2022.06.15 - The First 50 Gigs - Episode 8: The Appetite for Destruction Lineup is Born

We pick things up after Tracii and Rob leave Guns N’ Roses and the revolving door of band members spins for the final time. Slash and Steven agree to join Guns N' Roses and hit the road for the Northwest Tour that Duff planned but need to quickly get up to speed on the set list for an upcoming show at the Troubadour -- the Appetite lineup's first gig as a band that featured Axl, Izzy, Duff, Slash and Steven.

In this episode you’ll:
Hear Marc Canter's first-hand account of this crucial lineup change and how it all came together.
Hear about Slash and Steven joining Guns N’ Roses and quickly preparing for the Troubadour gig and the Northwest tour (aka the Shakeout Tour/Hell Tour).
Listen to Duff and Slash describe the Appetite lineup coming together and rehearsing for the first time.
Listen to Marc’s experience photographing and recording the band at their first gig as the Appetite lineup.

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Transcript:

Jason Porath: So let's talk about the night of that Troubadour show.

Marc Canter: All five of them held their own as far as stage presence. Whatever I looked at with the camera, I pulled the trigger.

JP: Welcome back to the first 50 gigs, Guns N' Roses, and the making of Appetite for Destruction. I'm Jason Porath. I'm your host today. So, Marc, welcome back.

MC: Hey, guys.

JP: As you know, we're here to talk about the final stop of the incestuous revolving doors that spun for the last couple years since you started following Slash. In and out of different bands, we covered Rose, Hollywood Rose, the new Hollywood Rose. We covered Roadcrew, we covered Tidus Sloan, we covered LA Guns, and we covered the original Guns N' Roses. And we talked a little bit about London, so there's a lot of bands that these guys were in and out of, but that revolving door now stops at the Appetite lineup of Guns N' Roses. And we got here because Tracii and Rob dropped out. Duff had scheduled this Shake Out tour to Seattle, and Tracii decided he didn't wanna go. Because Tracii and Rob were a team, I think Rob felt compelled to follow Tracii out of the band, despite the other band members like Axl and Izzy and Duff trying to keep him in. But he leaves and then they need to quickly find a guitarist and a drummer because they've got a show at the Troubadour and they're going to go to do this Northwest tour. So what happens? You know, who thought of Slash and Steven? How did this unfold?

MC: Well, I know that Slash was working at Tower Video where Axl once worked before that, but was no longer working there. But they knew where to find Slash and I think that's pretty much what happened. Axl and Izzy probably went to his work at Tower Video and mentioned the fact that they got a gig booked at the Troubadour and they got this little Northwest Tour booked and Tracii's out, you want in. And Slash had just joined Black Sheep. So not that he was happy in Black Sheep, but he was just joined literally two weeks before that. And that was their first gig. They were just about getting ready to do their first gig, like probably that day. It was a decision Slash had to make. Believe it or not, as much as I loved that lineup to be together, I didn't think it would hold. And I, you know, I just, because I'd seen it and they worked great together, musically, there's always things that make that made it fall apart between them. And I just didn't think it was steady. But the only difference is this time is you had Izzy where last time Izzy really wasn't involved. So that could help things a little bit. But obviously Slash made the right decision, quit Black Sheep, joined up with them. And, you know, five, four or five days later, they had their first gig.

JP: And Slash had a history already with Axl, not necessarily with Izzy, and that didn't work out very well. So he had this gig with Black Sheep, and you thought that was more of a sure thing that he could hang on to. But that going to Guns N' Roses with Axl would just result in them breaking up once again, which was predictable given the history that we just came through.

MC: It was very predictable, except for one thing. Slash knew that Izzy was a player, someone that could really help out in many ways. And last time Izzy was gone, just as Slash joined in, Izzy was out. So this time was a little different. And, you know, obviously they knew each other's talents and they knew they were the right fit, the right pieces for them to make that puzzle good. So, you know, it sounded really good on paper. I just didn't know how if it lasts more than three months. That was my only issue. And Black Sheep was a band that might have been signed and it might have had a record deal. And so I didn't think Slash would last in Black Sheep either actually, but I thought it was a better stepping stone, that he'd get recognized. And somebody would pull him out to go to the next level.

JP: Are you telling us that Slash actually came to you for advice after he got invited into Guns N' Roses?

MC: He didn't come for advice, but I think I gave the advice.

JP: Okay.

MC: I think maybe there was a conversation, I don't remember exactly, but he was on the fence that it's not like he made the decision. He didn't make the decision in one second. OK, I'm in. I'm out. Forget Black Sheep. I'm back with these guys. He had briefly worked with Duff in Roadcrew for about a week. And so Duff was cool. You know, we know Axl's good and he wanted to work with Izzy. So his heart was in there. His heart was in there.

JP: But the important thing is that, you know, Axl, Izzy and Duff probably unanimously wanted to go with Slash as the guitarist. It sounded like they hadn't made a decision around the drummer. Maybe they were holding auditions quickly. But Steven came along for the ride, probably because Slash brought him in. And initially, from what we've read, you know, he was he was there to fill in. But at some point, he really wanted to stay and he convinced the others that, you know, he was the guy.

MC: I don't remember him trying out, you know, just hanging around until they find somebody else. I just knew that when Slash was in, so was Steven. They seemed to me like they both came at the same time. But I kind of recall Steven telling this story that Steven was in before Slash. So it's hard. I don't know.

JP: We're left to speculate here. The important thing is that Tracii and Rob dropped out. Slash and Steven came in. And now you have the Appetite lineup of Guns N' Roses, but not solidified at all. This was just the latest incarnation of, you know, the switching up of band players, but not necessarily, it wasn't necessarily like because these five guys now got together in this incarnation of Guns N' Roses, which used to be L.A. Guns, which used to be Hollywood Rose, didn't mean that they were going to stay together.

MC: Well, there's a couple of things, obviously, that made this solidified, but I think the very first piece of this, the very first piece to make it work was Izzy and Duff have to get the credit for hiding one of Steven's bass drums because that changed the dynamic completely. And you know, I know Duff said it was first few notes, it was like lightning hit the place or whatever, but I believe it because when I saw that band at June 6th, the Troubadour for the first time, I didn't go to the rehearsals or there might've only been one rehearsal. To me, yeah, that's what happened. Lightning hit the place. Everybody was doing everything right. Everybody was playing their part right and it seemed like they were together for months. If Steven was still playing double bass drums, it wouldn't have been as good. It would have been completely different.

JP: After Steven and Slash came into the fold, they had one rehearsal before the Troubadour show. Now this Troubadour show was already scheduled. The flyers were already printed. And those flyers had Rob and Tracii in them as the band members, not Slash and Steven. But they did rehearse right before that at a studio in Silver Lake. And both Slash and Duff, who we interviewed, had some great things to say about that rehearsal. So let's hear from them.

Slash: Eventually, Guns N' Roses was formed out of the combination of the people from Hollywood Rose, which was Izzy and Axl's band, and LA Guns, which was Tracii's group and that sort of came together and they called it Guns N' Roses. And Axl had a falling out with Tracii and came to me and said if I wanted to do it. And at that point, Steven wasn't in the picture. They had this guy named Rob Gardner playing drums. So it was Duff, Izzy, Axl and myself and we set out to do this Northwest tour. You know, Seattle and Oregon and all that. And when that became a reality. I mean we're talking about like a conversation that took up a couple days and all of a sudden we were going, you know. And Rob couldn't cut it. He was scared to go. So I called Steven and Steven came down and we had one day of rehearsal and it really was like a synergy that happened that was just basically like it was like we've been playing together for years. And we had maybe two or three rehearsals, I think, and packed up an Oldsmobile and a U-Haul and set off for Seattle.

Duff: And Izzy and Axl and I were just like, yeah, let's do it, let's go on the road, let's do this thing. And this is nothing against Tracii or Rob, but they were more concerned with where we were gonna stay, how we were gonna get there. And Izzy and Axl and myself just didn't care. That's not, it didn't matter, let's get to the gig. Let's do the gigs. So Tracii and Rob said, no, we don't want to do that. They got scared at the 11th hour. And as I remember, that's when we called Slash and Steven. And they came into that rehearsal place, not Nicky Beats, but another one in Silver Lake. Steven came in with all his drums. Izzy and I hid a bunch of them in the next room, told the owner guy at the studio, don't let Steven in. And we rehearsed. The first few chords with the five of us, it was like lightning hit the place. Everybody could feel it. This was it. First time in our... We've all been in a bunch of bands, bunch of different lineups of those bands. It wasn't until these five guys. That day was probably the most important day of the five of ours lives. You know, as players, as musicians, you know, definitely it ranks up there because that's when we all knew it was solidified. This was the best band that any of us had come close to being in, and it was because it was the five different guys.

JP: Both Slash and Steven literally said the same thing. They said it was like lightning hit the room. So there was something that clicked that they all recognized was there. And then they go and they play this Troubadour show, which you shot. You knew about this ahead of time, I guess, Slash let you know that you should come and shoot the first show of this new incarnation of Guns N' Roses. So you showed up with your camera. I remember you telling me that you brought four rolls of film. But you also recorded this. Can you tell us about the experience leading up to this first show? Did you think it was going to be anything different than anything else? Was there anything special about it or you were just showing up like every other show that Slash had played?

MC: Well, both. I mean, I knew everyone in the band. And to me, it was just a new incarnation of Hollywood Rose. It was Hollywood Rose with Duff and now Izzy, which Izzy's supposed to be in Hollywood Rose anyways, but we never got, when Slash was in Hollywood Rose, Izzy was out. So it's basically Hollywood Rose with a cherry on top, because you got Duff and you got Izzy, and you're missing one of Steven's bass drums. So you got, everything's just a little different. They got, you know, Don't Cry is the new song that was put together for that gig plus a handful of other songs that they had that I knew about from the past. But to hear Don't Cry that night, the way the guitar solo just fit in, it sounded just like it did on the record actually later on. Whatever Slash ripped out worked and he kept it. You got to hear four or five registers of Axl's voice in that song. And so everyone knew that new Axl that he could sing, of course. But that was just like hitting the nail right on the head. I mean, that one was a home run. And so you just knew that this is a great band and only good is gonna come from this. Whatever songs they end up putting together from that point on are gonna be great.

JP: Yeah, so how did Slash and Steven learn the songs in one rehearsal and then show up to the Troubadour and play? Is that because they had played these songs throughout these various bands prior to that?

MC: Yes, all the songs played at that first gig, other than Don't Cry, were all songs that Slash and Steven had played in Hollywood Rose.

JP: Yeah, I've actually got the set list right here. It looks like it's Reckless, Shadow of Your Love, Think About You, Move to the City, Don't Cry, Nice Boys, Don't Play Rock and Roll, Back Off Bitch, and Anything Goes.

MC: Think About You is a song that Slash and Steven were not familiar with, and Move to the City was another song that they were not familiar with. So there, they actually, there's three songs that they had to learn in that week. The rest of them they had, they'd known from Hollywood Rose past. So yeah, in one week they learned those three songs, plus, you know, got tight on the rest of the set. They also had, you know, Jumpin' Jack Flash and Nice Boys in there. Jumpin' Jack Flash was not a song that Hollywood Rose had played before. So that was also a new one. Although, they had to learn it. It was, you know, Jumpin' Jack Flash is a song you've heard all your life. So it's not like that hard to do. But they certainly pulled it off in that in those four or five days, you know, that's Slash and Steven had joined the band. And as far as I know, they only had one rehearsal.

JP: Yeah, they didn't have much time. They only had a few days before the Troubadour show. So they didn't they didn't really have a lot of time. So let's talk about the night of that Troubadour show. What sticks out for you, arriving there, you've got your camera, your gear. Had you recorded shows before, you came prepared with a cassette tape recorder and the night kicks off. Why don't you tell us just about the beginning of that?

MC: Well, I used to put my recorder in my jacket side pocket and I had a little microphone. I'd bring it through the arm and stick it on my watch so I can catch, you know, so it's a better recording.

JP: Was that to hide it from the bouncers? Did you have to hide the fact that you were recording it?

MC: No, I mean, I don't know if they'd let you record it or not, but probably they don't. But it was not a matter to hide it. It's a matter of I don't. Where am I going? I'm shooting the show. I can't hold it. I got to put it somewhere. If I stick it in my pocket without a little microphone in it, it's going to get muffled. You know, you're going to hear the pocket muffler or whatever. So the microphone gives you audience sound. Just so happens that night, there was a problem with the mic and I think it came out a little bit. It didn't go in all the way in the recorder. And so most of it was muffled until I figured it out. Maybe at some point I went to see if I needed to turn the tape over, you know, and that's probably when I saw that the microphone wasn't in properly. So I have the show, the whole show, but a lot of it didn't sound really well, really great.

JP: The jack separated from the attachment of the microphone and so then it defaulted to the device's microphone, which was buried in your jacket, which then resulted in this muffled sound. And right, and I've heard this show, this is a show that I'm sure every fan wants to hear. And it's tough, it's muffled, but there's some stuff that's salvageable from it.

MC: Not only that, what I did was I made the tape from one tape to another later trying to fix it. And you know, you could put the recording levels up. I put them up all the way because it was so quiet that you couldn't hear it at all. So what I did by doing that, you could hear it better, but it's even more noisier because it's just you've amplified the muffle. So it's just more muffle, but at least you hear the music. But forget about what the tape recorder heard. I know what I heard. And what I heard was hitting the hammer right on the nail. Axl was clean and perfect and you could hear the band members, the mix, the sound man, everybody did everybody did their job. The guitar solos were you know just insane. Like I said, all of a sudden they're playing Don't Cry, a song I never heard and then Slash just rips into this guitar solo. It's the same one we all know now and so it's clean you know it's it was just you know perfect perfect.

JP: So you had a lightning kind of strike moment yourself when watching these five guys?

MC: Yeah, and not only that, all five of them held their own as far as stage presence. Whatever I looked at with the camera, I pulled the trigger. The thing with when you're shooting a show, you'll look sometimes and you don't pull the trigger because it's not something that it just doesn't grab you. So you look for something else to do. Then you try to frame two people in one photo. Maybe that will do it because it's not working any other way. That night, I went back and I shot individual photos of everybody. So I got just Izzy, just Duff, just Axl, just Slash- Of course I'm always gonna get Slash, I grew up with Slash. So I'm more partial to getting more Slash than anyone else just because that's just my nature. But it was good, energy was coming off of all of them from all angles. So whatever you did, wherever you looked, you were getting something good.

JP: Yeah, it's great. If I look through these, so we have 42. You said you shot four rolls of film. I don't know how many pictures were on each roll, but we've scanned a total of 42 of them. And the majority of them are individual shots. You went around and you profiled each of these guys. And then there's a couple of great ones with Slash, Izzy, and Axl together. So Axl and Izzy are singing and Slash has his solo. There's a couple great group shots, but the majority of your shots are these incredible kind of solo hero shots, which I think is pretty interesting given that it was the first time they played together and you decided to kind of do a hero shot for each one of these guys.

MC: That's because they earned it. They were, that's what was, that was the energy coming off of them. You're producing energy. I'm going to, and I'm shooting the show. I'm going to capture it. I'm like a news reporter, I'm reporting the news and the news is there was news to report on everyone.

JP: You know, looking through some of your shots here, you know, the first thing I noticed is that Slash is playing, I think it's a B.C. Rich, it's his red guitar.

MC: It's a B.C. Rich Warlock. It was actually kind of an expensive guitar he saved up to get. It doesn't really fit who we know Slash is now, but it worked. It fit him in Black Sheep better than it did in Guns N' Roses. But with Slash holding any guitar, he's going to make it look good.

JP: What I also noticed in some of these shots is that he's wearing a hat. Now, it's not the top hat, but it does have the medallions around it. And it sort of looks like what would evolve into the top hat. I hadn't seen him wear anything like this before. Where did this come from?

MC: Probably his girlfriend.

JP: I just think it's interesting. The first time they played together, he's got a hat on. That's not necessarily the case as we will see in the rest of these shows leading up until he actually gets his top hat.

MC: It's true. The first Guns N' Roses show Slash had a hat on. I don't think he had it for the whole show, though. I kind of remember a couple things without that hat.

JP: And then the only other thing I can see is, you know, Axl's got his chaps. Maybe he starts the show in a kilt. I don't know if this was the first time he used a kilt, but eventually the kilt comes off as do t-shirts and other things as they go on. Was is there anything there to talk about?

MC: No, it was just different. I mean, he might have used a kilt before that. There was a handful of the shows that they did with Tracii that I didn't attend, so I don't really know what he looked like. Although, come to think of it, I think there was a girl that shot some photos and I might have seen that kilt before that. But it was interesting. I had never seen the kilt before and I thought it was interesting that, you know, that's just doing something different.

JP: Just going back to the show, I wanted to point out a few more things. One, obviously we see Steven with a single bass. Did they remove the double bass to kind of reduce the bass or to or to slow him down?

MC: They removed it to slow him down. So there's a back and forthness. It was just too loud. And Steven was a massive double bass drummer. You know, it was overpowering. And for what they were doing, there were no songs that needed double bass in them. What they did was a perfect fit to Steven. I mean, there's no other drummer that could have filled in that spot better than Steven for what they were doing.

JP: Looking at these photos, Marc, is there anything else that you want to remark on before we continue on?

MC: Well, Slash was 19 years old. So, you know, he's already just got that stage presence. Actually, they all had stage presence, but Izzy and Axl were, you know, three years older. So they had been... They're not 19 anymore, they're 21, 22, something like that. So, but to me, Slash was still a kid at 19. And he carried himself well, and they all did actually. But that's the only thing that really stands out is, other than the Charles Manson behind Slash, there's one picture that's actually in the Reckless Road book that's one of my favorite shots of Slash. And in the background you could see that Charles Manson photo on the wall. But as far as Slash's equipment, he was going back and forth with Marshall cabinets, then he had wrists on, then he went back to Marshall. The thing with Slash is he would, he would get something in his brain and focus on it and work his ass off to get it. And then like, you know, two or three weeks later, realize he made a mistake. And then go back and buy the... He'd have that Marshall amp and he'd sell it in the Recycler and buy this other amp. And then a couple of weeks later, he'd say, oh, I made a mistake. And then he'd go back and buy the Marshall again. So, you know, Slash experimented with different things.

JP: So, yeah, it sounds like Slash was somewhat of a perfectionist or he was really just tweaking things to find the right sound for him.

MC: I remember like back going back to even the Tidus Sloan days back in 1981, 1982. He would go to the guitar center and get this little, you know, a little device and, you know, he'd use it, he'd write a song for it. And then all of a sudden, like two, three months later, he got rid of it, he sold it. He didn't want that effect anymore. He just thought he wanted it. And then he, you know, so he went through different, he experimented a lot with that stuff. He was good with the crybaby with the wah-wah pedal. He certainly knew how to use that well. He wasn't using it... He used it in Tidus Sloan and he didn't use it in the beginning of Guns, but later on I got him one for his birthday, we're jumping in the future, but it ended up on Sweet Child O' Mine and Brownstone. So, you know, his birthday was in July and those songs came out a month later. So what did he do with it? He put it right to work and, you know, and made the best he could from it. So I knew that, you know, he definitely knew how to work a wah-wah pedal. And that was something that was missing, you know, in Guns N' Roses, with that Appetite for Destruction lineup, that was a year, over a year without a wah-wah pedal. So, and he managed fine, but once we gave him that wah-wah pedal, it certainly, you know, it sent things up a few levels.

JP: So there you go. Your genetic fingerprint is now in Appetite as well.

MC: Yeah, when I hear, every time I hear Brownstone or Sweet Child O' Mine and I hear him playing that wah-wah pedal, it's like I take just a little credit for, not for making that sound, but for giving him the tools that he needs to make that sound.

JP: It's just another example, Marc, of you giving them everything they needed to find their sound and to do what they did. So just a couple more things about this show before we move on. I wanna go back to the image you talked about of Slash playing. Again, it's that hero shot of Slash, and behind him is the Charles Manson image. Is that something that was just at the Troubadour, or is that something that GN'R put up behind them?

MC: No, that was something that was hanging at the Troubadour at that time. I don't know why. I don't know the history behind it. Charles Manson used to play the Troubadour back in the 60s. I don't know. But for whatever reason, it was there.

JP: Well, it gives that particular shot a little bit of sinister quality, I guess.

MC: Slash looks good from the floor up. Some guitar players, they look good from the chest up. But Slash puts his whole body into what he does. And so I tried to, when I was taking pictures of Slash, to get it all, you know, how he stands, all the way, what's going on behind him. So I always put a lens on that was, that can capture more.

JP: So he puts his whole body into the performance.

MC: Right, he's leaning in a certain way, and if you crop that out, you're just cropping out the coolness, and you're not getting it all. So you got close-ups of Slash, it might be cool, but it's not as cool as seeing the whole Slash.

JP: The last thing I wanted to touch on was, you know, Rob Gardner had mentioned that the Appetite lineup of Guns N' Roses really took advantage or kind of latched on to the following that was already building from LA Guns into the original Guns N' Roses. Do you think anybody in the audience knew that Slash and Steven were going to be there that night? Do you think anybody came to see Tracii and Rob? Was there any confusion around that?

MC: Well, OK. There was probably like -- I'm just going to take a guess -- I'd say there was about 50 people there that night. And now, of course, out of those 50 people, probably 30 of them were girlfriends or best friends or people they lived with or whatever. OK, so yeah, Guns N' Roses had a small following before that. I actually know a couple of people that stopped going to see them when Tracii weren't there anymore. It works both ways. Guns N' Roses was the opening band, I believe. I don't know if there was a band before them or not, but they certainly weren't headlining.

JP: So, Marc, they wrapped the show and now it's time to hit the road. They have this Northwest tour that culminates in Seattle. They're going to hit Sacramento, Eugene, Portland and then Seattle. So they had four or five gigs planned and everybody was on board and they needed some promotional shots. So it sounds like you were able to give them some shots from this first Troubadour show, is that right?

MC: That's correct. When I got them developed the next morning, I picked some shots for them. I had a good shot of everyone except Axl. Axl, there's a shot where he's on his knees and he's screaming his heart out. And Axl wasn't thrilled with the picture that I picked for him. But he wasn't necessarily mad at me either. We met right where those photos were getting developed at Vine Street and Sunset. There was a Fromex lab there, right across from the McDonald's. There was a little something that went on, Axl got pissed at Slash or somebody. I forgot, one of the other members of the band that were there, and they got into a little spat, and Axl kind of walked off. Everyone left but Axl, and me and Axl ended up eating at the McDonald's across the street. And he calmed down a little bit and he apologized for, you know, whatever. And he said, it wasn't my fault. It was just, he knew the picture that was picked was the best I could do with what we had to work with. It's just, he wasn't really excited about or enthused about that particular photo for how they were going to use it. And that's all I remember from that.

JP: You've printed these eight by tens for them. I think they're scheduled to play Seattle on the ninth or the 10th. So they've got to get out of town, like they got to leave. It's a thousand plus mile drive, you know, 1200 mile drive. They got to get on the road. So what happens next?

MC: They jump into a car with their equipment and the car makes it about a hundred miles out of Los Angeles and then the transmission breaks.

JP: I can only imagine the scene and all of their, with all of their gear and whatever they're dressed in, leaving, you know, in the wee hours of the morning for Seattle. And yeah, they head out. It's a very hot day, apparently. And the car makes it to Fresno before the transmission gives out. This is the ShakeOut tour that Duff scheduled. Let's see what happens and who gets shaken out. So with that, we will wrap. Marc, thanks for these great stories. Many of these I hadn't even heard before, so they didn't even make it into Reckless Road. We're very excited to have reached this point in the story when the Appetite lineup first gets together but it's definitely not a sure thing that they're gonna stay together.

MC: It's a good spark. They knew they all wanted to work together, but there was no guarantees on how long it would last. A few more things needed to happen to solidify them to keep them together. And Hell tour was another huge part of that.

JP: That's right. And this is one of the major turning points that we're gonna talk about on the next episode.

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