Have you ever had that one song that you could listen to forever?
I mean FOREVER?
That’s a long time.
That one and only song you have while marooned on an island you plan on listening to forever.
The background of the song alone is rock and roll badassness. The lyrics, the music, the vocals…Perfect.
The background:
Guns was coming off the biggest album in a generation, hell, maybe longer. The purpose of the double album was to bury “Appetite For Destruction”. Personally, I think they could have picked songs from both albums and done that easily…but 2 albums is what we got.
Steven Adler, the drummer, was so fucked up on smack he couldn’t sit on the drum throne to play in the studio. I saw them do Farm Fest in Indianapolis and Axel made the remark that the band was done if certain members didn’t get help. I thought it was Slash. Nope…Steven.
Anyway, album time came and Steven couldn’t stay awake long enough to do one song…“Civil War”. This one song took all day just to lay down the drums. Even then, they couldn’t get the entire song done with Steven. The producer, Mike Clink, ended up taking what he had and spliced the drums together to have what you hear now. Simple. If you listen to the drums on the song you will hear the drums repeat the same fills and beats over and over. I love it. Simple and to the point. Perfection. Amazing in my book.
Shortly after that day, Steven was gone. The only song he played on in both “Use Your Illusion” albums.
The best song, if you ask me.
The music:
The way Duff and Steven play together is amazing. The bass mirrors the bass drum. Probably the best in the industry at the time. Duff hits the bass notes perfectly with Steven’s bass drum kicks. I love it. Slash’s guitar playing is amazing. The wah wah pedal is the best touch. The solo…forget about it.
We can’t overlook Izzy’s rhythm playing. He is such a scat back player. A lot like Keith Richards. He just sits in the background and fills the void. The band was never the same when he left.
The Lyrics:
Mind Blowing. Deep. Makes you think. Axel can write some lyrics. He was a big influence on me when I was writing as well as Duff when I was playing. The fact that you start a song off with a line from “Cool Hand Luke” is fucking bad ass, then follow it with the powerful lyrics is just mind boggling.
Have you ever just dissected the lyrics?
Verse 1:
Look at your young men fighting
Look at your women crying
Look at your young men dying
The way they’ve always done before.
Verse 2:
Look At the hate we’re breeding
Look at the fear we’re feeding
Look at the lives we’re leading
The way we’ve always done before.
Chorus:
My hands are tied
The billions shift from side to side
And the wars go on with brainwashed pride
For the love of God and our human rights
All these things are swept aside
By bloody hands time can’t deny
And are washed away by your genocide
And history hides the lies of our civil wars.
(solo)
Verse 3:
Did you wear a black armband when they shot the man
Who said “Peace could last forever”?
And in my first memories, they shot Kennedy
I went numb when I learned to see
So I never fell for Vietnam
We got the wall in DC to remind us all
That you can’t trust freedom when it’s not in your hands
When everybody’s fighting for the promised land.
This song applies today. It applies to 20 years ago, it applies to 50 years ago and it will still apply 100 years from now.
It is the perfect song—music, lyrics, tone, vocals and meaning…everything.
This is the one song I will never get tired of. Powerful. The perfect group together writing and playing.
Guns N’ Roses will NEVER be as good as they were unless all these members play together again.
I would pay an ungodly amount of money to see the reunited band play just this one song one more time.
I’m glad this was captured and is on Youtube. It is something to see…to hear.
I hope this has inspired you to have a listen and digest what is going through your ear holes—the perfect song
Later…PJ