We review “Guns N’ Roses” 20+ years after their infamous Montreal riot show

Guns N’ Roses
Metropolis
July 14, 2013

The last time I saw Guns N`Roses I was an excited 13 year-old at 1992’s ill-fated Montreal stadium gig with Metallica, which saw Metallica front-man James Hetfield accidentally alight himself during a pyro miss-hap, sending him to the emergency ward and cutting their set in half. An unbearable 2  ½ hours later, Rose et al. took the stage for an abbreviated set which was also cut short when Rose stormed off-stage, allegedly due to some issue with the monitors. This being Montreal, a full-scale riot ensued, with fans lighting fires throughout the stadium, and flipping over police cruisers outside of the venue. All told, $400,000 of damage was caused by the tens of thousands of disappointed metalheads, and the then-mayor vowed that Guns N`Roses would never play Montreal again.

Of course, rock star careers generally outlast those of politicians, so the band did indeed return to Montreal in 2010, promoting their bloated, decade-in-the-making Chinese Democracy album. While I held off that time, I couldn’t resist the opportunity to catch the band in the relatively tiny-confines of the 2,000-capacity Metropolis last night.

Perhaps age has mellowed the once-volatile Rose. While no longer the bandana-clad shirtless behemoth from the band’s prime, he has at least shed the unfortunate cornrows from a few years back (not to mention the excess weight that launched untold “Fat Axl” memes). The band even managed to hit the stage only 3 minutes late, a far cry from the days when they would habitually go on anywhere from 1-3 hours behind schedule.

From the get go, it was obvious that Rose was enjoying himself. This was a smiling, joke-cracking incarnation of his former tempestuous self, and it generally served to uplift the tone of the show, which was way better than expected, despite a few glaring pacing issues.

Even with the smaller venue, the band held nothing back production-wise. They were surrounded by enormous arena-size screens on all sides, and brought along a light show that seemed to consist solely of giant search-lights that constantly bombarded the crowd.

Their 170 minute (!) set started off strong, with “Welcome to the Jungle“, “It’s So Easy” & “Mr. Brownstone” all being pulled out as part of their initial salvo. However, Axl’s constant passing of the spotlight to various members of the band for needless solos or even covers of their pre-GNR material served to only flummox the crowd, and led to long awkward stretches of near-silence. It’s doubtful anyone paying $150 to see this line-up of Guns N’ Roses in 2013 is interested in hearing braided-goatee guitar player Ron “Bumblefoot” Thal perform a solo track from his unknown oeuvre in the midst of a nearly 3-hour GNR set.

All in all, nearly a third of the set consisted of some type of cover, from well-known GNR staples including Bob Dylan’s “Knockin’ on Heaven’s Door”, to an unexpected cover of Neil Young’s “Don’t Let it Bring You Down“. Truth be told, Axl seemed to be having the most fun during these covers, leaning off the monitors with a full-on smirk for most of their cover of The Who’s “The Seeker“.

What originals they played were evenly split up between tracks from 1987’s landmark Appetite for Destruction, and 1991’s twin Use Your Illusion albums. The band essentially concentrated only on singles, leading the set a bit of a Vegas “Greatest Hits” vibe, which could have been remedied with a few more deep-cuts from their stacked catalog. After all, the whole purpose of an act like GNR playing a small-club show at this point should be to reward their long-time fans with a set geared at the true diehards, not the baby boomers waiting around impatiently for “November Rain”.

After the inevitable “Paradise City” closed things out at nearly 1am, a friend remarked that we had just seen “the best cover band in the world”, which sums up this iteration of Guns N’ Roses pretty well. Once you get past that fact that you won’t be witnessing a shirtless Slash shimmy up alongside Axl in his top-hat anytime soon, this is really as good as it gets. It was almost enough for my 13 year-old self to let Axl off the hook. Almost.