we had a great experience together, and he was always very kind to me up until the machine got crazy. When the machine got crazy, everybody got crazy. He's one of the greatest, most talented frontmen I've ever been behind. I've never seen anybody be able to hold an audience of 50,000 people like he can."
According to information put together by ConcertHotels.com, Axl Rose has a greater vocal range than any other popular music singer. The Guns N' Roses vocalist has sung notes that span more than five octaves, and just a few semitones under six octaves. They range from the high of an F1 (in "
There Was A Time") to the low of a B flat 6 ("
Ain't It Fun"). This is a greater range than Mariah Carey, who has managed to span the slightly smaller gap between F2 and G7 on her recordings and Prince whose has reached both a B6 and an E2.
Some of the band members keep up collections in their spare time. Axl Rose collects antique crucifixes, and Slash collects snakes.
Axl Rose does a voice for the video game
Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas.
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Slash did not allow the TV show Glee to use any of Guns N' Roses' music despite many attempts from producers. He stated, "Glee is worse than Grease and Grease is bad enough."
On Thursday, June 6, 1985, Guns 'N Roses played their first live show with the Appetite for Destruction lineup. Two days later, their car broke down on way to Seattle, so they hitchhiked to the gig, eating raw onions from a field along the way. The band members made it to Seattle for the show, and when they'd finished, the owner refused to pay them. Axl Rose and co. responded by trying, and failing, to burn the club down.
Through the vagaries of RIAA certification, Appetite For Destruction held the title of best-selling debut album of all time in America, but only from 2008-2018. Boston's debut had the claim at 17 million until Appetite was certified at 18 million in 2008. The calculus shifted in 2018 when the RIAA gave Hootie & the Blowfish the mark with 21 million, claiming they sold an additional 5 million copies of their debut Cracked Rear View from 1999-2018.
Axl Rose signified the end of their concerts - no more encores - by tossing his microphone into the crowd, a much better souvenir than a guitar pick. This practice continued until 2022 when a fan in Adelaide caught it with her face, giving her two black eyes.