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D, the spouse of my office spouse and I saw Guns ‘n Roses at the Warfield last night, or rather, Axl Rose n’ friends, as well as Sebastian Bach of Skid Row. Our respective spouses were kind of like "um, yeah, you guys have fun." Not that they are haters of G’nR, but they didn’t think it was worth 60 bucks & a weeknight bender.
Show sold out in less than a day. As the day drew closer D and I kept making jokes about how the band hadn’t broken up yet, or no one has OD’ed yet, and we were actually going to see them.
Finally, despite my illness (killer cold) I was hell bent on seeing the man, Axl Rose, whose posters once were plastered all over my bedroom. 6:30 D left his respectable banking empire. I fled being anyone’s therapist or supervisor, put on the skull and crossbones tee I bought in New Orleans (pre-Katrina), throw on boots and cuff -and off to meet D at Virgin Megastore.
Sebastian was due to go on at 8pm, doors open at 7. After dinner at Plouf we saunter to Warfield and braved the jungle of meth addicts, homeless, porno shops lost tourists, etc. as we edge to the Tenderloin. I wonder if we will be late but D doesn’t really care about seeing Sebastian, plus he said "given who we’re dealing with -we’ll be lucky if anything goes on time".
It’s now 8:45 and hundreds of irate black-T-shirt wearing aged rockers or former rockers (uhm. like myself I guess) are queued in the street. Some dude is leading a group chanting "this is bullshit! this is bullshit…" while another voice calls out "what do U think you’re accomplishing!?".
D & I now need to accomplish the location of an acceptable loo. But the ones near Warfield include Crazy Horse or Donut Star, where you take your life in your hands just walking in the slimy door.
We hoof it back to tourist land in Union Square and wind up taking the elevator to Cheescake factory. We debate how sissy it is to eat cheesecake at a Gn’R show. I feel it’s like eating caesar salad and sushi while watching a ball game. Lame, but everyone does it now. After much perusal, we buy a slice of Key Lime cheesecake. I call P to inform him that the show is like 2 hrs late. Don’t wait up.
Back to Warfield, people are surging inside and Sebastian is singing and hollering his heart out onstage already. D is forbidden from bringing in our Cheesecake, and winds up gifting a group of homeless folks outside with the fancy $7 slice, and they seem quite happy.
Finally now, the show.
I’ve never been in the seats at Warfield-normally only the main floor. I must say that from the distance where we sat, Sebastian is still looking pretty damn good in his leather pants and vest and shampoo-model hair. Ya figure the guys gotta be pushing 40. Songs like "18 and life" " I remember you" and of course "youth gone wild" bring me back to being like 16 and playing that Skid Row tape (yes, an audio cassette tape) in my parents’ house back in Cupertino. He sounds good but screams so much I wonder how he manages to keep his voice. The dialogue is peppered by lots of F words and comments about all the pot the crowd is smoking, and a brief chorus of "When the lights go down in the city…" for the benefit of the San Franciscans. He also talks a lot about the show on Vh1 he is on with freakin’ Ted Nugent.
During the show among the hands grabbing him, someone passes something up to the stage and it’s…a toddler. D and I look upon this w/raised eyebrows as the tiny little boy with shiny blonde hair is grabbed onstage, and then Sebastian puts the kid up on his shoulders continueing to sing and walk about the stage. He manages not to drop the baby, and the show goes on.
By 11:00-Gn’R fans are plenty restless. The house lights go out, those familiar chords radiate out…it’s Welcome to the Jungle and the crowd goes bonkers. The pyrotechnics are a lot of fun too-showers of sparks, exploding flames, and if we don’t all die in a fire in here then this is awesome!
The night is punctuated by old favorites that bring back memories and have us all rocking out. What a cool show! Sweet Child ‘O Mine, You Could be Mine, My Michelle, Mr. Brownstone". They bust out the full grand piano for November Rain.
But then-
there are the random moments. Like, between each set Axl goes off stage left and dissapears.
So…his band has these long jam sessions. Which is cool. Until like the 4th or 5th one. And the show which was set to end at maybe 10:30 is now running past midnight.
At one point 2 very excellent guitarists are jamming and wailing for many minutes before I realize that these rock stars are playing an electric guitar rendition of Christina Aguilera’s "Beautiful". WTF!?
And Axl’s mike fades out often, and Axl’s voice sad to say, sorta fades out often too. At one point he brings Sebastian out onstage with him-and it’s undeniable that while Axl is the big rock star everyone came to see; Sebastian’s voice is far stronger. (and for god’s sake Sebastian is not wearing corn rows). Axl also shares that he was kicked out of a restaurant earlier that night for refusing to button his shirt.
After 3 shirt changes and a lot of random moments punctuated by rock n’ roll bliss and snapshots of greatness-D and I have to bail. We keep sticking it out waiting for Paradise City, but the last BART is loooong gone, and Dave’s car is in a garage that closes at 1:00. Having no desire to take a transbay bus through Oakland at 2 am, we make a dash out of Warfield at about 12:53 & barely make it out of garage before closing ($50 re-opening fee for those who don’t make it).
So I don’t know if he did finally sing Paradise CIty last night. Rather, this morning.
D says he missed Paradise City the last time he saw G’nR as well since Axl stomped off the stage in a huff that night years ago and never came back.
Somehow, the chaos is appropriate to the show-more authentic even. They are headed to Fresno next and then Oakland Arena in Dec.
I got over my Axl Rose fixation many years ago but never got over the music (Welcome to the Jungle is on my "angryrun" playlist for running) or being partial to leather pants…
Hell, I think it’s pretty cool that these guys can still make a living as rockers for like 20 years. Their fans were kinda paunchy (not D and I of course) but as wildy enthusiastic as ever.
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