The crowdsourced journalism of Twitter brings this situation to light, as do the attendant twitpics. The situation rendered in a lower light, those twitpics, but at least cameraphones are kind to Axl’s bloat — it is fashion week after all. (Update: Twitpic swapped for that photo that came in by Patrick McMullen.) This secret show went down at a Varvatos and L’Uomo Vogue afterparty, after a publicly billed set from Alberta Cross, who were really just a ruse/opener and now have a story to tell their moms about Fashion Week. Sure, there’s some unintentionally sad poetry to it all — at the John Varvatos store, built on the site of the once glorious CBGB, hosting “Guns N’ Roses,” also self-consciously built on a rusted foundation. But whatever Chinese Democracy and the band’s various spaghetti incidents did to your post-Illusion impression of them, this 17 song setlist is mostly great (so, mostly old), and doing it karaoke style and singing every word with Axl and his GN’R cover band would have offered a unique brand of stupid fun.
We have the setlist and some video, but there’s another Axl note worth noting: Despite being dispelled, rumors that Rose had banned all Slash-related merch and shirts from GN’R shows persisted online to the point that he took to the internet and lashed out. His tirade reads like alternate lyrics to “Get In The Ring,” so you should read it:
What the fuck do you know? That’s right! You don’t know jack fucking shit you fucking ignorant, know it all, fucking deluded, misguided, self important, self righteous, pious, small minded, clueless, loud mouthed, arrogant cunt. You’re not a fan or a voice of reason… you’re a sick n’ diseased mind spilling it’s bile over the internet.
Axl posted that as username Dexter (a handle he’s used before) to the MyGNRForum (via RockDaily). Read the whole thing here.
OK. Last night’s setlist:
01 “You’re Crazy”
02 “Mr. Brownstone”
03 “I Used to Love Her”
04 “Welcome To The Jungle”
05 “Street Of Dreams (The Blues)”
06 “Sorry”
07 “It’s So Easy”
08 Band intros –> “Patience”
09 “Rocket Queen”
10 jam –> “Catcher In The Rye”
11 “My Michelle”
12 “Knockin’ On Heaven’s Door”
13 “Whole Lotta Rosie” (AC/DC cover)
14 “Paradise City”
—-
15 “Sweet Child O’ Mine”
16 “This I Love”
17 “Night Train”
Via press release, the band’s lineup was “DJ Ashba, Ron Thal and Richard Fortus, bassist Tommy Stinson, keyboardists Dizzy Reed and Chris Pitman and drummer Frank Ferrer.” Setlist via BV, as is this video, which we’ll update with more of its kind if/when they pop.
Looks exactly like when the real GN’R did the real CBGB in ’88, rrrriiiggghhhttt?
Totally.
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The audio in this clip is lousy, but it sounds like he is completely nailing these vocals. I saw them in ’06 or ’07, and while his look was kinda WWE Raw, he sounded great then too, like actually better than he sounded through most of the 90′s. It’s just a shame that he and the original band hate each other more than they love making bushels of money. Oh well, that leaves only 9 million other great bands to go see.
Guns n’ Roses looked like a bunch of amateurs compared to Alberta Cross last night. It was the first time I’ve ever heard of Alberta Cross and they crushed it-great live band!
I’ll second that, Alberta Cross killed it last night!
Pleasantly surprised by all the Alberta Cross comments but I have to agree–they were killin’ it! Not trying to be a Guns n Roses hater, but I would take something like Alberta Cross (fresh, new, great rock and roll) over them any day.
what says fashion more than Axl Roses corn rows?
Where is the photo credit? Who took the photo?
Patrick McMullen, as noted in the post.
FUCK john vavrvatos. How embarassing to have a store there now. I think its perfect that GNR played there. Lame as hell.
Er.. do you even know who John Varvatos is? If anyone is going to have a retail store in the old CBGB it should be him.
not that i really give a shit about GnR these days but a “Rocket Queen” live is dope…
The after party band was also kick ass…band name Midnight Spin…just checked out their myspace (www.midnightspin.com) and they are definitely worth a listen.
Yeah, geez, when is Chinese Democracy going to come out already? What a joke.
stupidfuckers,axl knows better why avoid you suckers. he plays in canada, southamerica, europe. you just cant understand one simple thing. the past is the past. enjoy the present, carpe diem.you spend alot of energy to cry and cry and fuckin cry fosr slash(who feat fergie now) i’m sick of you all.
please, no more guns talk. there has come and thankfully gone. if your feeling nostalgic check some real 8t’s music- XTC “oranges and lemons”, dinosaur (jr) “you’re living all over me”, the smiths “the queen is dead”, rem “lifes rich pagent”, my bloody valentine “isn’t anything”.. and the list goes on..