0:00

Where Were You in ninety two is a production

0:02

of I Heart Radio that

0:06

was all actl driven. I mean, he was completely

0:09

convinced that if he spent money

0:11

on huge, big videos, you

0:14

know, the fans would you know, I noticed that

0:16

cliche. But if you build it, they will come,

0:18

you know what I'm saying, And they did in

0:21

millions. Welcome

0:27

to Where Are You In nine two, a podcast

0:29

in which I your host Jason Lafier,

0:32

look back at the major hits, one hit wonders,

0:34

shocking news stories, and irresistible

0:36

scandals that shaped what might be the wildest,

0:39

most eclectic, most controversial

0:41

twelve months of music ever. This

0:45

week, Guns and Roses monster

0:49

hit November Rain was more than just

0:51

an epic nine minute power ballad for

0:53

the Ages. It served as a swan

0:56

song for the band and for all the hair bands

0:58

who dominated MTV rock radio.

1:01

As Nirvana's grunge anthem smells

1:03

like teen Spirit burst onto the scene

1:05

and birtheden icon, gin R,

1:08

who had been one of the most popular acts in the

1:10

world, would begin to unravel and

1:12

lose their grip on the spotlight. In

1:14

the next two episodes will chronicle

1:17

the making of Guns and Roses, Sprawling dual

1:19

albums Use Your Illusion One and Use

1:21

Your Illusion Too, and their wildly

1:23

expensive November Rain video, as

1:26

well as the events that led to the group's demise,

1:28

from the drug abuse to the lavish spending

1:30

to singer Axel Roses. Theatrics

1:33

on stage and off will also explore

1:35

the tension between Rose and Nirvana frontman

1:37

Kurt Cobain, whose infamous feud

1:39

reached a fever pitch at the now legendary

1:43

Video Music Awards. Plus former

1:46

Nirvana manager Danny Goldberg joins

1:48

us to share his side of the story. This

1:50

is the extraordinary tale of heavy metal taking

1:53

its last glorious gasp as

1:55

grunge and alternative swept America,

1:58

ushering in an era of flannel shirt, ear

2:00

piercing feedback and enough apathy

2:02

to fill a thousand high school gymnasiums.

2:06

The year was I

2:09

know, a rough place to start, but bear with me because

2:11

a few good things came out of that dark, unprecedented

2:14

time. Here's one of them.

2:16

Tera Reader and Robin Petering live in Los

2:18

Angeles. Readers a bartender.

2:21

Petering is a former hip hop DJ who

2:23

now serves as executive director of

2:26

lens Co, a research and advocacy

2:28

organization committed to ending homelessness

2:31

in l A. The friends met

2:33

nearly two decades ago when they were living

2:35

in Oregon in their late teens. Like

2:38

most of us, they were stuck in lockdown

2:41

with too much time on their hands, biting

2:43

their nails over the impending presidential

2:45

election and the fate of their divided,

2:47

COVID stricken nation. That

2:50

year, former Press House Secretary

2:52

Sarah Huckabee Sanders released her

2:54

memoir Speaking for Myself,

2:57

The Women learned that In one passage, Sanders

2:59

described how former President Donald Trump

3:01

told her and Communications director Hope

3:03

Hicks that he wanted

3:06

Guns and Roses hit

3:08

November Rain added to his rally playlist

3:11

because it was quote unquote the greatest

3:13

music video of all time. To

3:15

hammer his point home, he queued up the

3:17

video in the Oval office so the three of them

3:20

could watch it, says Reader. He

3:22

makes her sit down and watch it, even

3:24

though she's she doesn't disagree. She's

3:27

kind of like baffled by the whole story. So

3:29

she goes home from work that night after

3:32

being forced to watch November Rain with Donald

3:34

Trump, and she goes to watch

3:36

the premiere of the Bachelor, and then Donald

3:38

Trump goes viral for an insane

3:41

tweet about Kim john Ans

3:43

nuclear weapons, so he

3:45

went on like a nuclear war rant, like

3:48

right after watching November Rain. In

3:50

the tweet, Trump boasted in his typical,

3:52

cartoonishly macho fashion that

3:55

his nuclear button was quote unquote much

3:57

bigger and more powerful than John

3:59

guns and that quote unquote my button

4:02

works. So when I saw that, I'm

4:04

like news, Trump, guns

4:06

and Roses, It's like the Holy Trinity. Immediately

4:09

sent it to Robin. A lightbulb went off,

4:12

says Peter Ing. We were like, maybe

4:15

he's right, Like it's I think he might

4:17

be right. And then it was how

4:19

do we how do we know? How do you know?

4:22

And so how do you answer that question? And I was like, let's just

4:24

watch it over and over again and

4:27

see if that's the greatest music video of all time,

4:29

you know. The pair then took things a step

4:31

further, documenting their findings and

4:33

Nothing Lasts Forever the November

4:36

Rain podcast, which they launched

4:38

in December. Two

4:40

years later, they have hosted more than eighty

4:42

episodes, tumbling down numerous

4:45

rabbit holes as they tackle not only the November

4:47

Rain video but the legacy of its controversial,

4:50

heavy metal creators, Guns and Roses, from

4:53

their love lives to their lawsuits to their

4:55

general lunacy. As Reader likes

4:57

to say, the n r U that's

4:59

the No Member Rain universe is vast

5:02

and infinite. There are people that don't

5:04

know what November Rain is. There

5:06

are adult human beings in America

5:08

that don't like that whole thing totally

5:11

missed them. However, Nirvana

5:15

smells like teen spirit that think

5:17

that was happening at the exact same time. Is

5:21

is a huge part of their you know, cults

5:23

are still you know, Guns of Roses is really

5:25

just kind of in this like umbrella of one

5:27

of those old eighties hairbands. She's

5:29

right, a certain segment of the American population

5:32

is unacquainted with all the outrageous

5:34

splendor that is the November Rain universe,

5:37

and then when it came out it was a hit. Many

5:40

who do know it consider it irrelict. Now,

5:43

most major moments in music history are

5:45

about being in the right place at the right time

5:47

with the right sound. But some

5:50

of those major moments are about being in the wrong

5:52

place at the wrong time with a

5:54

sound that suddenly finds itself being taken

5:56

out with the trash in a sense. That's

5:58

what happened with November, a brilliant

6:01

but sometimes misunderstood slice

6:03

of pomp rock that marked the end of

6:05

an era maybe a few eras, but

6:07

more on that later. It nearly

6:10

nine effusive minutes. It

6:12

showed up at our door and came on strong,

6:15

real strong. But the song

6:17

and it's absurdly expensive, opulent video

6:20

also became something bigger than itself,

6:22

an emblem of rocks unchecked,

6:24

excess and artifice. This

6:27

at a time when a new sound, a

6:29

grittier, low fi and therefore

6:31

seemingly more authentic sound, was starting

6:33

to take over the air waves. If

6:36

grunge killed heavy metal, then November

6:38

Rain, the video for which featured an

6:40

actual funeral, was Heavy

6:42

Metals Requiem. But before we

6:45

get into how it all ended, you've got

6:47

to know how it all began. The

6:54

year Guns

6:56

n' Roses were massive, one of the biggest

6:59

acts in the world. They released

7:01

their debut studio album, Appetite for Destruction

7:03

in the summer of seven, but

7:05

after a string of hit singles in Sweet

7:09

Child of Mine, Welcome to the Jungle, and Paradise

7:11

City, the record went to number one on

7:13

the Billboard Top two hundred Albums chart and

7:16

became one of the best selling albums of

7:18

all time. It's still right up

7:20

there. If you could ever imagine

7:22

a time when heavy metal reigned supreme,

7:24

the late eighties and early nineties were it.

7:27

I'm talking def Leppard, Motley

7:29

Crue, Skid Roll, Poison, Winger,

7:32

Warned, White Snake, and most

7:34

of all Guns and Roses. Even if

7:36

you didn't like heavy metal, chances are you

7:38

liked at least one G and R song. I

7:41

mean, how anyone in the right mind can pop

7:43

on Sweet Child of Mind and not want to jump in

7:45

their car, roll the top down, take their

7:47

top off, speed to the nearest seven eleven

7:50

and just pump some goddamn gas is

7:52

beyond me and I don't even drive.

7:55

Scizzling, sticky, dirty and slutty.

7:57

That song is Summer in a Bottle After

8:03

Appetite. G and R

8:06

lies a sort of stop gap album,

8:08

consisting of four tracks from a previously released

8:12

and four new acoustic cuts. The

8:14

band's next proper albums arrived

8:16

simultaneously. Use Your Relusion

8:18

One and Usual Illusion To dropped on

8:20

September seventeen, offering

8:24

the world thirty new tracks spanning over

8:26

two and a half hours. As

8:28

G and R lead guitarist Slash Rights and its

8:31

two thousand seven memoir Slash. After

8:33

someboding in his house, the group wrote early

8:36

versions of more than half the LP songs in

8:38

two nights. This was because a good

8:40

number of them weren't totally new. They

8:42

had already existed in some form, including

8:44

what would eventually become the records ambitious video

8:47

trilogy Don't Cry, November

8:49

Rain, and Estranged. November

8:51

Rain is the centerpiece of Usual Illusion one

8:53

and, if you ask me, by far, the

8:56

best thing out of all thirty tracks his

8:59

bandmates have set. Actual Rose began working

9:01

on November Rain as early as three

9:03

and that he'd essentially completed the original version

9:06

of it when it came time for G and R to release Appetite

9:08

for Destruction. But because that record

9:10

already contained that undeniable ballad Sweet

9:12

Child of Mine, a number one single that would become

9:15

the group's calling card, they decided to shelve

9:17

the other ballad and save it for a rainy

9:20

day. Not to mention, the o G

9:23

demo for November Rain was eighteen

9:25

minutes, which would be demanding enough

9:27

for a bunch of sober guys, and

9:29

if you know anything about guns, and Roses. It's

9:32

that these guys were nowhere near sober. But

9:35

Rose had a fondness for the track, which

9:37

he planked away at on the piano for years,

9:39

so he was crushed to see it scrapped.

9:42

Now it was back. It had

9:44

been around forever, Slash rights in his memoir, and

9:47

it was finally getting its due. Because

9:51

they were piano driven and contained multiple

9:54

movements and were like four thousand

9:56

years long, November Rain and its

9:58

sister song Estranged were a

10:00

bitch to record, though the

10:02

group handled November Rain in a day,

10:05

Slash recall spending hours refining

10:07

its intricate arrangements. He also

10:09

claims his guitar solo in the track is the exact

10:12

one he played when he first heard it in the eighties, and

10:14

that it's mostly improvised. Rose

10:16

two was crazy committed to making it perfect,

10:19

so much so that he moved couches, a bed,

10:21

and his exercise equipment into the record plan

10:24

their studio, which also became a party

10:26

palace for the band In his entourage, Slash

10:29

pinpoints a source of tension among

10:31

the group where they were toiling away on Usual Illusion

10:34

one and two. Rose's edition of

10:36

keyboards and synthesizers. Rose

10:39

had snuck some into the appetite cut Paradise

10:41

City, and Slash had made it clear he wasn't

10:43

a fan. He felt they were superfluous

10:46

and that they diluded the G and R brand. Meanwhile,

10:49

drummer Matt Sorum wasn't digging Rose's

10:52

heart on for softer sounds, as

10:54

he recalled and Stephen davis is two thousand

10:56

eight biography Watch You Bleed the Saga

10:58

of Guns and Roses quote. I

11:00

didn't really sign up for this, all these ballads.

11:03

I was hoping to join a badass rock and roll band.

11:05

I was like, what's with the piano? But

11:08

Rose insisted on the ornamentation. Stoned

11:11

and surrounded by keyboards, he'd tweaked

11:13

and tinker, adding his vocals and

11:15

more and more synths to slash his guitar

11:18

parts. Those grand, weepy

11:20

strings you here on November Raine, that's

11:22

not an orchestra, it's synthesizers.

11:25

Go play it. It's insane that they are not

11:27

real strings. Even Slash

11:29

remains in all of them.

11:33

By slashes account, friction and g

11:35

and R ebbed and flowed, but Rose

11:38

was firmly behind the steering wheel during much of

11:40

the mixing of User Illusion one and two. As

11:43

he recalls in his memoir, Slash would

11:45

wait in the studio while Rose hung out

11:47

in his house and retooled mixes Slash

11:49

had none. Slash called the process

11:52

quote unquote one sided, adding

11:54

quote subconsciously, I think

11:56

I began to see the band as one guy sitting

11:58

on a throne high above and completely

12:00

apart from the crowd of people hustling around beneath

12:02

him.

12:04

The band's working arrangement essentially became

12:07

a dictatorship, with Dictator Rose

12:09

torturing himself and an attempt to be more

12:11

like his hero Elton John, whose work, in

12:13

particular his own nineteen seventy three double

12:15

album Goodbye Yellow Brick Road, seems

12:18

to have been a major influence for the Illusion Records.

12:21

As Storm told Rolling Stone in two thousand and sixteen,

12:23

quote we listened to Elton John for inspiration

12:25

for the drum fills and overall tone. I

12:27

vividly remember sitting with Axel listening to Don't Let

12:29

the Sun Go Down on Me, and Axel pointing out

12:31

the style of the Tom Tom drum fills. Rose

12:34

had long been frank about how precious November Rain

12:36

was to him telling Rolling Stone back that

12:39

if he didn't know the song, he'd quote unquote

12:41

quit the business. His

12:45

obsession was exhausting. November

12:48

Rain had become Rose's white whale, and

12:50

it was at least partly responsible for Genr's

12:52

demise. Slash even went so far as

12:54

to describe November Rain is quote unquote the

12:56

sound of a band breaking up. I know,

12:58

harsh, but take that with a grain of salt, because

13:01

he writes in his memoir the Guns and Roses

13:03

cover of the Rolling Stones Sympathy for the Devil,

13:05

which they recorded for the nine four soundtrack

13:07

for Interview with a Vampire, was also

13:10

the sound of the band raking up. So yeah,

13:12

you get it as purty as it wound up being.

13:14

November Rain rained on the parade of everyone

13:17

in the group who wasn't Axl Rose, and

13:19

it's impressive, some would say ridiculous

13:21

music video didn't help matters up

13:34

next after the break, the story

13:37

behind the November Rain video, which involved

13:39

multiple locations and a shipped ton

13:41

of extras to churches, a

13:43

supermodel, a wedding, a funeral,

13:46

a man randomly hurling himself

13:49

at a cake, and of course, buckets

13:51

and buckets of rain it was a

13:53

feat that someone deem a masterpiece

13:55

and others a disaster piece. The

14:10

year was Guns

14:13

and Roses dual albums User Illusion

14:15

one in two had debuted the number

14:17

one and number two spots on the Billboard

14:20

Charts. The previous fall. They would

14:22

score their final top ten hit with

14:24

their epic ballad November Rain, which

14:26

peaked at number three on the Billboard Hot One.

14:29

The song was bursting at the seams

14:31

with melodrama, but at least part

14:34

of its success must be credited to its

14:36

equally melodramatic music video. If

14:39

Axel Rose was crushing on Elton

14:41

John at the time, he was also crushing

14:43

on writer artist, longtime

14:45

Gene R chum and current Gene R Road

14:47

manager Del James, specifically

14:50

his short story Without You, which

14:52

reportedly inspired the video for November

14:55

Rain before it was published in james Horror

14:58

Stories collection. The l lguage of Fear

15:02

Without You centers on main man

15:05

Get It, a famous hard

15:07

partying rocker struggling after his band

15:09

breaks up. He's subsisting off

15:11

booze and pills to keep himself afloat in

15:13

his ocean of existentialism.

15:16

His lady catches Maine cheating on her and

15:18

dumps him. To try to win her back, he

15:20

writes her the song Without You, which becomes

15:22

his biggest hit. She isn't

15:25

having it, though, she won't accept royalties

15:27

from the song or his attempts to reconcile with

15:29

her. After going to her house one

15:31

night, he finds her dead, with without You playing

15:34

on repeat. She has shot herself

15:36

in the head. He completely loses

15:38

a trashing his apartment, his car, and

15:40

his guitar collection. The tail

15:42

ends with him lighting his place on fire, sitting

15:44

down at his piano, and playing without You one

15:47

final time. As he swallowed in flames,

15:51

Rose felt like someone had held a mirror up

15:54

to him. I basically was that person,

15:56

he wrote in the introduction to James is the Language

15:58

of Fear. A few years later, Rose's

16:00

tempestuous marriage to his ex wife

16:02

Aaron Everley had ended in early so

16:06

he was going through some of the same ship as Maine.

16:08

The tragedy and historyonics Without You spoke

16:11

to him. When it came time

16:13

to craft the video for November Rain, Rose

16:15

wanted that vibe. Enlisting award

16:17

winning director Andy Morahan, he would

16:20

pull out all the stops to execute his vision

16:22

and release what at the time would become the most

16:24

expensive music video ever made.

16:28

By the time Rose recruited Morahan,

16:30

he had already directed videos for the likes

16:32

of Ryan Carrey, Brian Adams, Pet

16:34

Shop Boys, George Michael, and Moore.

16:37

His video from Michael's Father Figure,

16:40

which followed a cab driver's love affair

16:42

with a model and one Best Direction

16:44

at the MTV Video

16:46

Music Awards, piked Rose's interest.

16:49

He wanted a short film trilogy depicting

16:51

a tale loosely based on Without You. Morahan

16:54

had the bona fides to do it. First

16:57

came Morahan's video for Don't

17:00

Cry, in which Axel and

17:02

supermodel Stephanie Seymour, his

17:04

real life girlfriend at the time, sees

17:06

their way through a stormy relationship. In

17:09

the beginning of it, he has seen trudging

17:11

through a blizzard in a cape and period piece

17:13

soldier garb a bottle on one hand and

17:15

a pistol in the other. Cut

17:18

to Axel and Stephanie fighting over a gun.

17:21

Later, she bitch slaps a woman dynasty

17:23

style in a bar after she catches her flirting

17:25

with Axel, throwing a helicopter

17:28

a raven. Axel's very tiny

17:30

jorts Axel and regression therapy

17:32

and slash driving himself and some

17:34

poor chick off a cliff, only for

17:36

him to re materialize from the fiery

17:38

wreckage, unscathed and shirtless,

17:41

at the top of the cliff for a guitar solo. And

17:43

you've got a lot going on. But

17:45

this is nothing compared to the antics of part

17:48

two of the trilogy. November

17:50

Rain also stars Stephanie Seymours, Rose's

17:52

main squeeze. No slapping her

17:55

guns in sight here, though in fact

17:57

the couple are totally smitten and tying

17:59

the knot. We can't be entirely

18:01

sure of that gun scuffle and don't cry came

18:04

before or after their nuptials, but

18:06

more on that later. Pour yourself some

18:08

whiskey and buckle up, because we're about

18:10

to get into this thing. All

18:19

right. Here goes the November

18:21

Rain video opens with Axel sitting

18:23

on the edge of his bed in his gloomy room as he downs

18:26

some pills. Behind him, the curtains

18:28

blow, the wind whistles, the thunder

18:30

rumbles, we hear the pitter patter of rain.

18:33

Were then transported to a packed theater

18:35

where Axel tickles the ivories backed

18:37

by the rest of G and R and a full orchestra,

18:41

flashed to an empty church in the middle of a

18:43

desert, where he also sits at a piano. At

18:46

around the minute and a half mark, here

18:48

comes Stuff and he strutting down the aisle of a

18:50

different church, decked out in a white

18:52

gown shaped like a mullet. It's

18:54

been called the mullet dress. As we learned

18:57

an episode three of this podcast, mullets

18:59

were very trend, but

19:01

this thing takes mullet fashion to a whole

19:04

new level. It's back his big,

19:06

long and flowing, but its front is

19:09

dangerously short, shorter than a damn miniskirt,

19:11

revealing the bride's garter. Folks,

19:14

this may be the one and only mullet scenario

19:16

where the party's in the front. Meanwhile,

19:18

Axel looks like he's going to a revolutionary

19:21

war re enactment slash

19:24

his eternal cigarette dangling from his

19:26

mouth. Remember to bust out his trademark

19:28

top hat for the occasion, but he can't

19:30

remember where the hell he put the wedding rings.

19:33

Uh, but have no fear. G

19:36

and R Bass Stuff mccagan has some spars

19:38

safely placed on his leather gloved pinky finger,

19:41

Slash hands them to the minister. He thinks

19:43

duff for saving his ass, then heads down the aisle

19:45

and exits the church. Do you think he might be

19:47

taking a smoke break? But as an't he already

19:49

been puffing away during the whole ceremony? What's

19:52

going on? Surprise

19:55

Slash emerges from that other church

19:57

and a desert minus top hat entails

19:59

and in stead wearing his classic look leather jacket

20:02

no shirt. Were then treated to not one

20:04

but two guitar solos, the cameras

20:06

zooming in and out, encircling him like an

20:08

eagle, leaving us the viewers soaring

20:11

through an expansive, endless sky.

20:13

This is what true love looks like. But

20:16

wait, that are on the five minute

20:18

and second mark. As Slash slides

20:20

into that second guitar solo and the wedding

20:23

guests dous, Stuffy and Axel with white

20:25

petals, we see her in the back of a

20:27

convertible outside the non desert

20:29

church, with a hint of longing or

20:31

unease crossing her face. Trouble

20:34

in Paradise cut to the reception.

20:37

Stephanie has slipped into a sleeveless black

20:39

velvet number Axel is wearing a

20:41

shiny electric blue blazer. They

20:44

cut the cake. They toast guests

20:46

of all ages dance fuck a DJ.

20:49

There's a band complete with an accordion

20:51

and a multed saxophonist. Suddenly

20:54

the sky opens up and unleashes

20:56

a torrential downpour. The

20:58

invitees for cover. Pandemonium

21:02

ensues. People fall over tables,

21:04

knocking over glasses, and spilling bottles of wine.

21:06

A handsome man with very long hair charges

21:09

at the newly weds tiered wedding cake, shoving

21:11

miniature axel and Stephanie off its summit

21:14

and totally annihilating it. Que

21:19

a third, darker guitar solo. It's

21:22

actually a dirge, because now we're at a funeral.

21:25

Stephanie lies in a casket in a church,

21:27

half her face mysteriously hidden, next

21:30

a cemetery where guests are drenched

21:32

in more rain. Flashed to axle tossing

21:34

and turning in bed. Flashed back to Stephanie

21:37

strowing her wedding bouquet. As it races

21:39

through the air and through time. It's

21:41

white flowers termed blood red before

21:43

it lands on the rain soaked coffin, now

21:46

lowered into the ground. The flowers bleed

21:48

out onto the coffin, flickering

21:50

as they fade back to white It's

21:52

night and Axel is kneeling over

21:54

it, sopping wet and alone.

22:00

Yeah yeah,

22:04

I tried to keep that short, but I got carried away, because

22:07

when it comes to November Rain, you can't not

22:09

get carried away. Axel Rose got

22:11

carried away, Andy Morahan got carried

22:13

away. Terror Reader and Robin Petering

22:16

have certainly gotten carried away. That's

22:18

what this thing does. It sucks you

22:20

in. Since it premiered on the MTV

22:22

show Had Bangers Ball in June,

22:26

November Rain has racked up one

22:28

point nine billion views on

22:30

YouTube, the most views of any

22:32

video from the nineteen eighties or nineties.

22:35

In two thousand eighteen, it became the

22:37

first video it made before the invention of

22:39

YouTube, to exceed a billion views on

22:41

YouTube. In ven countdown

22:43

of the top videos of all time, MTV

22:46

put it at number three. If,

22:48

by some strange chance, you're

22:51

not responsible for any of those one point

22:53

nine billion views and think the whole thing

22:55

sounds decadent, you are very right.

22:58

It was as costly as it look, with

23:00

a reported price tag of one

23:02

point five million dollars

23:05

and This was thirty years ago. I tracked

23:07

down as director any Moorehan to get some

23:09

intel on what, at the time was the most expensive

23:11

video ever made. Why was it so lavish?

23:14

You know, it was an expensive video, Don't get me wrong.

23:16

At nifty thousands,

23:18

just start with that's expensive. But it

23:21

did grow exponentially. That was all ACTL

23:23

driven. I mean, he was completely convinced

23:26

that if he spent money on huge,

23:29

big videos that

23:31

you know, the fans would you know, I noticed

23:33

that cliche. But if you build it, they will come,

23:35

you know what I'm saying. And they did in

23:38

millions billions. Even Morihan

23:41

attributes all those YouTube views to the video's

23:43

epic nous, but also to its

23:45

ambiguity. You know, we decided to make a

23:48

virtue of the fact that the

23:50

more seeds of non

23:52

linear narrative that you kind

23:55

of throw together, the more you

23:57

know, weirdly enough of the more intriguing things

23:59

become. And and I think

24:01

the test, you know, that testament

24:04

of that is it's still to this date people are

24:06

trying to unravel what

24:08

the whole thing means and did how

24:10

did she Stephanie die? And why she got

24:13

half her face missing? And I

24:15

speak to students sometimes you don dissertations

24:18

on November and they start telling me what

24:20

some of them symbolism is

24:22

and what it means. Fans have indeed tried to

24:24

put the pieces together over the years. If actual

24:26

Rose is inspired by Del james short story Without

24:29

You, in which a rocker's ax shoots

24:31

herself in the head after he breaks her heart, then

24:33

maybe Stuffanie Seymour's November Rain character

24:35

did the same. After all, we do see

24:37

her in Rose's character fighting over

24:39

a gun in the video for gin Rs Don't Cry.

24:42

The predecessor November Rain and the first

24:44

of their in More Hands Use Your Illusion video trilogy,

24:47

was this foreshadowing don't expect

24:49

answers from more Hand. I don't have to explain

24:51

everything, and I think again, I think that's

24:53

why I'm quite protective of the amba ambiguity

24:56

of it, because I think it's

24:58

open to interpretation, and I think

25:00

that's why has longevity.

25:03

Morehand had his own inspirations for the video,

25:05

including the nineteen seventy three thriller

25:08

Don't Look Now, about a husband and wife

25:10

mourning the loss of their young daughter, who then go

25:12

to Italy to restore a church. Things

25:14

get weird when the husband starts seeing his dead kid running

25:17

through the streets of Venice. But some

25:19

of what we see in November Rain is a result of

25:21

happy accidents. Turns out, when

25:23

Slash stops out for that killer guitar, soul in the

25:25

desert, dude was going for a smoke at

25:27

least in real life. The video's wedding

25:29

scene was filmed at St. Brendan Church

25:32

on van Ness Avenue in Los Angeles,

25:34

and after the cameras captured him heading down the island

25:37

through its doors, Morehand got the idea

25:39

to segue to what would become one of the most iconic

25:41

moments in November Rain. Morahan

25:44

hunted for a week before finding the perfect spot

25:46

for it, Syrah Polone Ranch

25:48

in New Mexico, which has served as the location

25:50

for a slew of movies, including Silverado,

25:53

Cowboys and Aliens, Wild Wild West,

25:55

and Thor. There was a

25:57

white clapboard church but

25:59

in the set, but it was on a pallette, So

26:02

we basically talking

26:05

to the people who owned the things. They said, O, yeah, if you want to drag

26:07

out the middle of the desert, put

26:09

your little fence around him and do what's your like to

26:11

get that part of the video was

26:13

the biggest pain really thing.

26:16

There were no drones then, so to shoot

26:18

it, Morahan's team used a crane, a study

26:20

cam, and a helicopter, all for

26:22

a scene that makes up less than thirty seconds

26:25

of the video. Fun fact, designer

26:27

Tom Ford eventually bought that ranch, so

26:29

it's not been sold to somebody else. Church included

26:33

also a fluke that famous cake

26:35

dive. It wasn't planned. It was like, we've

26:38

done all the rain and the cake was there with

26:41

fucking less trash it, let's do it on one take

26:43

and this kid offered himself

26:46

and did it. My cameraman, Daniel

26:50

Pel He still to this day cannot stand that

26:52

shot and all the fact it was in the video. They

26:54

found it so silly that Morahan left

26:56

the shot on the cutting room floor and

26:58

it was excellent. Saile went, man,

27:01

where's that shot of the guy from going through

27:03

the cake? And I go, yeah, it

27:05

was all right. I mean, it was nothing much

27:07

to write home about. It was seen the last shot of the

27:09

day and actually wanted it back in

27:12

and his interestinct must be right

27:14

because now people have not stopped

27:16

talking about it for years and

27:18

years and years. The big question that has

27:20

haunted Genre disciples for years who

27:23

was the Great Cake Destroyer. The

27:26

theory among many was that it was Ricky Rachtman,

27:28

Roses Pale and the former host of head Banger's

27:31

Ball, who does show up in the reception

27:33

scene. Wrong. With

27:35

intense prodding from Terror Reader and Robin

27:37

Petering, the host of the Nothing Last Forever

27:39

podcast, Morihan got to the bottom

27:41

of the mystery when we spoke. He was initially

27:44

a bit koy, but then after some prodding

27:46

from me, he pulled up an email from a guy

27:48

named Chris Saint Quax who claims

27:50

he and the Cake Destroyer worked his extras

27:53

in the video. He said, Yeah, of course

27:55

I know who jumped through the cake.

27:57

He was one of the gang. He

27:59

and what buddies at Central casting on cool

28:02

being long haired brookers in the nineties. So we did tons

28:04

of videos, but we were just standing

28:06

around and the A D was desperate to find someone

28:08

that he was the man for the joke. We

28:11

busted these bulls before and as it was clear there

28:13

was only one cake telling when he was going

28:15

to miss it, and he kind of did. His

28:18

name is Steve catro C a

28:21

t R E doubled l Reader

28:23

and Petering have tried to track Step Controlled

28:25

down, but to no avail. Morehan

28:27

doesn't never call Sheet vaguely remembers the

28:29

guy Steve. If you're out

28:31

there and listening, please contact me.

28:34

That's law fier L A M

28:36

P h I E R. And also

28:38

contact Terror and Robin. We're looking

28:41

for you. We love you. That

28:44

poor demolished Cake is now a frosted

28:46

artifact in music history, but

28:48

shooting the November Rain video, much like

28:50

doing anything with guns and roses, was

28:52

hardly a cake walk. The band may

28:54

have been one of the most famous in the world, but

28:58

they were also one of the most un hinged and

29:00

reliably unreliable on

29:02

drugs, on the rocks, and never on

29:05

time. Axel Rose was the chief

29:07

reason for the notorious tardiness,

29:09

but all of them were a no show for one November Rain

29:11

video set up where they were supposed to play live with

29:13

an orchestra for more than a thousand extras

29:16

wrangled into the Orpheum Theater in l A.

29:18

A cinematographer who worked on that shoot

29:20

told the Los Angeles Times in two thousand twenty

29:22

two that he accrue with eight

29:25

cameras and all those extras

29:27

waited for the group in the theater until three

29:29

in the morning, only for the whole operation

29:31

to be shut down and filmed a few days later

29:33

and a new location. And because

29:36

the early sun is poison to party monsters.

29:39

More Hand came up with the workaround for that too.

29:41

You learned pretty quickly that you're going to get daylight

29:43

shots, come do it on the end of the night shoot.

29:46

We basically had to keep them up

29:48

all night to shoot them

29:50

first thing in the morning. Slash wasn't always

29:52

feeling the concepts. He has since knocked

29:54

the November Rain in Estranged videos for being

29:56

so over the top, telling Q Magazine

29:58

in two thousand four, we

30:01

got into doing these huge production videos,

30:03

and by November Rain it was just too much, just

30:05

too involved. At the end of the day,

30:07

it was a great video, but that's when I started

30:09

realizing that it was getting out of hand. Was they

30:11

ever worried about looking a bit silly? Well? Yeah,

30:15

wait, though has Slash ever looked anything

30:17

other than cool? Still? More

30:20

Hand maintains that Slash and the rest of g

30:22

n R showed up and did their jobs without

30:24

much complaining. He could detect issues

30:26

between Rose and his then girlfriend Seymour,

30:29

but friction in the band didn't cast a pall over

30:31

production. I didn't feel there's a powerful

30:33

tension internal band at

30:36

tension, but

30:38

there was tension in the experience,

30:41

in the process um,

30:44

which was kind of inevitable. I think

30:46

from you know, you got from

30:49

being the biggest ban. You know you're the biggest

30:51

ban in the world. But it started full part, it seems

30:53

it's bound to be some kind of tension. Tensions

30:56

were there due to have you drug use the

30:58

strain of a NonStop Two or two were the

31:00

making of those wildly ambitious Illusion

31:02

Albums and Roses Swelling Eaglemania.

31:12

Up next, after the break, we explore

31:14

Guns and Roses off camera drama in the early

31:16

nineties, including a concert fire, two

31:19

riots, a fan suicide, and

31:21

an overdose that nearly killed one of them.

31:45

The year was that

31:47

summer, Guns and Roses embarked on

31:49

a co headlining stadium tour with

31:51

Metallica. As Slash recalls

31:54

in his two thousand seven memoirs, Slash

31:57

gin R's chemistry on stage was quote

31:59

unquote beauty full, but their

32:01

dysfunction as a unit off stage

32:03

was that an all time high. He

32:06

Embassis stuff McKagan would down

32:08

vodka back stage to cope. Meanwhile,

32:11

during a show at Giants Stadium in New Jersey

32:14

from an axel, Rose could barely get

32:16

through the set because of intense pain in his throat.

32:19

He was diagnosed soon after with severe

32:21

vocal cord damage, and the band had to

32:23

cancel three shows. Shortly

32:26

after that, in August, when

32:28

Metallica was in the middle of a set in Montreal, some

32:31

pirate technics malfunctioned on stage,

32:33

seriously burning James Hetfield's arms

32:36

and shoulders and forcing the band to cut their performance

32:38

short. G and R filled in, but

32:40

Rose claimed his throat still hurt, and they

32:43

too had to end their set prematurely. Piste

32:45

off fans took to the streets of Montreal

32:47

and rioted, overturning cars, looting

32:50

businesses, and setting fires. It

32:56

wasn't the first time in abridged G and R

32:58

performance ended in a riot. A

33:01

little more than a year before, in July, at

33:04

a concert in Riverport Amphitheater in Maryland

33:06

Heights, Missouri, near St. Louis, an angry

33:08

Rose jumped into the crowd and took a video

33:11

camera from an audience member who had been recording

33:13

the show. Furious of what he considered

33:15

a lack of concern from the venue security.

33:18

He then grabbed his mic, shouted something

33:20

to the effective because of bullshit security,

33:22

We're going home, and left the stage. The

33:25

concert goers went ballistic. Dozens

33:28

were injured, and the cost of damage amounted to more

33:30

than two hundred thousand dollars. G

33:32

and R were banned from playing St. Louis. They

33:35

didn't return for a show there until two thousand

33:37

seventeen. Rose is arrested

33:39

a year later when the band returned from touring

33:41

in Europe, but a judge dismissed the charges,

33:44

ruling that he had not directly incited the riot.

33:47

The group was so resentful of the debacle that

33:49

when Use Your Illusion one and two came out,

33:51

they included a special message among the thank

33:53

yous in the album's inserts. It

33:56

read fuck you St. Louis. As

34:00

Us recalls in his memoir, Rose was

34:02

consistently late to concerts and prone

34:04

to walking off stage. One report

34:06

says he once even puked on stage. All

34:09

this left his bandmates and audiences fuming

34:12

one scene. As a scrappy symbol of the working

34:14

class, Rose became infamous

34:16

for his diva like behavior, as one

34:18

Boston journalist wrote, quote, at

34:20

the stars are in the proper alignment and

34:22

if Axel Roses psychic herbalist, massuse

34:25

local coach and chiropodist, I'll

34:27

give him the thumbs up. Guns and Roses will

34:29

perform tomorrow at Foxboro Stadium.

34:32

Guns and Roses reputation had long been

34:34

questionable, but it was sullied even further

34:37

after a grim event in Argentina that The London

34:39

Times reported. On watching

34:41

the news, a man named Nestor Tallarito

34:43

looked on and discussed as Rose and Slash

34:46

pede from the eighth floor balcony of their

34:48

five star hotel into a crowd of fans. Suddenly,

34:51

he spotted his sixteen year old daughter, Cynthia

34:53

among those adoring fans. When

34:55

she got home, Tellartos slapped her and

34:57

forbade her from attending her Idol's concert that weekend.

35:00

In response, she shot herself in the head

35:03

with her father's revolver. When he found

35:05

her, he shot and killed himself. The

35:12

band was also accused of burning

35:14

the Argentinian flag. They held

35:16

a press conference to deny the claims, but critics

35:18

still protested their presence in the country. President

35:22

Carlos menhim, called them criminals and

35:24

threatened to cancel their performances. Before

35:27

any of the chaos and tragedy in the

35:30

group had undergone some staffing changes. Matt

35:33

Sorum had replaced drummer Stephen Adler,

35:35

who was fired from the group because of his hair

35:38

and addiction. G

35:40

and R had also replaced their manager Alan Niven

35:42

with a new manager, Doug Goldstein, and May

35:46

Slash has described him as a self motivated

35:48

climber who really only cared about making

35:50

a buck, and claimed that around the time of the

35:52

release of the Illusion Records, Guns and Roses

35:55

had become a quote whirling dervish

35:57

of miscommunication that spent money like it

35:59

was water. Furthermore, Rose's

36:01

bandmates felt very uncomfortable with his continued

36:04

insistence that they work ownership of the

36:06

band's name and their contracts. They

36:08

didn't like the idea of their quote unquote identity

36:10

becoming a quote unquote commodity, Slash

36:12

writes in his memoir of this tension mounting

36:15

after he offended Rose with a rolling stone

36:17

interview he gave. Rose apparently

36:19

reacted by ignoring Slash while they were

36:21

prepping this stage for a show During the Allusion tour

36:24

and then leaving a strait jacket. Slash It presented

36:26

him as a birthday gift on slashes Amp

36:29

before he left, But petty manager

36:31

and bandmaate Drama was the least of slashes problems.

36:35

In September, before

36:37

his show in Oakland Stadium, he got into

36:40

a big fight with his then fiance, model actress

36:42

Renee Sarran over their pre up agreement. As

36:45

he recalls in his memoir, I went to

36:47

the gig so angry that I was determined to

36:49

do what I do when I want to act out get

36:51

some smack. After

36:53

bumping into an old porn star friend of the show,

36:55

he gave her seven dollars to get him some heroin.

36:58

She rocked up at the room of his Sam Francisco hotel

37:00

at five the following morning with her boyfriend

37:02

and the goods. Slash had already

37:05

been drinking, but they proceed to consume

37:07

copious amounts of crack and smack. Later

37:10

that morning, his bandmate from Romatt Sorum

37:12

called and invited him to his room to do some blow. Slash

37:15

caught up and opened the door to had to swarm his room.

37:18

He didn't make it far, crumbling to the floor and

37:20

blacking out. When he came to, he

37:22

was told his heart had stopped for eight

37:24

minutes. I

37:26

woke up when the defibrillator sent an electric

37:29

shock through my chest and stunned my heart into

37:31

beating again, he writes. In his memoir, Slash

37:36

recalls wrapping Jars year long tour

37:38

soon after his brush with death, only to

37:40

discover that they had little money to show for

37:42

it because of Rose's pricey backstage theme

37:45

parties and the union fees they had racked

37:47

up for all those late performances. As

37:49

Slash tells it, Goldstein informed

37:51

Rose if he wanted to keep his mansion in Malibu,

37:54

they'd have to continue touring. In

37:57

October, just weeks

37:59

after slashes overdose, before the band

38:01

would embark on another year of tour dates they would

38:03

take them to Europe, Japan, Australia,

38:05

and that ill fated stop in Argentina. Slashed

38:08

Mary renaiss Iran at the Four Seasons

38:10

at Marina. Del Rey Duff mccagan

38:13

was his best man. We can be pretty

38:15

sure he had their rings on hand. When

38:17

Slash describes his wedding and his memoir, he

38:20

might as well be referring to the fictional one he attended

38:22

and his massively famous bands November Rain

38:24

video quote. We definitely

38:27

didn't do it small. It was

38:29

this really big production that I had very

38:31

little to do with. Of

38:34

course, there were other forces of play, forces

38:37

beyond the control of Slash and Axel

38:39

in the Gang Well

38:42

Guns and Roses were hard at work finishing

38:45

their dual user illusion albums, The Tides

38:47

returning the courser less,

38:49

flamboyant, more low five sounds of grunge

38:51

were creeping in from the Pacific Northwest. Bands

38:54

like Soundgarden, Pearl Jam, Allison,

38:57

Chains, and Nirvana were gaining

38:59

momentum. Nirvana's Smells

39:01

Like Teen Spirit would completely change the game

39:04

soon after its release in September that year,

39:06

radio big wigs would scramble to retool

39:08

their programming to accommodator shift and taste.

39:12

The video for Smells Like Teen Spirit, which

39:14

premiered on MTVS Alternative Rock Show A hundred

39:16

and twenty minutes later that month, would become

39:18

a staple on the network, changing MTV's

39:20

own rotation strategy and letting loose

39:22

a decade's worth of copycats. Remember

39:25

that nine countdown of MTV's

39:27

top five videos that placed November

39:30

Rain at number three. Well, Smells

39:32

Like Teen Spirit was number one. Guns

39:36

n' Roses stagy grandiloquent video for November

39:38

Rain stood in sharp contrast to Nirvana's

39:40

simple, five minute video for Smells Like Teen Spirit,

39:43

a murky anarchist affair depicting

39:45

up pep rally in a high school gymnasium that ends

39:47

with its listless students coming to life

39:50

and trashing the set. In the band's gear, no

39:52

opulent churches, fancy weddings, top

39:54

hats, or period costumes. Frontman

39:57

Kurt Cobain is seen hanging out with everyday

39:59

kids in a pair of jeans and a sweater layered

40:01

over a T shirt, his hair tangled

40:03

and greasy and mostly in his face, looking

40:06

like he'd been stirred away two minutes before

40:08

shooting began. The vibe

40:10

was visceral and raw, and it tapped

40:12

into a new generation's disillusionment

40:14

and apathy. It spoke to young

40:17

MTV viewers because it felt fresh, relatable,

40:20

sincere real, to

40:22

put it bluntly, more punk. By

40:29

September, after

40:31

Guns and Roses had piste away so much

40:33

money and Slash had nearly died, heavy

40:36

metal was already attending its own funeral. Robin

40:39

Petering, co hosted the Nothing Last Forever

40:41

podcast, points to the exact moment

40:45

when Nirvana played Lip

40:47

the m and broke the guitar like changed

40:50

everything and guns and roses

40:52

clothes with the dueling piano with

40:54

Elton John. People did not want

40:57

that, you know, It's just it was over, like

40:59

right then and there. Yeah. Next

41:06

week, we delve into the simmering tension

41:08

between Axel Rose and Kurt Cobain had

41:10

culminated with a nasty showdown at the Video

41:13

Music Awards, a night that, for many reasons,

41:16

has become legendary. We'll also

41:18

examine how grunge exploded, leaving

41:20

heavy metal for dead and changing the music

41:22

landscape, and why Axel ditched

41:24

women for Dolphins. Plus former

41:27

Navada manager Danny Goldberg joins us to share

41:29

his side of the story.

41:31

Yea

41:48

Ye,

42:07

Where Were You in ninety two was a production of

42:09

I Heart Radio. The executive

42:11

producers are Noel Brown and Jordan run

42:13

Talk. The show was researched, written

42:15

and hosted by me Jason Lafier,

42:18

with editing and sound design by Michael Alder

42:20

June. If you like what you heard,

42:22

please subscribe and leave us a review. For

42:25

more podcasts for my heart Radio, check

42:27

out the I heart Radio app, Apple podcast,

42:29

or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.