The Guns N’ Roses reunion at the Troubadour (affectionately known as the Troub). What a night. The Troubadour is a 500-ish person capacity venue on the western border of West Hollywood. It sits at the corner of Santa Monica Boulevard and Doheny Drive. If you take Doheny north for two or three blocks, you’ll be spat out at The Rainbow, The Roxy, Gazzari’s (which turned into the Key Club later years), The Whiskey and Viper Room.
After securing a golden ticket (1 of around 200 wristbands) earlier in the day, I left home at about 9 that evening, about a five minute drive away from the Troub. I got a bite to eat with some friends a couple blocks away. We strolled down and I Wayne’s World-ed my wrist band through the throngs of looky-lous who were there to catch a glimpse of any glory they could. I got in line and was given a commemorative ticket for the show. Number 430/500 to be exact. Fantastic.
As the final chorus of “It’s So Easy” came up it was make or break time for whether or not Axl Rose’s voice was going to have power and drive behind it … to everyone’s surprise he nailed it and even exceeded it. All the grit and power was there and you could hear a faint gasp of shock from around the venue as he belted it out and finished the song to a rousing round of applause.
I met a couple more friends at the bar just through the door and made the executive decision to go find a perch to watch the show from. As I walked into the main room, it felt undersold, in terms of how many people were in there. It wasn’t too far off show time. I thought it’d be packed to the rafters and more – so be a punishing event trying to stand comfortably or get a drink and retain a spot.
Before the show my friend and I took a couple of shots and felt them burn in our chest. I needed a buzz going to deal with the anticipation and the uncertainty of what I was about to witness. Was this going to be great? Was it going to be OK? Was it going to be a trainwreck? Were we going to have to wait until 3am for Axl? Who knew. The Troubadour is a cosy little spot that has no barrier and has a stage just big enough to fit a band onto with minimal space to run around on. Slash, Axl and Duff were going to be shoulder to shoulder and sweating on the crowd and having to play in each other’s space. Up above us to the right, Jim Carrey, Andrew Dice Clay, Nicholas Cage, Lenny Kravitz and Chris Brown with entourages of people took their position.
I saw the stage hands flashing their flashlights at the sound and lighting guys to signal show-time start. It was about 11:45 when the intro music started. Slash ran out, Frank Ferrer, Duff and Richard Fortus ran out onto a darkened stage and started playing the opening bars to “It’s So Easy.” My feet just started dancing up a storm and before I knew it the spotlight came on and in it was the man himself, the lynchpin of the show, Axl Rose. The most notable thing off the bat is that he came out straight away with no hat, no bandanna and no glasses. He had shoulder-length red hair and a giant smile on his face. It certainly seemed like he was stoked to be back.
The crowd overpowered him for most of “It’s So Easy”, which is more of a lower octave number – a great voice warm up number and level checker for in-ear monitors and stage volume. Slash, Duff and Richard were way in the pocket with Frank. Perfect accentuations. The crowd going insane to the “Why don’t you just f**k off?!” part as Slash ripped the short little solo and displayed his tonality for the night. Slash was in the crowd’s face, poking his tongue out in a “I’m loving this” way. Even his top hat and curly fro couldn’t conceal his big stoked grin all night.
Great Moments In Rock N Roll History:
Guns ‘N’ Roses @ Eastern Creek, Sydney (1993)
As the final chorus of “It’s So Easy” came up it was make or break time for whether or not Axl Rose’s voice was going to have power and drive behind it. In the past few years it’s been lacking. To everyone’s surprise he nailed it and even exceeded it. All the grit and power was there and you could hear a faint gasp of shock from around the venue as he belted it out and finished the song to a rousing round of applause.
The set melted into “Mr. Brownstone” became a giant love-in with Axl, Slash and Duff interacting with each other, hugging each other and leaning on each other and playing off each other’s vibes. The band and the singer were all on fire. Everyone was singing and dancing, myself included. The sound, as usual at the Troub, was incredible.
By mid-set they kicked into the intro jam and high-hat pepperings of Rocket Queen while the band just noodled about and built up the riff before Axl came in and delivered the verses. To my surprise, Slash gave Richard a solo section during the middle of the song before playing a blistering solo himself, followed by the slide guitar solo from the record. When the outro section snare hits started to pound the crowd joined Axl in the bitter-sweet-lyric final verses and carried that song to the end while Axl sung the best he’s sung since, in my opinion, 1993. The sweet spot on every single note. It should be noted at this point that I was dubious about this reunion since Steven Adler and Izzy weren’t going to be involved, or at least to any large degree. Back in the day they were super key in the band’s swing. At this point it proved that their absence was inconsequential. The people replacing them had the fire, passion and the swing. Good job, guys.
The final three songs before the encore were unexpected ones for me. Axl told us that he had an Uncle Bob and he was sure that everyone else has an Uncle Bob, too. The G, D, C & C chords for that song started playing. The chord progression I remember becoming aware of music to back in ’92 when the biggest song on the Australian Saturday morning music TV show “Rage” was GNR playing “Heaven’s Door” live at Wembley Stadium for Freddie Mercury’s tribute show. Duff McKagan clad in a black button down shirts with white polka dots, Slash in leather pants and a blue denim jacket and a double neck black Gibson SG. That vision and that music was when I said to myself: “That’s what I want to be and what I want to be involved in for the rest of my life.” I got a guitar five years later and that was the first song I learnt ‘cause I knew it had to be easy, yet super flavourful. I felt a full circle moment wave of emotion during the slow jam break down before the crowd participation of the chorus. It almost felt like I was getting to experience my own personal “Live At The Ritz ‘88” moment. Let’s make ‘em pull the faders back on this one.
The next song was My Michelle, a song with a screechy chorus, I was watching Axl like a hawk and he hit every note with every bit of power necessary. It was incredible. Michelle Young, the lass who that song was written about was in the crowd that night, too. 30 years on, I wonder how that played out, haha. The final song was what I’d hoped the set was going to open with. Slash started playing the tastiest riff on Appetite, the main riff to Nightrain. I think we all turned to each other and sang every word to that song while dancing up a storm and thrashing about. It was such a fantastic moment and had such a great swing. The band finished to a rousing round of applause and went off for a pee break for a second.
They came back out shortly after and play “The Seeker” by The Who to a relatively flat response (I mean really, that song between explosive rock n roll songs ain’t that great). The band winds down and then the blue-grassy notes to Paradise City start playing. We all start clapping to the snare hits as the distorted chords wash in. At that moment a giant sasquatch of a person stepped in front of me obscuring my view of Axl. I heard a whistle blow followed by the sound of what I thought was a beer bottle hitting the bottom of the balcony above my head. People around me gasped and ducked so instinctively I ducked with them. I thought I was going to get showered with glass. Next thing I felt something ding the left side of my head at rocket speed and what ever it was land in the person’s hand next to me. Motherfucker, It wasn’t a beer bottle, it was Axl’s steel whistle! What a bummer, but oh well. Can’t win ‘em all and at least I have a bruise on my head for the next few days as a reminder.
We all jitterbugged through the song and the sped up outro. The band bows and leaves the stage to a rousing applause. I look up at the balcony at Jim Carrey smiling and I was thinking this was ridiculous. What a spectacle. We got to see a dead body rise from the grave, so to speak. To witness this come back and it be as glorious as it was and have some keepsakes, memories and the experience of it all was just pure magic. If you missed that show, you missed the closest thing to ’87 as can ever be. You will never see those guys play a Hollywood club show like that ever again. Only huge venues, of which I still implore you to go see them at. Everyone’s on fire and hungry to make up for lost time. As GNR fans, you should be too.
Thanks for reading.
Words: Nath, 2016
Photos: Ali Shayesteh
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