Estranged, which appeared on Appetite on Destruction, is Guns N’ Roses second-longest song overall. Like November Rain and Don’t Cry, the song’s lyrics were inspired by a short story that was written by Del James.
The music video was originally planned to be continuation of the story started in the videos for November Rain and Don’t Cry but that plan was abandoned when Axl Rose and Stephanie Seymour broke up before shooting on the video began. The storyline for the video was changed, though it still dealt with the same themes as the other two videos. This time, instead of ending with Axl thinking about Stephanie Seymour, the story ended with Axl swimming with the dolphins.
Today’s music video of the day is the latest video from the veteran rockers Gun N’ Roses.
This video is the first to have been filmed since the return of Slash to the band. Watching this video, it’s interesting to see the members of the Guns N’ Roses, all older and more weary but still as proficient at rocking out as they were in their youth.
Yesterdays appeared on Use Your Illusion II and the video mixes pictures that were taken during the Use Your Illusion tour with black and white footage of the band performing in a warehouse. Looking at the photographs, you can see both Izzy Stradlin and Steve Adler, who had left the band by the time the video was filmed.
Director Andy Morahan is one of those directors who worked with everyone in the 80s and 90s. As I have mentioned elsewhere on this site, he directed Highlander III but he didn’t write it so don’t hold that against him.
When this music video first came out, it was one of the most expensive music videos ever made. It was also one of the longest. Axl Rose plays a singer who marries a model (who is played by real-life model Stephanie Seymour, who was dating Axl at the time.) Their marriage ends tragically. This video is often described as being a sequel to Don’t Crybut I think that, even though they’re based on the same short story and are thematically connected, Rose and Seymour are playing different characters here than in the first previous video. Seymour and Rose split up after making this video, which meant that the concept for the third video in the projected trilogy, Estranged.
Slash’s signature guitar solo was filmed in New Mexico. The scenes inside the church were filmed in Los Angeles’s St. Brendan Catholic Church.
This is a video that I used to laugh at but, as I’ve gotten older, I’ve come to better appreciate its themes of loss and regret.
This is the video where Slash murders his girlfriend and then laughs about it.
Sure, there’s a lot of things that could be said about this video. It’s the first part of an unofficial trilogy of videos in which Axl Rose struggles to come to terms with the loss of his girlfriend (who, in the video, is played by Stephanie Seymour). Axl said that the scene with the gun was inspired by something that actually occurred between him and his ex-wife, Erin Everly. Everyone remembers the scene where the three Axls confront each other and also the epic girl fight at the piano bar. This video is also remembered for the sign reading, “Where’s Izzy?” Izzy Stradlin felt that the music videos were a waste of money and declined to show up on the day of filming. He would soon leave Guns N’ Roses.
But, in the end, this will always be the video where Slash drives over a cliff. As the guitar solo proves, Slash managed to get out of the car but apparently, his girlfriend wasn’t so lucky. It’s a weird scene but it’s also a fair portrayal as to how many people viewed Slash and Axl Rose within the context of Guns N’ Roses. Axl was the frontman who could sing everything but who also wore his vulnerability and instability on his sleeve for all the world to see. Slash was rock ‘n’ roll. Nothing got to him as long as he could keep on playing.
The older I get, the more I appreciate Guns N’ Roses. Say what you will about the self-indulgent nature of some of their albums and videos, Axl can sing and Slash can sure as Hell play.
This was one of the few Guns N’ Roses’s videos to not get heavy play on MTV, perhaps because all of the members of the band appear to be either depressed or under the influence. Black-and-white shots of the sleaziest parts of New York are mixed with color footage of strippers. The video makes 1993 New York look so dangerous that it could almost be a Rudy Guiliani campaign commercial.
(Of course, we all know that it wasn’t New Yorkers fear of crime that elected Guiliani. It was their anger over Yogurt that falsely claimed to be low fat.)
Alice Cooper and the late Shannon Hoon can be heard providing background vocals on this song.
In this video, Arnold Schwarzenegger is sent to the past to eliminate Guns N’ Roses but ultimately decides that it would be a waste of ammo. Obviously, he knew that fulfilling his mission would change history and the world would never get to hear Chinese Democracy.
This song (and this video) were used to promote Terminator 2: Judgement Day.
Supposedly, this is a video that MTV initially rejected, feeling that it would be too intense and sordid to appeal to its audience. In the end, the only reason MTV relented was due to the intervention of David Geffen, who convinced the channel to play the song once at five in the morning. No sooner had the video aired than the station started to get calls from viewers who wanted to see it again. Just as the song would become one of Guns N’ Roses’s signature songs, the video became one of MTV’s signature videos.
This is yet another video that was directed by Nigel Dick. The video follows a young Axl Rose, as he gets off the bus in Los Angeles and finds himself in the jungle. Interestingly, the members of the band appear as an assortment of drug dealers and other lowlifes, all of whom are trying to corrupt Axl. It’s been said that the video actually follows the real life dynamic of the group as Axl, despite his reputation, stayed away from the heavy drug use that the rest of the band happily indulged in,
The video has been called a combination of Midnight Cowboy, The Man Who Fell To Earth, and A Clockwork Orange. That sounds right to me.
When I wrote about the video for Live and Let Die, I mentioned that Guns N’ Roses were responsible for two of the best covers of the 90s. This is the other one. Axl Rose and the entire band proved that they were just as capable of covering Bob Dylan as they were Paul McCartney and Wings. Just as with Live and Let Die, Guns N’ Roses respected the original while also creating their own unique version.
There are actually two videos out there for GnR’s version of Knockin’ On Heaven’s Door. This one was filmed at the Freddy Mercury Tribute Concert in 1992.
I have to give credit for Guns N’ Roses. No matter what else may be said about the band, they were responsible for two of the best covers of the 90s, Knockin’ On Heaven’s Door and Live and Let Die. Both of these covers treat the original version with respect while also sounding very much like the type of music that Guns N’ Roses was known for.
The video for Live and Let Die features footage of the band in concert, mixed in with pictures of them in their younger days. This was also the last Guns ‘N Roses video to feature Izzy Stradlin as being a part of the band. This video was put together by Josh Richman, an actor who was also a friend of the band.
Through the Shattered Lens 