AXL ROSE’S TRAGIC REAL-LIFE STORY
One of the aspects of Guns N’ Roses’ music that fans love most is its sheer ferocity. Who can hear “Welcome to the Jungle,” “You Could Be Mine,” “Garden of Eden,” “Mr. Brownstone,” or a couple dozen other tunes without recognizing that snarl, that explosiveness, that feral energy? Yes, the band’s instrumental nexus, built around Slash’s guitar and Duff McKagan’s bass, provides the music that illuminates the danger expressed in singer Axl Rose’s lyrics, but Rose’s delivery makes you believe every word he sings. And considering Rose’s rocky journey through life, that just might be the truth.
Rose’s volatile personality feeds his songs and persona on stage and in the studio; it’s when he’s expressed that volatility in the “real world” that he has done real damage, the kind that causes injury, ends relationships, and summons the authorities to level legal consequences against him. And while he has led Guns N’ Roses on a successful, years-long reunion tour virtually without incident, the decades-long trail he left in his wake can still make one wonder why he did what he did. Let’s take a look at what events in Rose’s past made his appetite for destruction such a real and dangerous thing.
The following article includes allegations and descriptions of addiction, domestic abuse, child abuse, and sexual assault.
Though Axl Rose certainly got into his share of trouble as a kid, he was not lacking in intellect, but his zero tolerance policy towards authority became problematic. “On the placement tests in school, I was always in the top 3 percent,” he told Rolling Stone. However, he dropped out twice, once in the eleventh grade and again after returning as a senior. Apparently, Rose wasn’t particularly interested by the curriculum, so he took a permanent hall pass to pursue topics of greater interest — or what he deemed “Axl’s school of subjects that I wanted to learn about” — which one day led to the authorship of the immortal couplet, “Found a head and an arm in the garbage can / Don’t know why I’m here.”
Nonetheless, Rose was motivated to pursue an interest in music, though due to his stepfather’s religious beliefs, he had to do so clandestinely. While most kids his age could crank their stereos or destroy their hearing with headphones, Rose had to get creative. “I remember once my friend Dave called me and played Supertramp over the phone,” he told the Los Angeles Times, “I just acted like I was talking to him so no one would know.”