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What Do I Have To Say To Get You To Listen To … Guns N’ Roses’ ‘Appetite For Destruction?’
Why this soundtrack to living on the edge NEVER gets old
Oh no … not Guns N’ Roses! Those shaggy-haired rockers from the ‘80s? I simply cannot stand that type of testosterone-drenched, over-produced ‘rawk’ music. And this first album you want me to listen to… from 1987? It must sound laughably dated now. You will never convince me otherwise. Plus I have a train to catch – so this better be good!
Ok, I can see this won’t be easy. So let’s kick right off by saying Appetite For Destruction is one of the greatest rock albums ever made.
There, I said it.
Don’t make me laugh. I cannot see how a load of drink- and drug-addled tearaways with very little – if any – formal musical education can lay claim to creating one of the ‘greatest rock albums.’ It simply defies sense.
Well, in a strange sort of way, you have touched upon what makes this debut album so good.
It is largely because it possesses one of the great, fundamental, indefinable things found in amazing music. It’s that secret “X” ingredient that’s impossible to conjure: Magic.
Magic?
Yep. No other word will do. There’s just something about Appetite For Destruction that’s so visceral, so uncompromising, so self-assured, and just so darn melodic … it ticks ALL the boxes.
Go on …
And you are correct, up to a point, how the sum of Guns N’ Roses’ parts — namely excess drink, drugs, wild, chaotic lifestyles — should mathematically add up to nothing more than an appetite for self-destruction.
But miraculously, it doesn’t.
The fact that this pack of underdogs absolutely smashes it out of the park is testament to the band’s very real and enviable natural chemistry.
Appetite For Destruction is a thrilling blend of the hard-rockin’ riffs of Aerosmith, the swagger of the Rolling Stones, the glam of T-Rex, and the attitude of punk outfits like the Sex Pistols and The Misfits. All in all, a pretty heady brew.
