Various Artists - A Millennium Tribute To Guns N’ Roses
Mascot Records

file under hardrock / aor

Richard V.: 177 months after the release of the ‘Use Your Illusion’ albums, we are still waiting for the new studio album of Axl and his new pals. During that long period more Guns N’ Roses tribute albums have been released than GNR originals will ever see the light of day. ‘It’s So Easy - A Millennium Tribute To Guns N’Roses’ is yet another tribute. Richard Kendrick co-ordinated this project and recruited a handful of familiar names like Tracii Guns (one of the founders of GNR), Gilby Clarke (also ex GNR), Jizzy Pearl and Phil Lewis. The remainder of the musicians are less known, almost all played in a famous band on a blue Monday, but I am not going to bore you with names and details.

Does this tribute album add anything to the original versions? The answer is no. The seven songs from ‘Appetite For Destruction’, three from ‘Use Your Illusion’ and ‘Patience’ hardly differ from the originals and never surpass the GNR versions. That of course is no surprise as ‘Appetite For Destruction’ is one of the best debuts ever and the third best selling hard rock album of all time (after Led Zeppelin IV and ‘Back In Black’). The one song we have to mention is ‘Patience’ that is sung very well by Jasy Andrews, a woman I have never heard of before.

The last few years (too) many tribute albums have been released. Most of them add nothing to the original versions, but as soon as bands alter, intensify, speed up or do a totally different take on a familiar song, matters tend to get interesting. Country versions of Kiss and Metallica song were funny and the blue grass takes on Van Halen classics were also quite enjoyable. To simply copy the original has been done too many times, certainly with the really big bands in the genre.

We keep waiting for ‘Chinese Democracy.’ Month 178 and counting…

No score