For those who weren’t quite convinced by Appetite for Destruction but wondered if there was something special about Guns n’ Roses, the band did everything they could to prove people wrong in subsequent releases. Use Your Illusion I, particularly, is a horrific encounter with what might be music. Right Next Door to Hell sets the scene. You are, indeed, sat adjacent to the seven circles when listening to this passionless, hard rock. A third album from Guns n’ Roses, but the group had used up all two of their tricks on the tightly wound but messy debut. Use Your Illusion I is fascinating for all the wrong reasons. Axl Rose may be ridiculed for his voice now, but it was, for a time, an iconic part of rock and roll. It’s sewn into the fabric of its history, no matter how hard we may yank at it in hopeless attempts to remove it. Use Your Illusion I does well to pick it out of that spot in history.
An all-over-the-place album with more interest in dressing up Rose and Slash as rock and roll legends than actually putting the effort into music that would cement them as such. Still, those who write Welcome to the Jungle and cover Knockin’ on Heaven’s Door are set for life. Use Your Illusion I is waterboarding for the ears, though the torturer has no intent on extracting information. Seventy-five minutes of sluggish rock and roll. Hollow noodling from Slash, barebones commentaries from Rose. The latter is desirable, the less you can understand from Rose, the better. It’s not as though he’s one of the great rock and roll thinkers, not if we judge him off the back of Appetite for Destruction. Dust n’ Bones is a fantastic example of where everything goes wrong for Guns n’ Roses. They’re trying and failing to be a swaggering rock and roll band where coolness oozes from their songs. To do that, you need not be good at your job as a musician, just confident.
None of these songs sound as though the band are confident in them being hits to better their previous works. Live and Let Die leaves the album stone dead. Rigid. Impressive, considering it’s the third song. Abysmal guitar work, as though Slash is being kicked in the mouth every time he places his hands on the instrument. Rose sounds like Jack Black if he were bunged up with flu at the best of times on this gutless, malignant album. Moments of hope appear on Don’t Cry, though they’re too short, too standard, to have much of an impact. A sluggish listen is what Use Your Illusion I becomes. Weightless instrumentals, shameless rips of artists whose work has unfortunately inspired Guns n’ Roses to create, and meaningless lyrical offerings.
Use Your Illusion I is so consistently bad you may find yourself turning back to whatever belief system you abandoned. A lapse in your faith all those years ago is repaired by just how horrendously plodding the likes of November Rain can be. Ask for an embrace from the deity you abandoned. There is nothing but rot and sin and wasted time in Use Your Illusion I. We are often told to reserve snobbery, to accept all those from any genre. Not Guns n’ Roses. People will rightly think less of those who actively listen to this vapid, rock and roll slop. If you were hoping the instrumental strength of Guns n’ Roses’ debut would remain, but that their lyrical choices would improve, you’ll be sorely disappointed. Use Your Illusion I is never underwhelming, though; it’s an actively obnoxious, regressive piece of work.
