Modern Life Is Rubbish

The past few years have been hard for ex-Guns N' Roses guitarist Slash.
He's had to come through a fatal bust-up with Axl Rose, divorce, the
loss of his record deal and the unfortunate discovery that he'd earned
nothing from the two-year 'Use Your Illusion' world tour. Now he's
finally ready to talk about it all...

   The Sunset Marquis hotel, located just off LA's Sunset Strip, is
quiet for now. It's early Saturday night and, as night falls, it seems
that most guests have left their rooms to explore the city's nightlife,
leaving the foyer, swimming pool and hotel bar devoid of life.
   Slash walks in with a minimum of fuss. With his ever-present black
hat atop a head of long curls, a sleeveless black T-shirt, leather jeans
and red Converse All-Stars tennis shoes, he looks the same as he has for
the last 10 years. Guns N' Roses' 'Appetite For Destruction' burst onto
an unsuspecting scene in 1987, but for Slash time seems to have stood
still.
   His handshake is firm and although he's kept us waiting for several
hours, he apologises so sincerely for the delay that it's hard to blame
him. He drops into a poolside chair, ready for business.
   "Everything's great!" he says in his soft voice. "I've finally got my
band straight and went through this whole thing with changing record
labels. And I've been taking care of a lot of my business myself."
   Slash's new album with his band Snakepit comes out in August,
although he can't reveal the name of the label issuing it. It's called
'Ain't Life Grand?'.
   "The record is killer and the band is killer," enthuses Slash. "I
don't have any whiny fuckers in the band any more!"
   He takes a drag from one of his imported Gitanes cigarettes, which he
will chainsmoke throughout the conversation. He feels that the album
title is an ironic comment on the way his life  has been during the
latter half of the past decade.
   The '90s weren't an easy time for the man born Saul Hudson in
Stoke-on-Trent, England. Although there are certain things that Slash
can't discuss about his former band and bandmates, there's much that he
will say - his resentment at Guns singer Axl Rose's megalomania spilling
out during the course of the evening.
   "Guns was the antithesis fo everything that was going on in the music
at that time, 1985," he says. "The '90s were a drag, because I watched
whatever unity we had in the band go downhill. I split that and I was
stupid enough to get married and get divorced right at the same time I
left Guns."
   I mention that he seemed to disappear, in much the same way as Axl
Rose has, once  his first Slash's Snakepit album, 'It's Five O'Clock
Somewhere', and tour were complete. Slash disagrees, claiming that he's
been jamming and done session work with different people in far-flung
locales.
   He says he just got back from being Michael Jackson's side-man for
two massive shows in Korea last month. He's gigged with his own Slash's
Blues Ball band, covering '70's rock tunes long into the night. He
claims that this is satisfying for him.
   "I would show up at concerts here and there, just to keep myself
above ground. I get a sense of accomplishment out of that, out of
meeting cool people and getting inspired by certain people. I find it
always helps me to remember the reason I do what I do."
   Slash is incredibly humble for a man who was an integral part of the
biggest rock band of the '80s. He's quick to reject inquiries about his
fame, dismissing them as "rock star questions".
   "I just like to play guitar. It wasn't about business, or trying to
be cool on Sunset Strip, or getting the cover of fucking 'Rolling
Stone', or any of that. It was about just getting together with a bunch
of guys that could *cause* something. Even if we weren't all on the
exact same page as far as direction goes, somehow we managed to make a
band that was a mixture of everything - of attitude.
   "At the time, the five of us were the only people who could have made
up Guns N' Roses. And that I'm proud of."
   You can hear the pride when he speaks of the wild early days, when
GN'R gigs were *the* place to be seen.
   "The word got out that there was this band and we had this huge
audience in LA comprised of all the different fads that were going on -
old school rock 'n' roll people, punks, Beverly Hills High School
teeny-boppers, model chicks, drug dealers, it was great.
   "When the '90s rolled around, Axl got really, really into the whole
trip and became a more exaggerated version of someone I already knew.
Nothing that Axl does now surprises me. It's just a bigger, more
exaggerated version. That's where he was headed. But the rest of us
didn't give a fuck, because we liked doing what we were doing. As long
as we could do that, we were fine.
   "The 'Use Your Illusion' tour was supposed to be the high point in
our lives - when you're one of the biggest rock bands in the world and
you're headlining with Metallica and doing stadiums, and you can do
basically whatever the fuck you want. But somehow, some way, between
management and Axl and whatever other elements that were involved, when
the tour ended we had lost a ton of money. Which was fine, but seemed
kind of senseless. I just wanted to go back in and do another record and
keep going, but we just never fell back in sync. So I just quit."
   The first Snakepit album was not exactly well-received when it
appeared in 1995. Slash, himself, claims that he basically took a demo
tape and turned it into an album.
   "I've always been into being in bands," he shrugs. "I've never been
into being a solo guy. People were coming up to me telling me that I
should form some kind of supergroup, but I didn't want to do that. I
love jamming with friends, anywhere from The Baked Potato jazz club in
LA ro playing with Boz Scaggs in Cleveland, from big festivals to small
clubs.
   Anywhere where there's a guitar handy."
   Snakepit today is made up of completely new faces from the previous
incarnation - drummer Matt Laug, bassist Johnny Griparic, guitarist Ryan
Roxie (who's currently on tour with Alice Cooper's band) and singer Rod
Jackson.
   "When I decided that I was going to do Snakepit again, I had to find
the right musicians that I felt comfortable playing with and they had to
be a 'band'," explains Slash. "It's called Slash's Snakepit only for
legal reasons otherwise it would be simply Snakepit."
   At the time of the 'Use Your Illusion' albums, Nirvana still hadn't
released 'Nevermind'. The hottest rap star in the world was MC Hammer.
Soundgarden and Alice In Chains were rising stars. Since then, we've had
a whole new crop of stars - from Korn to Limp Bizkit to Marilyn Manson -
appearing on the scene.
   Slash says he admires bands like Rage Against The Machine, but that
it doesn't matter to him if today's audience 'gets' him or not.
   "If the record industry had taken a really weird turn - like, say,
polka was the really big Top 40 sound - then that would have been rough
for me!" he laughs. "I just do what I do, and I never put a label on it.
It seems like there's enough support for me to put this record out.
   "I wouldn't sign with anybody until I could find the right place. I
paid for the record myself, and I wasn't about to sell it out to just
anyone. The recording industry, from the majors to the independents, has
changed so much. The reason I left Geffen was that there was no place
for me. It's become a hip-hop label."
   His resolve was strengthened by Geffen's failure to sell GN'R's 'Live
Era '87-'93' album last year. But then, he adds, what did he care, it's
not his band.
   Slash says that the new Snakepit album has its fair share of songs
that tell of the dark sides of drugs, sex and violence.
   "They're just a bunch of 'get up and go' songs," he says. "'Been
There Lately' is about coming back to your apartment after you've been
away for a month and there's all this shit that's been going on when you
let somebody use your place. Simple. Everybody can relate to that."
   Rumours of rampant drug use were part of life in GN'R. But Slash
shrugs when asked if he considers himself a survivor.
   "I never think about myself in that way. Sometimes we'll sit around
and reminisce about how many times we woke up in the hospital - ha, ha!
But I don't like to take myself that seriously. I admit I've been lucky.
I don't like to make the same stupid mistakes more than four times!"
   He's not one to make claims that sobriety is the one and only answer
either. Both being addicted and being straight are "too confining".
   "And it gets boring," he says, "when dealers, are always getting
busted when you jonesing. It's a pain in the ass."
   Recently, Kerrang! reported the rumours sweeping LA that the classic
GN'R line-up - Slash, Axl, guitarist Izzy Stradlin, bassist Duff McKagan
and drummer Steven Adler - were secretly rehearing together in Phoenix.
Slash hasn't seen the story, but he had heard about it.
   "If someone comes up to me and asks me if GN'R is going to get back
together, I say that if it was the original band and if everybody could
straighten their heads out enough to be in the same room to do it, then
I would do one show if the situation was right," he says. "We've been
offered *millions* of dollars to regroup. Originally, I thought, 'Shit!
A couple of days of rehearsal and then go out and play in front of a
really excited, enthusiastic audience? Might be fun'.
   "But when we recorded a Stones song ('Sympathy For The Devil' for the
'Interview With A Vampire' soundtrack), Axl didn't even show up. So
everybody lost interest. If it was the original band, and Steven Adler
could get his shit back together, which I know that he's been trying to
do since time began, since I still talk to him all the time. But, the
chances of that happening are pretty much nil."
   Slash lights another cigarette. Its embers shine brightly in the
darkening night air.
   "I wouldn't quit what I'm doing now to go back to Guns for any amount
of money," he says. "It's not about the money."
   Is it really Guns N' Roses without him in the band?
   He thinks for a moment.
   "I can't answer that. I just wish the fucker would get the fucking
record out so I could see why he took something so cool and
systematically, destroyed it. I want to hear where he was headed, and
what he was trying to communicate that none of us in the band could
relate to."
   Can he pinpoint the exact moment when things went sour between him
and Axl?
   "Yeah," he smiles. "It was before Guns even started! I mean, he's a
brilliant man. I'm a huge Axl fan, but he's got one way of doing things
which I just don't understand."
   Despite the recent rash of press attention devoted to uncovering the
whereabouts of the hermit-like Rose, Slash says that he's ignored much
of the commotion. After all, he says, he's "lived through it". He says
that he devotes his life to his muse and takes everything in moderation.
   "The main goal is to find an even balance," he concludes, "and to not
go too overboard. If you're seriously going to do something with your
time while you're alive, then you should try not to fuck it up by doing
something that you don't totally *need* to be doing."