2016.08.03 - AT&T Stadium, Arlington, TX, USA

Preston Jones wrote:AT&T Stadium preps for Guns N’ Roses

ARLINGTON

For its first performance with the original lineup in North Texas in more than 20 years, Guns N’ Roses is not thinking small.

Workers clambered all around the enormous stage, situated in AT&T Stadium’s western end zone Tuesday, putting the finishing touches on a three-day process that will culminate with the Axl Rose-led rock band’s “Not in This Lifetime” tour stop at the venue Wednesday.

During a brief press conference, just a few yards from workers testing video panels and adjusting confetti cannons, tour production manager Dale “Opie” Skjerseth told reporters “everything’s been running smooth and the band’s excited.”

“It’s a fantastic show,” Skjerseth said, “with video, pyrotechnics], the band, the music everybody thrived on — the show will be fantastic: two hours and 45 minutes of rock and roll.”

The band, which features Rose reunited with founding guitarists Slash and Duff McKagan as well as veteran keyboard player Dizzy Reed, had a hand in designing the stage, which requires 16 trucks to transport between venues (after the Arlington stop, the Guns N’ Roses tour heads to San Francisco’s AT&T Park on Aug. 9).

The production elements are conveyed on 20 trucks, with about 25 local workers complementing the 25 crew members tasked with pulling everything together.

“It’s the age of technology now,” Skjerseth said. “There’s video throughout the set [and] just the way the show moves and presents itself, it’s fantastic.”

There will be one piece of technology in the vast building that will not be in use Wednesday: AT&T Stadium’s enormous video screen.

Skjerseth said the band did not want the screen turned on, as it would be a potentially dangerous and brightly lit distraction for them.

“Basically you’re watching yourself and it’s not a good thing,” Skjerseth said. “You never know, they could be watching it and fall off the edge of the stage. That’s a reason a lot of bands won’t turn it on.”

Wednesday’s performance will be the original lineup’s first appearance in North Texas since an impressive bill at Texas Stadium in September 1992, which featured Metallica and Faith No More as opening acts.

Of Guns N’ Roses’ showing then, former Star-Telegram music critic Dave Ferman wrote: “Rose and company turned in very good renditions of many of their best-known songs. … The set also suffered from Rose’s frayed vocal cords and too many self-indulgent solos.”

In an amusing case of history somewhat repeating, Rose is again fresh from mending a broken foot, which left him confined to a chair onstage at the beginning of the tour.

But not to worry, Skjerseth said — Axl Rose is all healed and ready to take fans back to Paradise City: “Axl’s doing great. He’s mobile. Everything that needs to be done physically on stage, he can do and more.”

Preston Jones wrote:Guns N’ Roses brings concert of a ‘Lifetime’ to AT&T Stadium

ARLINGTON

The eyes still have it.

If every other aspect of Guns N’ Roses’ performance at AT&T Stadium on Wednesday felt comparatively safe, you only needed to look into Axl Rose’s eyes — glittering, with a hint of madness dancing behind his pupils — to understand the unhinged force of nature this influential band was and, arguably, still is.

The 54-year-old Rose also remains utterly magnetic — the loudly enthusiastic crowd (an eyeball estimate put its number at around 35,000 or so) was locked on his every move — and transfixing in a way too few rock frontmen are in the 21st century. He’s like a cobra, coiled and waiting to strike.

The purists will haggle over which line-up represents the true, vital core of Guns N’ Roses, but for those who book tours and pay what has to be several millions of dollars to put on these shows, the men (and woman) standing on stage in Arlington represent the “classic” GNR line-up: Rose, reunited with guitarist Slash and bassist Duff McKagan after a nearly 25-year estrangement, alongside more recent members like Frank Ferrer, Richard Fortus, Dizzy Reed and Melissa Reese. (Izzy Stradlin and Steven Adler are MIA for this particular reunion, which marked the “original” line-up’s first North Texas appearance since the fall of 1992.)

For more than two and a half hours, the seven musicians on stage diligently worked through GNR’s multi-platinum catalog, touching on all phases of the rock band’s career, from 1987’s breakout Appetite for Destruction through the two-part Use Your Illusion opus — even 2008’s wildly uneven Chinese Democracy got a moment in the spotlight.

Spread out on a vast stage tucked into an end zone, with attendant pyrotechnics and rather modest video screens (modest being a relative term: the images were several stories high), Guns N’ Roses never seemed to really enjoy its time before the adoring audience.

There was a grim detachment evident, as Slash muscled through one dazzling solo after another, or as Rose carved startling nuance out of a lyric, veering from a whisper to a roar. (The two men were rarely near each other, performing yards apart.) Perhaps the band is merely confident in its abilities, and doesn’t need to pretend it’s great to be playing together again — with no new album to support, this arena run around the world is purely a mercenary exercise, as evidenced by the staggering price tags at the merch table.

Or, as likely, the “Not in This Lifetime” tour is meant to rehab GNR’s reputation and burnish its legacy.

Rock lore is rich with tales of GNR’s wanton hedonism and wildly unprofessional behavior at the apex of its career, and in a way, the current tour seems like Rose and his collaborators reclaiming their pride: Guns N’ Roses can be a relevant, reliable rock band, professional if not necessarily punctual (Wednesday’s show began a half hour after its scheduled start time).

Sleek has supplanted seedy, and bruising recklessness has been replaced with cordial politeness: “So, how do you like to be addressed here? As Dallas or as Arlington?” Rose inquired, as Wednesday turned into Thursday. “I’m just askin’!” (Hard to imagine snarling young Axl really giving much of a crap about where he was, never mind what its residents preferred to be called.)

The shift is surprising, but eased somewhat by the relentless nostalgia bath, whether it was the epic opening chords of Sweet Child o’ Mine, or the grand, wounded heart climax of November Rain, the raw ugliness of Mr. Brownstone or the amphetamine rush of Rocket Queen.

Rose was in mostly fine voice throughout — the stadium seemed to swallow his more delicate phrasing, but when he unleashed his signature roar, it could probably be heard all the way to Waco — and the band was airtight throughout, whether it was Ferrer’s thunderous timekeeping, Reed’s tasteful playing or Slash’s fretboard fireworks (his one-two punch of Nino Rota’s Godfather theme and the extended climax of Eric Clapton’s Layla was as impressive as any of the GNR riffs).

Guns N’ Roses, for a night at least, proved why it has endured through all the tumult of the last quarter century.

In those moments, when the music matched the flash in Axl Rose’s eyes, the years fell away, and the safe, yawning expanse of a football stadium felt dirty, dangerous and thrilling.

Kevin Curtin wrote:
Guns n' Roses’ Texas-Sized Reunion
You know where you are? You’re in Jerry World baby. You’re gonna die!

Don’t overlook the symbolism of that red flannel shirt knotted around the waistline of Axl Rose. For the mercurial frontman, the accessory hangs symbolic of his commitment to the Guns n’ Roses fan base.

Of course the most important baggage he’s unpacked for the 36-date Not in This Lifetime Tour is core members Slash and Duff McKagan, who previously hadn’t shared a stage with Rose since 1993. Call it a nostalgia trip, but don’t overlook the masses' desire to hear songs played by the people who wrote them. This reunion – and the flannel nod to the onetime Hollywood quintet’s mid-Eighties ascension – is about giving people what they want.

Younger baby boomers and older Gen X-ers, many dressed in top-hatted tribute to Slash, filled Texas’ largest sports arena, Arlington’s AT&T Stadium – better known as “Jerry World” – on Wednesday for an improbably satisfying concert. Hard rock radio hits were punctuated by pyrotechnic blasts rather than any hint of interpersonal acrimony between bandmates. Oil money filling the stands helped grease the evening’s wheels.

In the two and a half hours between middle-finger opener “It’s So Easy” and encore-capping sing-along “Paradise City,” the frontman donned seven T-shirts, five hats, two flannels, three jackets, and half of one glove – all carefully designed to make him look like the Axl Rose of yesteryear. No atrocious red facial hair, cornrows, or blinding yellow suits crept onto the comparably fit rock star, who got his cardio workout by sprinting, snaking, and tossing around his purple mic stand to early set highlights “Mr. Brownstone” and “Welcome to the Jungle.”

Better still, his banshee howl has held up beyond expectation. A torrential shriek into his red-poof-ball microphone on the Paul McCartney-penned “Live & Let Die” brought down the house. Later, his machine gun prosody on “You Could Be Mine” and passionate delivery of highlight “Civil War” demonstrated that the 54-year-old Indiana native remains an inhuman vocalist.

His bandmates got no shortage of the spotlight, either.

Slash, wielding his trademark Les Paul Goldtop, dazzled with a coruscating solo on “Double Talkin’ Jive,” then played guitar hero on a ridiculously melodic instrumental variation of Pink Floyd’s “Wish You Were Here.” Bassist McKagan, who looks like he drinks from the fountain of youth (probably health smoothies), overtook lead vocals on a cover of the Misfits’ “Attitude.”

Of the lesser-known members, Chinese Democracy axe man Richard Fortus may look the part of an Izzy Stradlin stand-in, but proved a phenomenal lead guitarist, stealing major moments on Wednesday, including a jaw-dropping solo on “It Doesn’t Really Matter.” G'N'R loyalist since 1990, Dizzy Reed and more recent addition Melissa Reese – who wears the second most makeup in the band... – both contributed keys and backing vocals. Drummer Frank Ferrer made everyone forget the name of Matt Sorum.

The midweek tour stopover wasn’t all roses, however. The set suffered from a flatlined version of Use Your Illusion 1 skipper “Coma” and several instances of overindulgence: Slash’s Frampton-esque talk box solo on “Rocket Queen” and the inclusion of excruciating piano ballad “This I Love,” one of three songs pulled from Axl’s rogue LP Chinese Democracy.

While the band began 30 minutes late, leaving the crowd wishing openers the Cult had played longer (Skrillex opens tonight’s Houston concert), a dangerously safe vibe looms over the Not in This Lifetime Tour, like every measure has been taken to make sure that things run smoothly and Axl doesn’t say the wrong thing. Yet caution doesn’t suit Rose and, for most of the show, he seemed emotionally tentative, lacking the fire-eyed egomania that he wears so well. Only at the end, when the band turned a corner via an epic crowd-participation version of “Knockin’ on Heaven’s Door” and drunken “Nightrain,” did the singer – by then dressed like Yosemite Sam in a gigantic cowboy hat – appear loose and in his element.

He then thrived in bonus time, finding his groove on ultimate highlight “Patience” and spirited Who cover “The Seeker.” When Slash’s guitar fell out of tune, Rose joked that it was his fault (“I put that in a special tuning for you”). At the end of stadium-made closer “Paradise City,” a confetti cannon covered the football coliseum’s enormous interior with red and white confetti as the band soaked in a Texas-sized send-off.

Crowd flowing out afterward, through halls decorated with old photographs of the city’s football heroes, a drunk man in a Dallas Cowboys shirt lost his composure.

“Fuck you, Jerry!” he slurred loudly with tears in his eyes, referencing the Cowboys’ billionaire owner Jerry Jones, as his friends tried to keep him upright. “Where’s our Super Bowl, Jerry? Where’s our fucking Super Bowl?”

That was the takeaway: No matter how much money you throw at something, you can’t always get what you want in life – unless you’re a fan of Guns n’ Roses in 2016.