It's So Easy and Other Lies Page #2

because his name was Slash,

I thought he was probably

a punk rock guy.

An old punk rock guy like me.

And in walked this,

you know, six-foot-plus guy

in a red and black

full-length trench coat.

Hair to the ceiling.

And, like that, I said,

"That's got to be him."

He had this sort of

punk rock thing going, but then he sort of

had the anti-rocks thing going.

Sort of fusion rock-and-roll,

punk kind of deal going on.

"I walked in,

"looked at the first booth on the left

"and saw all this f***ing hair.

"Somehow...

"Somehow, I'd expected these guys

to look like Social Distortion.

"Instead,

"even though they appeared about my age,

"the dudes in Roadcrew had long hair

"and rocker chick girlfriends.

"If the sight of two long-haired rockers

from Hollywood was a shock for me,

"I could hardly imagine

having to talk to them.

"Of course,

"with my short, day-glow blue hair

"and long pimp coat,

"I must have looked like

a Martian to them, too.

"Both parties were a little surprised, and

curious, when we first met face-to-face.

"Slash's long hair, it turned out,

"hid a shy introvert.

"He was cool, though.

"He had a bottle of vodka

stashed under the table.

"Now, he and Steven

"weren't yet 21 either.

"And this was as close

as we could get to a bar.

"We drank vodka and ate bowls

of Canters' Barley Bean Soup.

"And Steven Adler, he was really nice.

"And expressed himself with an infectious,

almost childlike enthusiasm.

"He said,

"'Listen, we're going to be great. Gonna get

the feet stomping and the hands clapping.'

"And he still says that, to this day.

"Gonna get the feet stomping

and the hands clapping."

And then going back to

Slash's house that night,

after we talked at Canters.

And he started playing guitar.

I was like, "What is up with this guy?"

He had a snake, you know,

and then he got the snake out...

"Isn't she? She's such a sweetheart."

I'm like, "It's a snake, dude.

"I don't know about the sweetheart.

And you're playing guitar like that?"

"When I showed up at my

first GN'R rehearsal

"in late March, 1985,

"Axl and I said hi to each other

"and started joking around

about this and that.

"And I liked him right away.

"Whoever was running the sound then

asked Axl to test out the microphone.

"And Axl let out one of his screams,

and it was like nothing I'd ever heard.

"There were two voices

coming out of him at once.

"I suppose there's a name for that

in musicology.

"But all I knew in that instant

"was that this dude was different

"and f***ing powerful

"and f***ing serious.

"And as for Izzy,

"he wasn't from the school

of fancy guitar playing.

"More a Keith Richards,

than an Eddie Van Halen.

"Not only a great songwriter,

"but in my eyes,

"the baddest man walking the planet.

"One night,

"when we were talking after rehearsal,

"Izzy mentioned a band called

The Naughty Women.

"And it rang a bell.

"'I know that band, ' I said.

"Trying to place the name.

"'I think I played a gig

on the same bill with them once.

"'Wait...

"'Izzy, weren't they cross-dressers?'

"'Yep, ' Izzy said.

"'I was the drummer.'

"Finally, Slash and Steven

agreed to come to a rehearsal,

"just days before our

previously scheduled June 6th gig

"at the Troubadour

"that was supposed to serve

as a warm-up for our tour.

"We met at a space in Silverlake.

"We rented it for $6 an hour.

"And that included a drum kit.

"From the moment the five of us

laid into our first song,

"we could all hear and feel

that the fit was right.

"The chemistry was immediate,

thunderous and soulful.

"It was amazing,

and all of us recognised it instantly."

It had to have been some sort of

meant-to-be kind of thing going on.

Because Duff ended up there,

Izzy, Axl, Steven's from Cleveland.

We were the only guys that

could have made up that band.

"We knew

we had to make it on our own.

"And after our Seattle road trip,

"failure was not an option with this crew."

And we were like all really...

Became very tight, very fast.

And we were all f***ing driven and...

Set on this path together, you know?

- It's a very romantic type of story.

- Four months, five months later...

He calls me, he says,

"Come on down, we got signed!

"I just got 20,000 bucks."

And he bought me a plane ticket.

And I went down there,

because they were playing at The Whisky.

And Aerosmith's manager rolls up.

And they got this limousine.

And that's when Duff said,

"Well, you can't come."

Hell, I'm standing on Sunset Strip.

First time I've ever been to L.A.

by myself.

Aerosmith's manager, Tim Collins,

wanted to meet with us.

And I couldn't very well

bring my friend along

for this big meeting.

It's like, well, wait a f***ing minute.

What am I gonna do?

"Well, you know how to get home."

"Here's the key to the apartment.

Just go..."

To the apartment.

Wasn't like I left him in the f***ing dust.

Man, I was pissed off.

First of all,

I wanted to be in the limousine, but...

Second of all,

he f***ing abandoned me. Anyway...

I went and saw them

and I said, wow, that's the spirit.

They're playing from their heart.

We said, let's take these guys on the road.

These guys would be great.

They're just like us. They're coming up.

And let's give them a break.

Ozzy gave us a break.

That particular tour was awesome.

There was two, sort of,

hell-raising bands from Los Angeles.

One that's been successful for a while.

And one that was on the way up.

But we were from that same gritty,

street kind of environment in L.A.

And we knew each other.

So it was just cool.

But yeah, and then it was just like...

It was just like, um...

It just took off like a jet.

"In early August, 1988,

"we were sitting backstage one day

"when some people from our record label

"came in with a sheet cake

"from the local grocery store.

"'Congratulations, ' they said.

"'You're number one.'

"I remember thinking,

"Wow.

"'A f***ing sheet cake.'"

I was like, I got to find this record

by this band, Guns N' Roses.

I didn't know what they

looked like or anything.

And then I saw what they looked like

and I was like,

"Jesus Christ!

"These guys are creeps!

"Who are these f***ers?"

And yeah, the record

definitely changed my life.

I listened to the sh*t out of it.

Growing up in England in the late '80s,

you could do nothing but hear

Guns N' Roses. It was everywhere.

When Appetite came out,

I played it over and over again.

I worked at Aron's Records,

which is no longer there, on Melrose and

the original copy with the original cover

came in and I would always grab one

and put it in the back.

And there were stickers

in it and everything.

And then they changed the cover

and then there's that one.

And then I had the EP. So I loved it.

I learned to play just about

every instrument from that record.

I learned every song on guitar and bass.

I got a crappy drum set.

And I learned to play

drums from that record.

I had this boom box,

you know, next to the kit.

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