Guns N' Roses recently embarked on one of the most successful tours of all time, reunion or otherwise. The tour paired vocalist Axl Rose with bassist Duff McKagan and guitarist Slash for the first time since 1997, and while talks of a new album with that lineup for the first time since 1993's "The Spaghetti Incident?" have been heating up, nothing has come to fruition just yet.
Guns N' Roses's most recent album was the long-fabled 2008 Chinese Democracy record, which featured a slew of guest musicians and tons of studio time. In an interview with Billboard, former Geffen A&R executive Tom Zutaut reveals that the record should've probably been an Axl Rose solo record from the perspective of sales.
"If he had released it as an Axl Rose solo record, it probably would have sold millions," says former Geffen A&R executive Tom Zutaut. "But when we sat in the studio and talked about Chinese Democracy, he [Axl Rose] just wasn't ready to go there yet."
Perhaps more interestingly, Zutaut adds that Chinese Democracy was supposed to be a trilogy of records. Which makes you wonder how much material we haven't heard and where it's all gone.
As noted earlier in Wild’s account as well as Axl’s own words, Chinese Democracy cast a giant spotlight on Axl's lifelong ideological struggle to "bury Appetite," while his fans wanted him to bring it back to life. "Axl's goal was to make a more modern record, to make GN'R a more modern band. But Guns N' Roses fans wouldn't accept that," says Zutaut. "Had it been a 'W. Axl Rose' record, who knows…but not a lot people know this: Chinese Democracy was going to be trilogy."
Maybe we'll get to hear some of the never-released material from the album on Guns N' Roses's new album, which may or may not exist.
